AIBU to be LIVID at my DSS mother

[Gooodmorningusa]

A long post. im livid and upset and I can’t sleep. I think I know how this is going to go but oh my god I need to vent.

my DSS mum, I feel is taking the absolute piss and I think she’s an audacious cow.

the back story is, we have DSS (8) EOW, I have been in his life since he was 2.5 and me and DH share a 2 year old boy. I work in a school office so I am fortunate enough to have most of the school holidays off (literally 12 weeks out of the 13!) so in the school holidays I step up and have DSS extra. So on the weekend he comes EOW, he comes on Friday morning, and we keep him till Tuesday evening and he goes home before bed time. I have always done this since he started in reception class and I do this for two reasons, so he has more time with us and also to help out his mum who is single and has to cut her hours during the school hols. In term time it returns to the normal EOW.

last week my 2yo DS was poorly with chicken pox and it floored him, early hours of Saturday morning he had a fever, had a funny turn, his eyes rolled into the back of his head and we couldn’t bring him round. It was horrible and he was rushed in an ambulance with me and DH stayed at home till MIL arrived to sit in the house with DSS as he was sleeping upstairs. DH came to hospital soon as he could. I was hysterical and have never seen my son so poorly and it frightened me, i thought he was gone when his eyes rolled into the back of his head. Anyways he was kept in hospital till Sunday night, we got home at 8pm. DH stayed with us most of the time while we waited for tests and DSS stayed with MIL (his grandma) then went back to his mums on Sunday evening. Just to add his cousins were there at grandmas too so not like he was the only child there.

anyways DH ex has booted off basically. Ringing up calling DH a selfish dad for staying at hospital all weekend and shipping DSS off to grandmas 🤯 so anyways DSS has come back this weekend as he was upset his missed his weekend last week. So I get a text earlier today off his mother ‘it makes sense for you to keep him till Tuesday as you needed to give it a miss this week’ ….. 😵‍💫so I reply saying no actually that wasnt the agreement, i have plans including an appointment of my own, wedding dress shopping with my SIL on Monday and I am going into work on Tuesday to do my admin. My mum will be looking after DS for these.
she then proceeds to call me selfish and tells me how I’m ‘palming my own son off’ and that ‘she knows I secretly hate her DS’ plus loads of other shit which I don’t think I deserve. In her opinion I should be making up for
the time I missed earlier this week. I reminded her my DS was very poorly and I also reminded her DH was in work on those two days so it’s always me who facilitates the extra contact.
my DH is fuming and has confronted her and she has repeated the same shit to him.
shes basically annoyed that she had To cancel her plans / work on Monday and Tuesday. But my DS was poorly and I didn’t sleep a wink all weekend with checking on him and being on a hospital ward. I admit that on Monday and Tuesday this week I didn’t think about DSS at all, I was shattered and I just let me DS sleep in my arms all day.

Would I be wrong if I told her to suck my big toe from now on?

The vast majority 😂you and one other poster. Bless.

How judgemental to make sweeping statements like this about the supposed 'first wives club'

Oh, the irony ...

I would think twice about completely cutting contact with the Ex/grey rocking/blocking all that satisfying stuff. I would definitely not respond to the horribly rude texts. Let your OH handle it and express disgust at her comments in a very clear manner as they deserve. However…as good as it might feel in the moment to say “I’ll nevereverever help her again, one bit!” you might consider that YOU may need a favor from her at some point. This lady is not going to vanish because you want her to. She will be in your life for a very long time. You don’t necessarily have to escalate the hate or destroy communications entirely in order to protect yourself or your son. (And as collateral damage, too, DSS would now have two loved female adults only communicating by semaphore or carrier pigeon or what not, making every handover and shared theoretically joyous life event feel like a hostile summit between two warring nations…not fun, and likely not great for your own DS as he gets older, either).

It was wrong of your OH to “not think about DSS at all”. Someone needed to. This isn’t “prioritizing the golden stepchild”, it’s just basic responsible parenting. He should have not left the Ex the lurch with her work at the last minute, either. As awful as her behavior was, and not excusable, she had a right to be angry at the situation. It must be stressful in unique ways to be a single parent with no second adult at home for emergencies, regardless of how her financial or friendship network situation appear to be.

My husband and I both work full time in long term careers that contribute significantly to the household income, and I am stunned sometimes by the way he just presumes he’s going to go into work as usual, when our kid needs something. He’s a lovely person and great dad in so many ways - but this had to be pointed out to him over and over until he “got it”. I had to ask directly many times until he started offering or checking what the options were. It’s one of his parenting blind spots - or was. Everyone has them and everyone needs them pointed out so they can (hopefully) be corrected. I hope your your OH listens and fixes his blind spot.

The supposed first wives club?

New to MN??

A typical comment from the second wives club ( or should that be the ‘should know better club’ ?)

you make a good point though - ‘ your DH could have done more’

No I'm not new, Imo the first wives club is nothing more than a derogatory term used usually by certain people on here who place all the blame for anything stepchild related on the 'crazy, unreasonable, batshit' ex's.
These people fail to look at themselves or their partners for any wrong doing, it's ALWAYS the ex's fault.

And if anyone dares to side, even in the slightest, with the ex, out come the ridiculous accusations of being a first wife.

Read the thread again slowly.

The vast majority of posters have said that the DH is the one to blame.

It's all in black and white. Myself and several others have pointed this out to you.

Laughing emojis are the resort of someone who has lost the argument and they know it. But I suspect there is more to this.

You clearly have issues to be so invested in a random strangers situation as to make stuff up and to be so entrenched regardless of the facts. I have no wish to trigger you or cause you distress and I'm starting to feel uncomfortable that I may be so will happily leave it there.

A typical comment from the second wives club ( or should that be the ‘should know better club’ ?)

Married once for nearly 50 years, so happy with my first choice. Just hate to see how step mothers get jumped on here.

Have those defending the mother read what she said about OP's toddler? Can you defend that?

Deeply unpleasant and designed to be hurtful - and as for lifting a photo of her son - what sort of creature does that?

CMS is the LEGAL MINIMUM adjusted by nights spent with the absent parent. I'm sick of men, and it is always men, thinking they are good fathers because they pay the minimum. To even suggest that they should pay less because they have sweet talked/conned another woman to provide extra care is batshit.

To be sure some men earn less and so CMS is less, some are unemployed or insecurely employed are pay less, some are self employed and hide money but some are well paid and pay the minimum. They self employed and hiding money and the well paid are the worse. Because they are not good fathers. They could see their DC more or pay more than the legal minimum for their upkeep but they make an active choice not to. Either because of lack of parental responsibility or childish desire to punish the mother.

No one has defended the mum regarding the photo of OP"s son.
People are only stating that the child's father is in the wrong, so best to pipe down with your comments re step mothers getting jumped on.

Just hate to see how step mothers get jumped on here.

Well luckily that hasn't happened here then isn't it. Point to one post that has 'jumped' on the OP as a step-mother.

Saying that you can understand why the ex is angry (whilst saying she hasn't behaved reasonably) is NOT jumping on the step-mother. Blaming the DH is NOT jumping on the step-mother. Surely that is basic logic.

I'm in a blended family so no axe to grind.

Many posters, including myself, are not justifying everything the ex has done and sympathise with the OP.

That does not mean however that we don't recognise the utterly shit parenting by the DH.

Wow...

It was DH's weekend to have him until Tuesday, the fact that OP looks after him during the day while DH goes to work is neither here nor there, his son is his responsibility while in his care.. if the OP can't look after him during the day, then it's up to DH to sort something out (grandparents, take time off work himself etc) not just dump him back with the ex unexpectedly like it's not his problem to resolve.. he should have at least asked the ex if it was possible for her to take him back, not just make it her problem, terrible parenting from him.

Good grief.

Once again, please post where I've made stuff up. You've already failed to do this. I have never mentioned the DH, you're talking about a different perspective that I haven't even gave an opinion on. Please keep up if you're going to keep having issues with my posts.

They are defending it. Some posters are all over me for saying the same thing.

Are you this much hard work in RL?

Cos its the first wife doing it. If it was the step mum who did it every post would be vilifying her. Oh ive only got to page for as i post this but im assuming (got to have faith sometimes right?) that i will see an apology to the @Gooodmorningusa from the poster who accused her of being the OW because they saw what they wanted to see (eg that the elder child was two and a half when they are eight.

No it wasn't.

So I get a text earlier today off his mother ‘it makes sense for you to keep him till Tuesday as you needed to give it a miss this week’ ….. 😵‍💫so I reply saying no actually that wasnt the agreement, i have plans

The irony. Do you chastise everyone in RL who doesn't agree with you?

I agree @JenniferBooth that someone asking the OP if she’s the other woman was/is out of order. But people do genuinely misread or misremember or mix up ages and dates. Happens on here all the time. IIRC the poster did comment on how they don’t know how they could have missed that.

@5iveleafclover

You’re misunderstanding. Everyone is talking about how last week, it was the husband’s responsibility to have him. It was agreed that the child would be at dad’s house until home time on Tuesday. Then, because OP was tired and couldn’t look after him, the husband sent him back to mum rather than take the time off work. So mum had to take the time off work.
That’s what everyone is saying is wrong. It was his days, and he pushed the problem into mum by sending the child home because he wouldn’t take time off work. So mum got stuck with it when she already has to lose shifts during the holidays because dad won’t do his share.

We’re not talking about this week, when mum has asked them to take him extra at short notice to make up for it. You’ve quoted the OP regarding tomorrow and Tuesday which are jit their days. We are talking about last week, it was their days and they sent the child back.

Block the ex - you shouldn’t need any direct contact with her and her messages to you sound vile.

Recommend to your DH that he sits down with her and reviews the contact schedule to ensure he has half of all holidays (and any other adjustments). Then he needs to plan for that time.

Exactly! I’m a second wife and a stepmum and if my DH had parented like the DH in this scenario we wouldn’t be together because my bar for a husband and a father is higher than the bare minimum. That’s not jumping on the OP it’s a fact.

Im child free by choice but it sounds like i really missed a trick here Be the first wife and have a kid because then you can get away with any sort of behaviour

message from her conveniently has allowed you to do that

Unfuckingbelievable

The first wife sounds horrid - I wouldn’t want to have to deal with her and she has behaved badly.

the husband sounds useless - I wouldn’t want to be married to him or have a child with him.

it’s a pity they didn’t stay together and contain the shit show!