What to do when step son suddenly wants to live with us?

[Msl1980s]

Tried to make this shorter but it's difficult to do as feel I need to explain the back story!
I've been with my partner for almost 10 years.
Met him when his son was 9 and I got along very well with him then. He's now 16. His mum was a pain in the backside when ss was younger, using him and turning him against my partner a lot but as ss got older and he's wiser up to his mum that's all been sorted. Partner and ex don't really speak to each other as no need now as is a teenager.
We have two young children between us 4 yrs and 20 months. The 20 month old is a bit of a handful, tried everything to sort it and he's slowly getting better, but he can have a proper tantrum at times which results in a lot of screaming and we just have to wait for him to calm down. Nothing wrong with him just trypical toddler behaviour .
Ss has never made an effort with the kids and I said that's fine, there's a huge age gap so understandable but he wouldn't even sit in the same room as them if they were eating as found it "disgusting" . He's stopped coming over so much because he finds our son "annoying", and he also says he has better Internet at his place. We also make him help tidy up at ours, nothing major as he's barely here long enough but do the dishwasher etc.
His mum used to get annoyed when he didn't come here much as she had a boyfriend and wanted the house to herself however she's now single and seems happy with ss being there more. She's always molly coddled him, has never taught him to be independent, does a the cleaning, washing etc. She also has a 5 year old daughtwr who lives with them and sees her dad every weekend (they don't get on at all but that's a diff story).
He started at college this year but isn't enjoying it and changed courses already, although I totally get it, what 16 year old knows what they want to do!?
We are going to be moving an hour away this year and downsizing to a 2 and half bedroom flat in order to save money and help with a family business.
Ss has now said he will prob come live with us after college..... We've asked where that has come from because we've talked loads about moving and he's never been remotely interested. We will be a in a tiny village with nothing to do. There will be no room for him apart from to stay the odd night as the half bedroom is an office, which will be used daily but with no space for anything else like wardrobes and def no TV or PlayStation space.
He's also never interested in coming over unless it's someone's birthday and he knows we will be going out for dinner (he won't eat anything healthy).
EG this weekend, asked him ages if he will be around this weekend as likely will be doing something but didn't know what and he said no.
Now mentioned we are going out for dinner with my side of family (that we only see once a year) which has been booked for months and he' said "OK I'll come". We've said its too late now as it was a squeeze getting us in to the restaurant, and have no way of getting there now as using a smaller car but it's clearly because we've mentioned we are going for dinner.

We mentioned 2 years ago that we would probably be going away in the school term time as cheaper and he was fine with that but last year did a big very expensive holiday with whole family which he came to.
This year have booked a holiday with our family and sister and their kids (who ss has said he doesn't like as too noisy) in the school time and he's said we should have asked him. Just fyi we didn't pay for it as have no money as are saving so parents kindly paying.
We've said we wouldn't take him in school time because he's got college but he said he doesn't care but obviously we said that his education comes first.
His dad took him away last year to stay with a family member abroad and takes him to his grandparents to watch football regularly, because he refuses to go anywhere with his dad as doesn't want to be seen out with him (again typical teenager stuff). Partner is going to try and take him away this year (depending on money). Ss hasn't given his dad a birthday card, or present or Xmas guvr in 3 years, doesn't even text or call to wish happy birthday until I remind him to (his mum won't bother telling him to). Last year I forgot to remind him and he didn't call or text the whole day.
He's not a bad kid, usual teenager stuff, lazy, doesn't have many friends as doesn't seem to be interested in doing anything other than going on PlayStation. We've tried to get him to get a job but he can't be bothered and I know his mums got a lot of credit card debt as well as on all sorts of benefits, and barely works and he sees that as something to aspire to.

Not sure really what I'm after here. Just to rant and see what people think about the situation??

What do you do? You change the plans slightly so that he has a room.
You also change your attitude towards a teen step son.
Sounds like a limp parenting partner as well, before long you might find yourself changing that as well.

...our family...

Your family includes your husband's child. Your stepson.

Sorry op, I agree with everyone else on here. You both need to sit down and reevaluate. It isn't appropriate to downsize when you have 3 children. Or to continually make plans which one child is then excluded from. Have another think about it all together and make the kind and right choice.

i agree with everyone else as well.

In addition, you may want to consider - one day IF this prince of a dad, your DH, and you ever divorce, be prepared for your two children not to have a room to stay in if he partners up again and has more kids, because well, you know, they are not really the same as his new partners kids. (scarcasm in case it needs to be spelled out !!). Is this really what you condone now ?? because if you think what is happening now is OK, you may find yourself and your kids being treated the same if you ever split up. I am sorry if I come across as blunt, i am quite upset at how you and your DH are treating this teenage boy. It is just horrible.

Dad and you need to provide a bedroom and be adults - dont marry a man with children already if you are not prepared to be part of a blended family. He sounds like a normal lovely teenager ( especially given all he has been through ) and 16 - oh my, he is young and needs family and needs to be wanted and valued by all his family and unless you plan to cut off your kids at 16 etc, treat him the same, which means being there for him when he goes to uni or whatever study he does beyond 18 - as being a parent doesnt magically stop at 18 either.

Honestly, if you don't want to cope with a blended family (and there is nothing wrong with that, I wouldn't be keen myself) then you don't move in with someone who already has children. It's quite simple really.

From many posts on MN it seems women want to have their own "little family" and any previous kids are supposed to just step aside - unless they are their own of course.

Wow. Who would want you as a step mother.
Poor kid. He is a kid. He should always be invited. And his father should not move away from him or downsize so he can't stay.

Clearly he is an inconvenience for you. But you should not have stayed involved with this man if you could not accept the baggage that comes with him.

Imagine this is your own blood child in 10 - 15 years time and how you would want your then ex and his new missus to treat them.

Teens are teens. Of course he is going to say toddlers are too noisy and disgusting. They are.
But that does not mean his father should love him any less and not include him in plans, nor that his father should move away.
If his father could not afford more kids then you should have stopped at 1.

I really think you should consider therapy to sort out your head here.

Poor lad. I hope this isn’t real.

Wow. So you're deliberately moving an hour away and he doesn't get a room.

Lovely.
Why can't your husband's child be welcomed into your house?
Your husband has 3 children.

This. You've decided he's 16 so you shouldn't have to bother with him any more. But he's still a child with very little agency.

OP, I have a 16 yr old son. Reading your post I am struck by how much of his behaviour you are attributing to malice when the truth is that he probably just a bit thoughtless.

I can imagine my own son doing much of what you describe and I roll my eyes and don't take it personally because I love the bones of him. You don't love your step son, and that's okay, but try to step away from the mindset that he could be doing so much more and so much better when the reality is that he's a vague, hungry, clueless 16 yr old boy.

In a 2 1/2 bedroom home where the 1/2 bedroom is to be an office, OPs 2 DC will already be sharing a bedroom. There will literally be no space (except a sofa?) for stepson.

I think you're getting a hard time OP. The boy has basically moved full time to his mother's home and shows almost no interest in his father. I'm not surprised DH didn't foresee him living with you. I don't agree with all the just-in-case stuff. If stepson's mother died DH could worry about how to house him then, he could be on the sofa temporarily until something more suitable was sorted out. In reality his mother isn't terminally ill so unlikely to die in the next two years.

Stepson's mother's benefits will reduce when he's 18. Is she planning on kicking him out, or asking him to pay rent, then and that's what has got him thinking he'd rather live with you (where he possibly presumes he'll continue to pay nothing)?

As others have said, if DH can't afford to house him as an adult either then a conversation needs to be had with stepson about his future plans. If a larger house is needed maybe he's going to have to pay towards the expenses of that. Once he realises he can get a house/flat share for not much more per month, and that it'll come with a whole heap more freedom then living with a parent does, he might prefer that option. So you'd have bought a bigger house for nothing and be left with all the costs yourselves.

The holiday without him I'd have told him it wasn't a your-nuclear-family type holiday like usual. It was a gift by your parents for their children and grandchildren. So you and your sister, plus your DC and their cousins. The spouses coming along was just because they can share a room with their partners, so no extra expense. I think if you'd worded it like that he'd have seen that not inviting him was no different to your parents not inviting his half sister who lives with his mum, neither of them are your parents grandchildren.

Stepson seems to be picking and choosing which bits of blended family life he wants. That's unrealistic and confusing for everyone else. I think it could be a useful lesson for him (if you sit down with him and talk about it) that if he wants to be part of a family he needs to, well, be part of it. Not pick and choose the most fun parts and opt out of anything he sees as drudgery.

At the moment that's the message both his parents have given him. He's at risk of growing up to become a partner who does the same thing he's doing now and opts out of family life when it's too boring, leaving majority of the grunt work to his partner.

If he wants "in" to your family, he needs to get on board with being part of birthday celebrations always, or at least be concrete on his availability and not leaving it to last minute to decide. That is him treating the birthday event as an option if he's got nothing better to do. It's rude to the birthday person.

He should be doing house chores, earning his own spending money with a part time job, eating meals at the table with the rest of the family, going on family days out with you all. And coming over and staying regularly, if he wants to maintain a bedroom in your home. Maybe not 50/50 if that doesn't suit him any more, but EOW or something.

He can't really go about insulting his younger half siblings, ignoring special events unless there's a freebie in it for him, barely visiting, refusing to spend any time with his father out of embarrassment or whatever and then still want to be considered "part of the family".

You haven't pushed him out, he's removed himself for his own teenage reasons. He's old enough now though to start learning you reap what you sow. I wouldn't hold anything against him up to now, he's young, he's learning about life and we all make mistakes. But I'd be having a conversation with him about whether he wants "in" (and will put the effort in with family relationships) or wants "out" (to go into the world as an adult, forge his own life and come back to visit occasionally), because he can't keep on cherry picking the bits he wants like he is currently doing.

You don't get it. It's the father's responsibility to always have a room for his son to stay in. The son does not owe his father anything - he did not ask to be born. It doesn't matter whether he was living with his mum the whole time before. He was here first, before the OP's children. He shouldn't be punished for the break up of his parents.

A parent / child relationship should not be the parent caring for the child if they think the child has earned the right!!

I don't think you or the OP knows or understands what parental responsibility actually means.

What a horrible stepmum you are.
Poor boy.
You are contributing towards making him feel unloved and unwanted.
Shame on you.

He’s too young to be cut off.

What to do when step son suddenly wants to live with us?
You buy a differant house l that has more space for him and include him on holidays.

I understand perfectly. Parental responsibility legally ends at 18. That's what I'm dealing with. Not morals. An 18yr old can't just decide he wants to live with other adults (even if they do happen to be his parent) at their expense when he's finished college, just because it suits him to. That's reality. It also takes the piss to not bother with people (family or otherwise) unless there's something in it for him. It's good manners to treat people with respect and make an effort with relationships, I you want to maintain relationships with those people. At 16 he's old enough to start learning appropriate adult behaviour.

Part of being a good parent is preparing teenagers to be adults. I don't believe children should be babied until they're 25 like some people do. He's currently old enough to marry with parents permission. Next year he'll be allowed to drive. The year after that he'll be able to do whatever he wants with his life regardless of his parents wishes. So he's old enough now to have adult conversations, stop behaving like a pre-teen and start behaving more like the adult he will soon be.

It's totally irrelevant that he is an ungrateful teenager, doesn't like little kids, is a pain in the arse.

His father should ensure he can provide accomodation for all his kids, whilst they are kids.

SS is still a child. You cannot just up and move away to somewhere where there is no room for one of your partners children, that isn't OK, you are excluding him and choosing to do so because it is convenient, saves money etc etc.

It is this kids prerogative as a child to be a self centered little sod, to change his mind, to want to live with whichever parent offers the best deal in the moment... thats part of being a child whose parents have split up.

I felt sad reading the bit about the restaurant and how he wanted to go along.

An office more important than child. You’ve completely ostracised him. I imagine he wants to raise the idea to see if he’s even welcome, which he clearly isn’t. This is very cruel. Would you do this to your own children? If the answer is no, then you and your other half shouldn’t be doing this to his son. I hope to god this is a reverse.

This

Classic of a parent, almost always a dad, getting a new partner having new kids and moving on.
I mean a car he doesn’t fit in? Moving to a house that has no room for him?

Why is it this child that gets pushed out? Why not the 4 year old?

So many women on here pick a partner with other children and then once they have their own they want to play happy families with just the new children and forget he was already a father

😕If he is not making an effort with family relationships, I imagine that is due to what has been modelled to him.

I have been a step-parent. Your step-son should be included in family events, including holidays, as the default. This builds a sense of belonging. Your husband has really messed this up.

My parents included my step-child in all family events. He is in his mid-20’s and is still part of my family events, even though his father and I divorced 15 years ago. He calls my mum Nanna and still refers to me as his step-mum. He has come to me when he has needed help. I still get the big bear hugs. This is the benefit of properly including your step-children in your lives. You get the joy of them far beyond them turning 18.

mnisawasteoftime I’m not sure what has happened that has resulted in you holding a view of parenting like this, but I am sorry that has been your experience. It can be so different.

I honestly don’t understand people who enter into a relationship with someone who already has children and doesn’t even consider the possibility that the children may end up living with them.
I don’t doubt that your SS is a bit of a pain , but that is your dh’s son . Whatever the issues,I think it is wrong to even consider downsizing when there will not be enough room for his own son.
You are wrong Op

You aren't this boy's parent but your partner is. Your partner is his father and you seem to think it's perfectly ok for your partner to be a shit parent. He seems to be leaving most of the actual parenting and emotional labour to you for a start. Moving to a smaller house that doesn't have room for one of his children is a pretty shitty thing to do though. The level of shittiness that you accept in his parenting of his oldest son will trickle down to being the level of shittiness that your own children get from him in a few years time. Be careful about how much shittiness you tolerate. He will need parental support and nurture until at least age 25 - don't expect him to morph into an independent adult on his 18th birthday.

It's fair enough not to include DSS in every family holiday etc when he's not living with you full time. If he does start living with you full time he will need to be included in everything. It is fair enough to lay diwn sensible ground rules for how things would be if he does come to live with you including that he helps properly with chores and is civil to his siblings.

If you move to a 2.5 bedroom house and he is living with you the thing you don't have the space for is an office and you reassign a corner of the living room to be for office.space. you do not, if you are any kind of decent human being, simply not have a proper sleeping space for one member of the family.

Exactly! A dad basically fucks off his kid and then 10 years later him and the new wife are shocked that the teenager doesn’t have a strong sense of family obligations… I mean someone get a mirror here!