Hi all,

I am new here and have been lurking for a few days. I wish I had known this site existed a long time ago! I’ve been through an array of complex and emotionally fatiguing experiences with marriage, divorce, relationships, children and stepchildren (only one). There is no way to touch on them all in one post, so I’ll start with my latest situation I find myself in. Even still I have to back up a ways to even give a flavor of how I got to where I am today, but here goes.

My boyfriend and I had lived together for a year. All was going well and pretty uneventful in our world. His daughter, 5 yo at the time, was over every other weekend. My son, 12 yo at the time and whose primary is his dad, was on a more flexible custody schedule but was often over on the same weekends…sometimes not. This was five years ago and it was at that time that my boyfriend’s ex-wife went off the deep end and made it her mission to destroy me and my family. To tell here what she did, I will have to save for another day. It is something so malicious, unthinkable and complicated that I can’t speak of it easily or without a good deal of time. In any case, besides its devastating impact on others in my family and her own family for that matter, it threw me personally into a state which I would describe, and my later therapist agreed, as PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder). In addition to this unspeakable malicious thing, she also convinced my boyfriend that she would move his daughter out of state if he allowed me to be around his daughter. She went so far to having this restriction added to their child custody orders. Needless to say it was devastating to me when BF signed it without even hiring an attorney. I know everyone will say that this is when I should have gotten out of the relationship, but I guess I was at a state in my life that I was done with people knocking me around and became determined not to let this woman tear me down further, or rattle me the way she does my boyfriend simply because of she thought she could.

Although he and I still continued to live together, he rented an apartment for when he had his daughter every other weekend and each Wednesday. I soon realized that he was pretending to his daughter that he and I were no longer in a relationship. He avoided talking to me on the phone when he had her, or if we did speak, it was obvious that he was trying to be inconspicuous at to who he was speaking to. I thought, was he really that afraid of his ex and her threats? Afraid of even her finding out from his daughter that he so much as spoke to me on the phone when he had possession? Anyway, during those weekends and days he had his daughter, he spent 100% of the time one on one with her.

Again long story short, after 2 ½ years of this arrangement, BF did eventually hire a lawyer and threaten to take his ex-wife to court to have the restriction removed. She eventually agreed to a temporary arrangement that allowed him to have his daughter in my presence one day out of of his EOW possession. Early on I would go to his apartment on ‘my day’, but soon I realized I was just an inconvenient visitor. His simple one bedroom apartment really contained none of my boyfriend’s personal effects and had minimal furniture, since most everything was at our apartment. It was more of a playhouse for his daughter’s toys. At least when I was over, his daughter dictated how the time was spent, playing dolls, games or watching cartoons so I am sure that was the case when I wasn’t there as well. With the food selection in the apartment usually being limited to Easy-Mac and cereal, on a couple of occasions when over I suggested we go out somewhere for lunch. My boyfriend made it apparent to both his daughter and me that all activities like this were solely up to his daughter. Polite small talk, as you do with a visitor, was about the only interaction my boyfriend offered me while I was over. It was like I was just an observer.

Eventually I convinced him that he should bring his daughter over to our apartment on a day instead. (She did not even know it was “our” apartment still, as he made it a point to refer to it as Where2Begin’s apartment) I really didn’t understand why he continued to cocoon his daughter away from the home and world he lived in when he otherwise didn’t have her. I believe they came over to “visit me” at “my apartment” only twice during the time that these temporary conditions dragged out another 1 1/2 years.

Because both my BF and I had been through difficult divorces previously (yet another story for another day), neither one of us came into our relationship in a rush to officially get married. To either of us, a relationship was not about that piece of paper. But we had been together over 5 years at this point, and we along with his lawyer agreed that marriage would be the most effective way to completely extinguish the legal restrictions that he had allowed his wife to put in place. Those who have had to deal with the court system on custody matters, know that once a legal agreement is in place (regardless of whether it was originally court ordered, mediated, mutually agreed or however) the court typically will not hear a case or change that agreement/order currently in place simply because one party changes their mind or decide they no longer like the agreement. There has to be a change in circumstance for the court to consider judgement for a modification of an existing agreement/order. The ex-wife’s lawyer advised her that she did not have a leg to stand if we took her to court to have the restrictions removed on me, the father’s now-wife, so she conceded without a court battle.

We began looking for a house. I was so excited that we were taking steps to have something, even just a little closer, to a normal relationship. Still I found something odd, or better said “somewhat unsettling” on the day we drove over to show SD, 9 yo by then, the house we were seriously considering. The conversation between him and his D was such that he was clearly leading his daughter to believe that the decision on which home we purchase was hers to make. Granted he worked to sell her on the one that we preferred, but I wonder to this day if we’d be living in the house that we are today if SD had been inclined to like a different one better.

We’ve been married for 1 ½ years now (together a total of 6 ½). SD continues to come every other weekend and each Wednesday. During those times, DH spends all of his time with his D, now 10 ½ yo, much the way he did when they had their playhouse apartment. She likes to be tucked away up in the gameroom or in her bedroom, so there the DH spends all his time. They play games, play with toys, watch tv, eat, etc. He is 100% devoted and focused on being her BFF, and personal butler from sun up to sundown the entire weekend he has her. If he so much as lingers to long for a moment of small talk with me while passing through the living room , you quickly hear “Dad, come up here” and he is immediately racing up the stairs. It has become very apparent that he truly feels he is betraying his daughter if he acknowledges me as more then an acquaintance in her presence….i truly can’t even substitute “dear friend” in the place of “acquaintance” here. Now I’ve seen him break away from her on just few occasions for 30 mins or so to mow the lawn or clean leaves from the pool, something like that, but only if she allows it. For me to ask him to do a favor or anything for me, much less with me, is destined to be rejected by his daughter thus by him as well.

You’ve probably figured out by now that at this point there is no relationship between SD and I, much less any type of “parenting”. We too are just acquaintances in the house.

Yes, I have spoken to H about all this numerous times and he tells me he only gets to see his daughter 10 days a month and he wants spend all the time he can with her. He says his dad was never around for him. I understand the effect of having a parent that was not there and the desire for non-custodial parent to be there for their child. Just like DH’s, my father too was away from home extended amounts of time while I was growing up and I too am a non-custodial parent. But is the relationships and interactions I describe common? Healthy? Acceptable? How would others handle it?

Sorry to be long winded and this is an abridged version!

Thanks all. I look forward to getting to you all.

W2B