Step dad bathing 8 year old DD

[Amiovereacting82]

I went out tonight to collect my older DD, before I left I told younger DD to relax with step-dad and I'll help her bath when I get home.
Got home, not very late, just after 6, and DH had already bathed her.
A couple of times recently I said I felt -as DD turned 8 a few months ago- it's less appropriate for him to be in he bathroom at bath time/ do bath time (admittedly DD doesn't need much help bathing now but likes me to be there).
I feel really really uncomfortable with this, like he has crossed a boundary that was really important and that I mentioned more than once.
He said DD asked him to, but he's the adult!

For context he has been in DDs life since she was 3 and is like a dad to her as her father sadly wasn't interested in being involved.

DD is a very young and vulnerable 8, nothing diagnosed but suspected ND.

I feel so uncomfortable with this - he knows I'm very very protective of both my DDs

Am I overreacting and being neurotic?

Either you trust him or you don’t. If you don’t trust him, your relationship
has no future.

Your gut is warning you - if you feel uncomfortable you need to listen to that.

Either way, it's not appropriate for an unrelated man to be bathing an 8 year old. It's worrying that he doesn't recognise that.

To be honest, I didn’t ask my DH to bathe my DD - his stepDD - at all because I didn’t want him to be put in a position where he may have felt awkward. He would look after her, put her to bed, read her stories, help with homework, taught her to ride a bike etc etc. but he was never in the position of father. She always called him by his first name. Now, she has her own DC and she told us about the pregnancy by giving is a card addressed to grandma and grandpa. Her DC see him as their grandfather.

Even leaving aside the fact that this is obviously inappropriate behaviour from him the reddest of red flags would be the fact that you’ve recently had that conversation, about that exact situation, multiple times and yet he’s waited until you’re out before he does exactly that… he cannot plead ignorance. dodgy dodgy dodgy.

At this stage, I feel like I don't care about my relationship.
I find it very hard to trust, that's said I don't think he's done anything wrong or inappropriate, but yes - the fact he can't see that bathing her or being there at bath time is inappropriate is very worrying

An 8 year old doesn't need help bathing, I don't understand why you would need to help her bathe when you got home. I don't understand why her step father would want to bathe her. The whole thing is strange. My children jumped in the shower in their own younger than that.

I don't help her bathe, she just likes someone to sit and chat to her, so I sit on the toilet, with the seat down, and occasionally I'll help her get soap out of her hair - is that odd?

She's generally quite independent but as I said there are ND issues I suspect

No it's not odd, my youngest was still asking me to do his hair at 9 because he didn't like it going in his eyes, he liked a flannel over his face.

If it makes you feel uncomfortable then go with that.

Was it her usual bath time or scheduled because you were out?

If you want to go forwards, advise that DH can sit outside the closed door and chat.

My 10yo still needs support to properly wash his hair. He often doesn't wash the back properly and can often not rinse out the shampoo/ conditioner properly.

It's not inappropriate for a parent to support a child who needs it.

It IS inappropriate for an unrelated adult to bathe a child when a parent could do it.

@OP yanbu. Your gut is telling you something.

As an FYI, step parents are biggest SA risk to children (followed by other one away relatives like uncles and grandparents. Terrifying really).

if it feels wrong then it usually is.

I think you're right to be concerned. Does he cross other boundaries with you or your DD?

She’s too old imo to be bathed by anyone of the opposite sex so it would be a no from me. Tell your daughter not just you dh.

1 in 20 children are sexually abused (I am one of them), a big risk is some unrelated male. This man was told repeatedly to not bathe your vulnerable child and he violated that.
Obviously not saying he's a paedophile, but be very VERY wary of any man who tramples your boundaries and instructions regarding your child.

Any man with basic common sense would simply not do what this man has done.

you think your husband has no self control and is going to abuse your daughter. You think he is capable of being a sex offender.

He has been in DD’s life since she was 3, does he act like her father in all other ways?

how would you explain to your daughter that you don’t trust your husband/her stepfather to bath her?

I think you might have shot off the end of the neurotic scale on this one & landed on button moon.

The right thing to do is end your relationship, unless your husband has given you reason to think he is a sex offender and likely to abuse your daughter oh no even in that scenario the relationship should have already been ended.

Listen to your intuition

If you are concerned by him why has he been in your DDs life for so long. You trust him to be alone with her in the house when you go out

She obviously did trust him - but when she reached a certain age she realised it was inappropriate and told him not to bathe her anymore. The moment she’s out of the house her partner bathes her daughter even though she told him not to and even though it was still early.

Nope. He was asked not to do a very simple thing and creepily chose to do it anyway. Stop gaslighting. You're helping paedophiles normalise their behaviour.

Don't listen to the gaslighting paedo protectors. You asked him to maintain a very normal, decent absolutely uncontroversial boundary. This would also have protected HIM.

The only question is - why did he chose to bulldozer that simple, easy to manage boundary?

I think this is a hard one.

On the one hand, yes, he's crossed a boundary as you said it wasn't appropriate for him to be present when she's bathing now she's getting older.

He's been in her life a long time. Have there ever been other concerns or things you've felt "off" about? Or is this the first time something like this has come up?

On the other hand, it sounds like this used to be OK and DD is used to having a parent sit and chat with her while she has a bath and she may well have asked him and saying no might have felt like a rejection and she might not have understood why he couldn't do something suddenly that she's been used to before. Especially if she's ND. And the reasons why would be difficult for a lot of dads to explain, let alone a step dad. Yes, he's the adult and should have respected your wishes, but that's also quite a difficult conversation to have and especially when the parent isn't present.

Have you ever explained to DD about getting older and needing her privacy and therefore it's only ok for mum to be there when you're in the bath and not for SD or any other adult to be there any more? It may help to create a different routine for her for when you're out so everyone is clear how that works. And it may be good also for him to be present for that conversation so she can see you're a united front on it. Then if she does ask him again, he has a conversation to refer back to when saying no I can't help you in the bath now because you're a big girl, remember what we said.

It's not complex.

He was told not to and instantly chose to override her parental right to put that normal, standard boundary in place at the first opportunity. He was - indisputably - wrong to do so.

The only question that matters is why he chose to do this.

Abuse doesnt just happen at bath time.

If you suspect your partner you need to end things and get your child to see a specalist

I agree - he didn't respect a boundary and he should have.

What I'm saying here is there are other possibilities as to why that happened that don't automatically mean he is a danger to OP's child. Such as he felt awkward and didn't have the ability to articulate the reasons why he couldn't help his stepdaughter in the bath to an 8 year old. As I said, a lot of fathers might have difficulty with that conversation.

Therefore, the reason why does matter and that's why it's a hard one to call for me as to whether OP is overreacting or not without that context.