DH changed his mind
Hi
could do with peoples thoughts on this. Long story short my DH daughter dislikes me. So much do that she's not seen her dad for 18 months and she said she would only see him if he drove to where she is and didn't bring me. He went a few times and then was upset that she had blocked me after everything I had done for her. I was only ever worthy of her time when she wanted presents. Simple. Things deteriorated when we got engaged she tolerated me up to that point but after that it got worse to the point she refused to visit any more and hadn't been back since.
a few months before the wedding I was becoming increasingly depressed by this huge resentment from an 11 year old child. I was the reason she no longer wanted to see her dad and he was no longer willing to put up with her behaviour and being disrespectful of me. However I felt this huge guilt for their relationship being broken even though I didn't do anything wrong. I'd always tried to be kind, when she started to stay I spent a full weekend decorating the room buying furniture etc so it would be a home from home. All of this was thrown back in my face. I strill tried to be nice even after knowing she only wanted to see DH if I wasn't there - truth is they spent lots of alone time but she now wanted him 100 % just her. I was still happy for her to be bridesmaid but she didn't even want to come to the wedding.
so as I was saying this horrible feeling of being the cause for rejection played heavily- this wasn't the life I wanted and I didn't want a life where I was going to be excluded from part of his life. I thought ahead of all things such as graduations , weddings, grandchildren - I guess my mind was racing. I told him I couldn't put him in a position where he chose and said I was going to walk away. I absolutely loved this man and it broke my heart that I was the reason for all of this.
DH convinced me that he wanted to put us first as SD was out of order and he would only ever consider a resuming a relationship if she showed that she was sorry for her behaviour and wanted to include me. He said he would leave things be until she was more mature and ultimately ready to be kind and not selfish.
so we got married - birthdays , fathers days etc been and gone and she's not reached out to him. He sent her gifts at Xmas etc but not been in contact.
however today he tells me he's going to see her tomo because she's visiting his family and wants to rebuild a relationship with her. I was taken aback but he says he's missed out on far too much and how it's such a big ask to ask someone not to see their child - I had offered to walk away so they could repair their relationship. I asked why he provided assurances so we would get married but he just says he can change his mind. Feel a bit duped
So go on his visits. Check into the highest end resort available
and do a major spa weekend for yourself while he wastes his weekend on this toxic failed family breeding experiement.
The two of you can hit a great restaurant or two on your way there and back home. Then you can bomb FB with pics of your awesome weekind trip/spa weekend. Rub SD's nose her own crap.
If SD bitches that it is a combo daddy visiting her and awesome couples trip during the time be is not with her. She can F-off.
Have fun! As SPs we might as well turn this kind of thing into a positive for us while rubbing the noses of the toxic spawn in the stench of their chosen crap behaviors.
DH is playing a bait and switch on you and you should bare his ass on it. Constantly. Inform him that you will not remain married to a man who will not only tolerate someone disrespecting his wife and marriage but foster a relationship with that person. Make it clear that his choices will have direct influence on his marital state and relative happiness in life because you will not tolerate misery in your life because of his parental failures and lack of testicular fortitude with his failed family spawn.
You have nothing to feel guilty about. You offered to wak away. He persued you and conned you into a marriage by falsely presenting that he has balls in holding his spawn accountable for her shit behavior. Sure, people can change their minds. SO can you. Make sure he has absolute clarity that changing of minds is your perogative as well.
Prior relationship breeders need to understand that their mistakes cannot be tolerated to ruin the lives of their spouse. There is an increased honus on the mate who brings children to a subsequent marriage to make damned sure their children do not negatively impact the life, marriage, and happiness of their mate. Marriage trumps breeding. A spouse and the marriage are always the priority over children. Regardless of child biology. Children are the top responsibility, not the priority. Two different things.
Great advice and you're right
Great advice and you're right I do feel conned !
Oh boy, have you gotten
Oh boy, have you gotten yourself into a pickle. You don't mention her mother aka as BM. It doesn't matter who DH married, SD would be pulling her drama anyway. I bet BM is high conflict and thinks she has a golden uterus. She's secretly burning inside with rage that DH moved in and got remarried and is HAPPY. She can't have that so she uses SD as her pawn to cause strife and dispair. Daddy was doing doing well at making adult choices and not putting up with it until he couldn't do it anymore. See, he didn't realize what the games were about and fell for them.
An 11 yo should have no say in adult matters. They do not get to give ultimatums to adults. Knowing all of this now, Rags advice should make more sense.
I'd-also suggest finding the shrink4men website and learn about high conflict ex wives and learn about the mini-wife phenomenon. (Plenty in here for that) Im guessing you are dealing with both in many ways and educating yourself on both will help you to understand what's at play and how to avoid potential land mines.
You don't have to walk away from the man... yet. But you should set some boundaries with him and his baggage so your marriage can have a chance at survival.
Thank you I'll definitely
Thank you I'll definitely look at that website as feel out of my depth here. BM is passive aggressive and I agree loves all of this.
with regards to mini wife syndrome one thing that sticks in my head is when she made a comment (was 10 at the time) how she was going to marry him - I have a daughter who is younger and knows you don't marry your dad and would be grossed out at the thought. Maybe the engagement triggered this intense jealousy!
I agree with the spa weekend
You have some fun by yourself. Just lock down the money. Make sure SD doesn't start using DH as an ATM.
DH had a weekend away with SD. Now he owns you a weekend away to a nice place. Plenty of social media pictures of the weekend.
Also time to start an exit plam, open your own bank account. Start putting money into it. DH wants his own life so do you
This is the thing i doubt she
This is the thing i doubt she will even want to see him because he went through with marrying me but she's very good at getting people to part with their cash. She used to lie about not having things so I'd buy them for her and then I'd find out the story she gave me was a complete lie. Should be a visit to the library rather than a shopping spree x
She should not have been
She should not have been allowed to stop coming over. She doesn't get to decide (though I'm pretty sure her mother was doing an amazing job of PASing her...). She is still a little girl and has TWO parents and she shouldn't get to just throw one away. I'msorry your husband didn't take a firmer line with her - it's too easy to just drop the ball and say "OK, if that's the way you want it...". That's taking the easy way out.
She is 11. He walked away
She is 11. He walked away from an 11 year old child because she misbehaved. Is this parenting...cutting off contact with your own 11 year old kid until she transforms into a mature, responsible kid? How is this ok? How is she going to become a responsible, respectful person unless her father is involved in her life to guide her into proper behaviour? He abandoned his daughter... Let's not sugarcoat it.
The 11 year old is not going to reach out to your DH, he is the adult here, he should be the one reaching out to her.
He made the choice to walk away from his daughter so most of the blame is on him. However, you pretty much gave him an ultimatum... you did make him choose. You told him to choose either the relationship with you or working on his relationship with his daughter. The implication being... He couldn't have both.
Why isn't ok if he maintains contact with his daughter and visits her without you? There's nothing wrong with him seeing the child without you present. Either that, or he makes her visit and actually parents, corrects her and guides her into proper, respectful behaviour, as parents are supposed to do. Abandonment shouldn't be an option because that 11 yr old girl needs an active present father in her life.
I agree with you…
But the BM should also be held responsible. As the other parent she should encourage her daughter to have a relationship with her father. Both parents should be invested in the welfare and proper upbringing of their child and they should make sure the child knows she cannot dictate her relationship with either parent.
Also, OP didn't make him choose, the daughter did by refusing to have a relationship with her father. If DH would have put his foot down within the first 18 months of his daughter being a brat, OP would not have been in a position to want to walk away.
Divorce does not necessarily mean someone walks away.
It also means that is not necessarily the NCP that walks away if one parent/partner does walk away.
Neither does it mean that one parent does not PAS children against the other resulting in that child breing aunadulterated shit when with the PAS targeted parent.
I am not a BioParent. So I have no nearly religious diefication gene that applies to children. Anyone's children. Ill behaved shit children are not pleasant to be around and I would not tolerate their presence, particularly the presence of one that was the victim of an X PASing that child against me. I would hold the X and the child, even an 11yo, accountable for their choices and behaviors and I would protect myself and my mate from their presence.
At least I like to think that would be the case in this type of situation.
More importantl though related, I would expect that my choice would be to not abandon my child. I would go full frontal assault war on the X, my child would be with me on a COd visitation schedule and would behave. They would have no choice. To make a different choice would be the choice to have abject misery rained down on them until they chose a more appropriate behavior.
As my partner I would expect my mate to work with me on all of this.
In my IRL blended family life, we had only a moderate to very little amount of PAS crap from the opposition or from the SKid. Mainly because neither my bride nor I would tolerate anything else. We set our partnership, commited to it, and held everyone else accountable for their behaviors in realtion to our partnership.
People in blended family relationships IMHO make it far more complicated than it needs to be. FIlter ot the lowest common denominators of behavior and performance and manage anyone, everyone, and everything within the confines and structure provided by the CO. Anyone who deviates, gets smacked with appropriate consequences. They comply, or they suffer.
Their choice.
Even an 11yo.
In my very binary (black and white with little to no grey) world of course.
@Drum, Your last paragraph above is absolutely correct IMHO.
Regards,
Rags
IMHO, your SO made a promise
IMHO, your SO made a promise to you that he never should have made. Honestly.. no matter what her feelings were about you... a good parent doesn't literally abandon an 11 yo just because they don't like their attitude about their new potential life partner.
They parent their child through this transition and they look to figure out if there is a legitimate reason the child doesn't like their partner (as in is the partner not a good person for them to date? could the partner be abusing or mean to their child.. not saying OP is like this.. just in general what a parent should look into). If there is no problem with their partner.. then the parent.. teaches their child to behave appropriately. They are told that they do not have a choice in their father's partner.. that they WILL be civil and not cause problems or else there will be consequences for the child...that they don't have to like the partner.. but that it is NOT their choice.. and they will accept and be nice to their father's new wife... "or else".
They don't tell an 11 yo that "i'm ditching you till you can act more mature".. I mean.. what a way to make their hatred of the new SP even more hardwired??? it was a bonehead move as a parent.. and honestly.. I wouldn't have a lot of respect for a parent that turned their back on their child for being a brat.
So.. now that he has "come to his senses" and realized that he never should have done that... where do you go from here? Well.. you talk to him about it.. ask him how he intends to move forward... counseling with his child sounds in order.. possibly with OP involved at some point. You ask how he will deal with disrespect. Ask how he intends to parent.. if he expects the SP to do any caregiving or parenting...What consequences will there be for the child not acting appropriately? (and "send her back to her mom's" is NOT what you want to hear).. you want him to be the father to this girl.. but that involves more than taking her out for icecream.. it means him doing the hard work to make her understand that while he loves her.. she doesn't have control over his life.. in fact.. it's more the other way around.. lol
No choices
An 11 year old child does not fully understand the consequences of their actions. They do not get a choice as regards parental visitation.
I understand that you married him based on his assertions that he would not subject you to his daughter who is being a lie-telling mooching brat, but you need to also understand that he has a responsibility to this child. At least until shes 18.
SO, I would move forward with all the things as advised above. Talk to husband. See what his plans are going forward. What does him "trying to have a relationship" look like. Is it him doing the "pick me" dance, or is it him resuming visitation, and parenting. You do not have to be involved in parenting her. Do not try to engage with her, dont buy her things. You are dads wife, to be treated with respect. But he needs to step up and parent her. NOW. While shes still young enough.
If he turns his back on her now, shame on him. Also, he will be blamed for "not trying hard enough". And then wracked with guilt will give away all his money (your money too) trying to buy her love. You and him need to deal with it now. You encourage him to parent and you do your thing separately.
Update
Thanks for comments.
just an update - he went to see her and upshot is she still won't have anything to do with him whilst he stays with me. I've decided that I don't want to be the reason that he and her don't have a relationship. I feel like everyone resents me. I was always the one who insisted he literally drag her to our house because children should not dictate terms but bio mum continuously says she would not force her to go. When he initially went to court over this BM said that DH going round everyday to see if he wanted to spend time with SD was causing her far too much anxiety and they said she was of an age where it was essentially up to her. He did not just walk away this was drawn out and he was still texting etc but I think he had tried everything and couldn't physically drag her here. She initially said that she would see just him as long as I wasn't there then he found out about the blocking thing, and realised everything I had said was true. My initial comment is very brief so doesn't cover everything, he did keep trying to see her to see if she was ready to forgive him for asking me to marry him but his BM even called social services to say he was causing anxiety issues so felt like he couldn't do right for doing wrong. I've never seen a child get their own way and dictate who their parents can see. The entire thing is toxic and I've told him to go rebuild his relationship with her. She won't ever see him whilst he's with me so I guess it's for me to walk away. I'm heartbroken but I can't see a way out
there is no way out
Do YOU have children together ?
if not run.
My SD is 28 now. been in her life since she was 9. Nothing has changed. I feel guilty and rotten every single day.
We have a beautiful daughter who is my shining light. If it were not for her I would run a mile.
Remember though its not the sd fault. its the adults in her life who have not handled things properly.
x
Typo
That was a typo - he would go down every day to see if SD would spend time with him but she said no.
My OSD(now 18) did a similar
My OSD(now 18) did a similar thing, but not against me (as far as I know).
She refused, starting at age 14, to talk with DH or come to our house, claiming DH was "mean." OH, rules are mean now? Not letting a 14 yo run the house like BM did? You betcha. So I put a LOT of this on BM - if BM encouraged a healthy relationship with the father AS WELL AS the mother, then I don't think DH would have so many issues with his daughters, esp. OSD. BM supported OSDs 'choice' to stop seeing her dad. If both parents were on it, then that kid would have still been communicating with DH. He had a couple meetings with OSD after she left the house but they were disasters; basically he was set up to fail at those. He's had no contact (but for one disastrous phone call with SD that, you guessed it, BM was also on!) with OSD since she was 15.
(DH also could have been more pro-active in a lot of ways, and struggles with this every.single.time. YSD16 is at our home. BM I think also knows this and so do the SDs and they use it to their advantage, so DH is not 100% the innocent party either...)
Your DH is experiencing classic PAS in my opinion, esp. with an 11 yo being allowed to determine that she no longer wants to see DH. I highly recommend your DH document everything - she will confront HIM for not being there at some point (OSD did this - but scoffed at DH showing her the emails and texts, but he did it!) and that's all I can say. It will not end if you leave. You have to make the determination of whether to stay; I'd be concerned your DH may end up blaming you which is very sad.
feel for you
Im hearing you, your stepdaughter is only 11 right ?.
so really its not about her. Its the adults surrounding her. All need to be in sync including the bio mum.
If that cant happen and you dont ever see it happening. id be worried.
He needs to be there for his daughter. But NOT at your expense at all. Finding that balace is very hard.
I have never managed. good luck.
Stop giving this Mini Monster any Power!
Of course your Marriage is Priority - when that isn't recognized- trouble has found it's new home! Kids need to witness what love looks like and our Universe has somehow been turned upside down with prisoners running the asylum - meaning children dictating parent's behavior. Doesn't have to be that way - it's up to you to tolerate this or not.