My children aren’t happy - where do we stand

[MummyNeedsVino]

Hi,
This is my first post and I really need some advice. Just a bit of back story. I’ve been with my husband for 10 years. We have two children together and we both have one child each from previous relationships. His ex wife made his life hell after having an affair and moving away with their son when he was 6 months old. My husband did everything to maintain contact and she eventually breached a court order (twice) and stopped him seeing his son for almost 4 years.
During that time, our children also didn’t see their half brother - there was no contact whatsoever.
Recently contact has started again with no transitional period for anyone but it is very strained. The children me and my husband have together have said that they don’t want their half brother to come here - he’s been rather unkind to them during contact weekends. His behaviour at home hasn’t been good either.
We had what I thought was an adult discussion about having to change how contact goes because the children aren’t happy. We all agreed on a plan. But now his ex wife is back to her usual demanding self and forcing the issue with their son coming to stay here even though our children really aren’t happy. She is an absolute nightmare to deal with - narcissistic and a bully!!
What I want to know, is whether the feelings of the children that live with us were will be taken into account if we end up having to go back to court?! She seems to think they don’t matter and it’s all about her son and what he wants.
Thank you in advance. My mood is being effected massively by the stress of this whole situation.

What, and split up another family unit???

You need to build up contact gradually if there has been a long gap. Your DH needs to take responsibility for parenting - he needs to be there the whole time when his son comes to stay and he needs to clamp down on any inappropriate behaviour.

And actually, while this boy has been through a lot, if his bad behaviour extends to violence or inappropriate behaviour towards younger siblings then that has to be taken seriously and might mean that he can’t come to stay until he sorts his behaviour out. Your younger siblings also have a right to safety. I would say the same if it was a full sibling - I’d support them moving out to relatives or even foster care if they were actively harming a younger sibling. But if it’s just that they don’t like him or teasing, then they have to lump it.

My stepson has had times of being very difficult. He is part of our family though so we worked through it. I think part of thr issue when he was younger was that he was an only child at his mums house and part of a big family at ours. What worked at ours was that he came and stayed with the whole family but during contact the priority was time with his dad. So we would all eat together but they might go off on a day out. There was times when it was tough but now he is 17 it seems to have really calmed down and we all enjoy each others company. In your case I think the priority needs to be mending the relationship with his dad before he can just slot into family life. He’s your husbands son ans you need to prioritise this

OP, you say there wasn’t a gradual reintroduction- but that is something you could have done. You could have eg gone to stay with family with your kids after spending a few hours with him and left your DH with his son, say.

Your DH either does not know how to parent his own son, or CBA to learn because it looks too difficult. Easier to blame the mother. Does he want to be the stereotypical head in the sand useless father who ruins his eldest child's sense of self? Or is he better than that? Because if your stepson continues to be exposed to two-tier parenting he's going to be a very messed up teenager and your lives will get harder not easier.

Their relationship needs fixing before teenage years. Only your DH can do this. You can encourage him. They need to find a shared interest, hobby, activity, anything that's 1 on 1/validating of the child and it needs to be consistent and followed through until some level of trust is restored. Give him his own space at your house, make him feel welcome and wanted. Then and only then you can start setting rules and boundaries about behaviour.

@Walkthelakes so refreshing to read this. This is how it should be done.

It takes patience, incredible maturity, commitment and engagement from all the adults. I'm not saying I'd do it easily but it doesn't take a genius to understand what is needed.

Kids instinctively know they're at risk of being returned like a naughty dog from Dogs Trust if they are too ' naughty ' at their other ' family' home. They'll often act accordingly.

Sounds like you guys did it right.

The trouble with alot of PPs advice is that after 4 years of estrangement this isn't a family, the DH has zero foundation from which to parent/discipline/wield any sort of authority over his son, and to the younger children this isn't a primarily a sibling - he's a stranger who has parachuted into their world and is lashing out at them.
They should no more be expected to understand the struggles of the older child than the older child should be expected to understand and forgive what he's been put through. They are all very young children who have been placed in a dreadful situation through no fault of their own.

The relationship between father and son needs some real work done to rebuild it. That comes first. Expecting to just drop the child back in as if he had been there all along was madness. The relationship with siblings and as a family unit should be in the back burner for now.
Trust needs to be rebuilt and dragging another few innocent kids into the mix is not wise.

Op is not wanting her husbands first child in the home and to see less of him. And in the 4 years they went on to have 2 children…an example of a father failing to be a parent and a step mother creating a family as if the first child doesn’t exist. The ex wife/parent has nothing to do with this, the child has had a difficult up bringing and been hurt due to this blended mess of a family. Of course there will be challenging behaviours from the child.

The OP states that their shared children did not see their siblings for the whole 4 years, not that they were born during it.
The mother/ex has everything to with this.
It seems to me if she had a) kept her knickers on when in the presence of other men b) not moved her child away from his father or c) complied with the court orders the child's father spent so much time and money obtaining then this thread wouldn't exist.
There is no blended mess of a family. There's a unblended mess. Thanks to one persons utterly despicable behaviour towards her own child. And now other innocent kids are to be fodder in this whole sorry affair instead of approaching reintegration into the family with a bit of sensitivity and common sense?
Well isn't she a peach.

@DearestGentleReader they want to cut the time with the child, for him not to be in the home - so I stand by what I said, yes, a blended mess - little consideration appears to have gone in to the husbands first child and how this child feels about everything. And with the suggestions in this post, it does not appear this child has a loving step mother who will treat the children all the same.

I do not doubt there are happily blended families out there, but would think this is rarely the situation.

@Whereisthelove2
It's not blended. The child is a stranger to his own family thanks to his mother's actions. Obviously OP isn't going to treat them all the same. They aren't all the same. Nobody is going to take her children away from her for 4 years for starters. She's not been given a chance to be a step mother, never mind a loving one.
She didn't even outright say she wants to cut time, she said she doesn't want him in the home for now, and that they wanted to work out a better plan to manage a transition. Which is a perfectly sensible approach, unlike Mother of the Century's manipulative and destructive decisions.

I feel like @DearestGentleReader is a name change for the original poster to pretend that someone agrees

@arethereanyleftatall well you'd feel wrong then.
I just find it preposterous that anyone could defend the mother and make out that OP is the villain in all this.

The site and the app don't allow you to post under more than one name per thread anymore.

@DearestGentleReader to want her husband first child out of the home is atrocious, and to do that to a child who is clearly struggling. Would that be the approach for her own biological children if they played up? - No, of course it wouldn’t be.

And to add the husband should stand up to his wife on behalf of his own child. I am certain to have a method of wanting the child out of the home, that this child has never been accepted by OP or treated with care. Any mother’s nightmare for their children to have a step mother like this.

@Whereisthelove2
I actually know a man who was in a very similar situation. His oldest biological child suddenly reappeared in his life and it all started up again with the ex. They wanted to meet younger half siblings and be straight back into the family home. He wanted to rebuild their relationship as father and daughter first and foremost. Very sensible when there has been a lot of hurt and alot of time passed. There is no "of course" when you have more than one DC to consider.

I think reintegration should have been managed slowly and carefully, given the long estrangement between father and son, you think it was fine to dump the child straight back in with the whole family to sink or swim and to hell with the younger kids being upset.

We are obviously very different people.

As someone said earlier in the thread - this is MN, so the only children who get any consideration are the stepchildren, and we’re supposed to forget the OP’s children have the right to safety and a settled home life. Just because the step child in this story has had a difficult time, it doesn’t become ok to make two other children miserable

Ironically @Thursdaygirl, this whole situation was caused by the op not thinking about her step child AT ALL.

If she had and her husband had had an ounce of empathy between them, they would have worked out that it would have been horrible for the dsc on walking in to their home and seen by her kids playing happy families with his dad, which he doesn't get.

They would have taken sone steps to mitigate it, such as her leaving for a few hours somewhere with her kids, to give him a chance to settle in.

They didn't bother to do that BECAUSE the op doesn't give a shit about him or thinking about her needs.

And yes, as a cohort of caring mums, mumsnet do tend to consider the feelings of a step child when the step mother hasn't at all.

@DearestGentleReader there wouldn’t be a problem with the step children had the adults in the situation done right by the first child. Sorry I’m not buying that the breakdown of the father/son relationship was caused by the child’s biological mother…more than likely the father built a life elsewhere with op, had children and is expecting everybody to play happy families - having give no time for the child to adjust to their new normal. There isn’t problems between the half siblings for no reason…and OP doesn’t come across to in the post to have an ounce of care towards the eldest child. I agree with @arethereanyleftatall, too often inconsiderate step mums who truly do not have any love and care for the child from the husband’s previous relationship. It’s not fair on any child to live like that, and her attitude will be picked up on by her own children.

Why can’t it be that both the stepchild and OP’s kids are equally important? The stepchild has had a worse time of it, but he is also the sibling of OP’s kids and they will be better off for having a relationship with their half brother…so just kicking the stepchild out doesn’t benefit them, it’s a stupid solution. OP doesn’t seem to be thinking about ANY of the kids tbh.

I believe OP has posted once only

So Mum breached a court order and Dad did nothing about it - after going to great lengths to get one in the first place?-really! not sure whether to read this as at 6 months she stopped him seeing the child for 4 years or the child was older and then stopped him from seeing him for 4 years allegedly.

The over riding thing that is despicable by OP and the father of this child is that they have collectively discussed with their children under the age of 10 yrs old that they collectively do not want their sibling or son in the house.

I do not see how this child has a hope in hell of knowing his family now. If he comes in the house the joint DCs will feel their wishes are being ignored and resent their sibling even more. If they do get o have him banned then the relationship is dead forever.
The DF is a useless bloody father- if he had a court order why did he not go back and get it sorted when she stopped contact, Why has he not worked out how to re integrate his child into his family. Sounds like he has not been discussed or his existence acknowledged for many years in the second family.

At no point does it appear that this child has been asked what he wants, feels etc.
I still can not get over asking siblings to decide that they do not want a sibling in the house - rather than work through the immense traum that has been and is now being inflicted on this child by both his parents.

The father should WANT to have contact with his child. On what planet are we living that mothers/ex partners are now being accused of ‘forcing their hand’ in a father seeing and taking responsibility for their OWN child. Just because he started another family, it doesn’t make his first child not exist. Whilst what you are saying may legally be true, where is the human decency in that - this child didn’t ask to be brought in this world - and now is made out to be a burden by the step mother and the father my the sounds of things. My heart goes out to that poor boy, I hope what is said about the biological mother is not true otherwise where is his place in this life?

The father should WANT to have contact with his child. On what planet are we living that mothers/ex partners are now being accused of ‘forcing their hand’ in a father seeing and taking responsibility for their OWN child.

It sounds like the father does want contact, but not necessarily the pattern/frequency the ex is demanding.