Are we being unreasonable?

[GreerGarrisonWinbury]

DP has DC EOW and half the school holidays.
4 years ago DP’s ex moved 40 miles away to be near her family and the DC go to school there.
DP’s ex has just given birth and she wants us to take the DC so she can recover.
It isn’t our fault she decided to have another baby.
Earliest drop off at school is 8am and latest pick up is 5pm.
If I do the drop off it is 120 mile round trip for me from home to school and then to work.
Is it unreasonable for us to say no, this does not work for us during term time, with our working hours and leave has already been booked for half the school holidays.
We have said are happy to collect the DCs every Friday for the weekend and return them to school on the Monday morning but during the week just doesn’t work.
DP is stressed because he wants to see DC as much as he can but logistically it doesn’t work and ex keeps calling.

I can’t believe the way people always turn to hate on the step mum and dad bio dad. There was a thread on here not so long ago, new wife baby is ill in hospital, dad fucks up and returns child to mum instead of having him (his contact time) mum pissed off rightly so then demands time is made up by the SM. Posters saying well sorry your baby was ill but not the mums problem.

in response to her daily messages I would send one final message reiterating that you are unable to have the kids for a week to allow her time as it will interfere with your work commitments and if you don’t work she won’t get paid next month. Furthermore you are still happy to have the kids every weekend for a month.

thinking further ahead, take her to court, fight for custody and the kids the full time. You’ve said that’s what you hope for and if it’s in the best interests of the kids, do it!

Funny how nobody says that about posters’ responses when the stepmum wants time to recover and it’s “Not the mum’s problem if stepmum has just given birth. Not mum’s days to have the kids so nope not having them, etc.” Really, really funny that.

I’m a bit too old to have babies now. But could you imagine if we said to her that we didn’t want the DC for the weekend or the holidays because I needed to recover? I wouldn’t expect that anyway.
DP is completely torn, he wants to see his DC. He’s really stressed with all of this, because of her constant asking and he’s trying to make a living as well.
We would have to leave the house at 7:15 as it’s mainly motorway. Luckily the work DP is doing at the moment isn’t too far away, he could go when I leave with the DC and then he would have to leave around 4 to pick DC up and could be home around 6 as it’s opposite to the commuting traffic. I wouldn’t get to work until 9:15 so would have to work until 6:15 and then I have the commute back which can take over an hour as I use park and ride normally. If I don’t use park and ride I have extra parking costs at my work.

Imagine if op said "I've just had a prem baby, we're in hospital. DH asked ex if we could not have the kids this weekend as it's too much. She's insisting we have to have them, even though DH has sent her a NICU photo every day. I just want time to rest!". She's be ripped apart on here!

It'd be more reasonable if she hadn't chosen to move her DC so far away from their father.

Up to you. I don't think you should be included in the school run though either DH can do it or he can't. Stepmums get absolutely destroyed on here when they suggest the stepchildren stay with mum when she's just given birth. So this is weird.

Yup that's exactly it.

Not at all- I’m just saddened to see yet another mother (and step mum), slagging off another mother because she wants the child’s father to look after his kids for an entire week.

This is despite the fact he does 4 days a month of childcare. He gets off very lightly…the ex has asked for 1 week because her youngest is in ICU. ( guessing the father might also want to be at ICU whenever possible).
This is a one off.

im just as surprised at the SM saying she shouldn’t be doing this. I agree. It’s not up to her to look after these kids- her DP’s responsibility! Not hers either!

I think if step mums reframed it slightly, it might help. She seems to be saying that she is being inconvenienced by this ( in this respect OP is NBU - she should not be dealing with it, but her DP should be stepping up in some way)

OPs updates suggest the exW has form for being a CF - this may be true, but we don’t know. So if the OP wants to sense check this, it better she hears how it might seem from the other side of this argument.

Ive said this up thread- the ExW moved for greater support. Is it any wonder if Dad is doing 4 days a month childcare? Any father worth his salt should be 50/50 imo. ( and actually parenting that time - not fobbing off kids to his partner or family)

Her partner, the father of the new baby, should be supporting her and the children who live in her home.

Just say no. YOu can't do it.

Does she realise that people who aren’t split up from their current children’s father don’t just offload their other kids for a week after having another child? 🤣🤣

So they live across the road from the school but she wants them to travel 80 miles per day instead of asking her live-in partner or local mother to help? Or other family or friends or school mums?

Your DP needs to toughen up. She chose to move 40 miles away and should have considered what this would mean.

How far away is the baby?

Is it too unrealistic for her to take the kids to school, see baby, collect & go again in the evening when her partner is home?

How many weeks was the baby & how long have they been in hospital?

Can you offer her some money to hire a mother's help or maybe a cleaner? As a gesture of good will of course

I’m not even sure that she moved for greater support.
We live in a fairly affluent commuter town. Ex didn’t like it. Said it was too snobby and wanted to move back to her home city. She was working in that city but quit her job when she split with my DP.
DP asked her to stay in the area, offered to help with the rent so the DC could continue to go to nursery and school here and they could do 50/50 like most of his friends do, but that would have meant no maintenance.
Yes she has been a CF in the past. Plans cancelled last minute because she wanted DP to take the children and he went and got them. When she got her council flat he built all her furniture for her. She would call him when she locked her keys inside her flat or if something was wrong in the flat wanting him to fix it.
We decided early on that I wouldn’t meet the children until we were sure about us. That was 2.5 years. He had known my now adult DC for some time.
Yes, it’s horrible that her baby was born 3 weeks early and they want to keep LO in hospital until due date.
If I could take leave I would. I would love to have the DC here but there is still the 80 miles to go to school and back twice.

Baby was 3wks early?

I didn't think that that was even counted as prem!

Hope it's not too serious.

We don’t talk about the children’s mother in front of them. I have tried with her but her and her new partner will not even say hello to me. She called every night we were on holiday together and told me to fuck off when I was talking in the background with my DP. When they were on holiday with the DC and my DP called they did not answer. He has since got the eldest her own phone.

Could you compromise on Friday night to Monday morning and one night in between? Just for a couple of weeks?
Expecting more than that is unreasonable given the distance

It stopped about 14 months ago when she met her current partner. This was in the first 3 years since they split. So overlapped with us getting together.

Instead of asking the same question repeatedly how about you read the answer OP has already given. FFS.

It is a pity that their mother doesn’t seem to put her children first. Why is it down to the stepmother to disrupt her work to help a woman who has a partner and her family nearby? You are being unreasonable.