Love my bf, but when will I break?
I’ve been a silent reader for a while, but could really use some thoughts from this forum regarding my struggle...
I’ve been dating a man with a young child for a few years now. Having no kids of my own, no real desire for kids, and interests primarily involving non kid friendly activities, events and locations, this has been a challenge.
He and I deeply love each other. I try my best to work with him while also being myself, and he tries his best to work with me while also being himself. As any relationship, he and I have our own set of challenges on our own. But add in the kid and the ex, and I feel like it’s a constant struggle. I wish there was some way to magically not care about the things that have frustrated or downright hurt me, but I DO care - very very deeply.
Over the years, there have been a number of things that have built up and never really landed in a great place - more just like “tentative tolerance.” But again, it is a constant struggle. I’m sure he could make a list of his own... but the things I can’t seem to get over are:
1. The constant involvement/text/calls from his ex, and the general support of her influence in our lives from either him or his parents (the grandparents) that leaves me feeling both uneasy about the type of exchanges she seeks with my bf (which in the past were not overtly crossing sexual boundaries, but subtly used the kid as a means to banter and inside joke beyond just “friendly parenting”) and also makes me feel that it will never be “our” lives, “our” rules, “our” family - always “his” + “hers” + “mine” with that very definite ranking.
2. The difference in parenting styles that he and I both have - his being lax (e.g. allowing chips and cookies for dinner and staying up until midnight on a routine basis) and mine driving towards slightly more discipline (e.g. reasonable bedtime and not always giving in to whining/tantrums). With him being the actual parent - and me not - his rules are the ones that we follow. This results in commonly being in situations that grate my nerves and I would rather leave than participate in - for example, when cookies come out after 10:00 PM and then there’s a sugar overload leading to a tantrum at 11:00 PM, we often don’t get to sleep until after midnight or later, at which point there is no adult time... just trying to make it through a situation I didn’t agree with in the first place. It’s not for lack of trying, either... we’ve had multiple conversations and agreements that boundaries and rules probably should shift... but it always backslides... and if I mention something to try to adjust back “on course,” my boyfriend commonly dismissed me to “keep the peace” with the kid - which just teaches the kid not to listen to me - so anymore, I keep my mouth shut and either leave or don’t come over in the first place.
3. The general challenge of being with someone with a kid when you don’t have one yourself. Especially as a woman, considering all the societal and family pressures to become a full blown “bonus mom.”
Original Post Continued...
Whoops - geez, it's been a while since I've done this forum thing. Didn't realize the darn "Save" button was basically the same as the "Post" button!! Anyway, original post continued....
3. The general challenge of being with someone with a kid when you don’t have one yourself. Especially as a woman, considering all the societal and family pressures to become a full blown “bonus mom.” In all brutal honesty, my perfect world would look like me and my boyfriend...... that's it. Just us, able to build a life and a rhythm on our own that's just ours - with no other outside ex influences... and no differences with "my kid/not your kid" to exacerbate all the areas where we don't perfectly align. But it's 100% not possible for me to have that with him, nor is it possible for him to have that with me. So we're doing the best we can with what we've got. And there's just a whopping dose of "well that really sucks, and always will suck" that comes along with knowing that. Possibly even more sucky, are all the pressures that everyone around us puts on us - and primarily me - to become the image of a perfect family. For example, both his and my mother believe that my role should be to become this child's "mom" through and through - neither one has asked me how I'VE been doing in years.... but they both ask me how the kid is doing and ask for status updates on my progress with various "tasks" they've assigned me to support the kid... Both of them generally believe that I should stay home all day cooking and working on fun educational activities whenever the child is visiting - and that I should actively participate in bedtime stories and set up rooms of my house (which is not shared with my boyfriend) dedicated to more bonus bedrooms and toys. Many friends and aquaintances assume that this is the path I should take to be with my boyfriend as well. And while my boyfriend and I both agree that this doesn't match who we are individually, or as a couple.... I often find even my boyfriend subconciously "assuming" that I will cover certain "mom" role type things - so not only is it frustrating to constantly have to set and protect my boundaries with the rest of the world, but it's even more frustrating to have to remind my own boyfriend that I'm not a "bonus nanny."
At the end of the day, I know that I've truly tried my best on all three of these things. And these are likely to only get worse as the child grows older and eventually enters adolescence... so I'm struggling with what to do at this stage....
I love so many things about my boyfriend... I love the connection we have - I love the way he works with me on nearly everything else, even to the extent of doing things that I've told him are important to me, when he doesn't see the importance himself; but he still does it just for me - I love that we love to do the same things, and spend time with the same people, and laugh at the same jokes and challenge each other and have the same outlook on life and way we like to approach things...
But then every single time something happens to remind me of one of these three things.... I feel so undermined and grated and exhausted and like I just want to escape.
And so I'm torn with wanting to run and wanting to stay. And I don't know how to break that cycle.
I was in the process of
I was in the process of writing my response to your first post when you added this lol. I think a lot of men assume their significant other will take on the “motherly” duties of their kid. I even found myself doing this when I was dating my husband. Naturally women have a nurturing side to us so we sometimes oblige. However, you shouldn’t feel pressured into doing something you don’t want to. I’ve gotten to the point where I only prepare meals for my SD and make sure she is safe.
Your feelings are normal. But
Your feelings are normal. But just to get clarification, you said that when your boyfriend dismisses you to keep the peace, you leave or just don’t come over. I’m assuming that you all don’t live together? If that’s the case, you shouldn’t be concerned about how he parents his child. I’m in the unfortunate situation where I am married and we have 2 kids together and I have a SD. My DH is like your bf. He allows the kids to stay up all night watching movies and he usually makes cookies for them when my SD is with us. It used to bother me, but I have to much going on in my life to let that bother me now.
The text messages with his ex don’t bother me, but sometimes when they talk on the phone and I hear him laugh, I do wonder what was said.
In the beginning of my relationship with my DH, I too felt the pressure to be “stepmom” and more. I was expected to have this bond with my SD that magically occurred once we got married. I still don’t feel a bond with her and it may never happen. I’m completely ok with that.
RE: Being ok with not feeling
RE: Being ok with not feeling a bond, and (I'm not sure if I'm extrapolating "shouldn't" with how you DO feel), but not feeling pressured to do something you don't want to do...
I wish I could get to the same level of being ok with all of this!! So far I haven't found a way to fully let go of the pressure or the "not being ok with it," but I've found it affects me to varying degrees... Some days I find it bothering me less than others. And sometimes it bothers me alot, but I can keep it contained. And other days, I can barely handle it. How were you able to get to where you got?
RE: Living together vs. not living together.
So a little background that I didn't fit in my original wall-of-text.... We used to live together and now we don't, and there's a little bit of a colorful story behind that, but the summary is:
Before moving in together, we had a great dynamic going and a healthy balance where we each had our "shared life" most of the week, and while mostly separate on weekends, still met up for dinners, movies, or visits to the park. Even during those meet-ups we had healthy boundaries and understandings of what our "blended" dynamic was, and wasn't.
Things changed and took a complete opposite direction the DAY we moved in together. All of a sudden, my boyfriend started inviting his kid into our bed - which had never been a thing in the past, so that was abrupt and caused a LARGE disagreement when all of a sudden things were very different than expected. He also stopped paying any attention to me or engaging with me in any way all of a sudden - usually coming home and burrying himself in his phone or the TV. Whenever I'd bring up a concern or an issue, he'd flat out stonewall me. When the kid visited, he would be in his phone, ignoring us both. The kid would go HOURS saying he was hungry. I could sympathize, because I'd be getting hungry, too. So after 3.. 4.. 5.. times of my boyfriend ignoring or putting off a request for breakfast or lunch, I'd make it myself for the kid. Then both my boyfriend and his kid started assuming I'd just keep doing this, and took advantage - breakfast and lunch turned into all meals. And that turned into an ultimatum from my boyfriend that I would stay home 24 hours a day whenever his kid was visiting. This was also around the time that I discovered the "out of line" texts between him and his ex... so that made things all sorts of awesome... I put my foot down at that point and said that the relationship wasn't worth losing my life over, so I would continue doing the things that were important to me, and that we needed to strike much better boundaries if we were to continue forward. Fast forward several months, while my boyfriend verbally acknowledged that I wasn't expected to be "mom" (and he claimed that he was reeling convos with the ex in) - that didn't stop alot of really bad guilt trips over doing the things that had always been important to me. And in the end, it was so bad and so consistent, that I insisted that we move back out.
But now that leaves us in an awkward position of having lived together and having certain *expectations* of being involved above and beyond "separate living" baked in, but also being back to "separate households", while also trying to see if we can eventually work our way back toward a combined one...
I wish our dynamic could return to the place before we ever moved in together. But to this day, he still guilt trips me if I don't come over and spend a significant portion of the weekend with them (or maybe I just FEEL guilty, or like I SHOULD be there)... so it's like I live separately... but I'm not actually living sparately... And ultimately, the goal if we are to move forward, is to get to a point where we're living together again.
So the way he raises his kid - the late nights - the discipline, or lack thereof - very very very much affect me now, in the future, and affect my "gun-shyness" for continuing and/or jumping back in to this situation.
Does he want you there
Does he want you there genuinely to have fun with them or is it that he wants you there to alleviate the pressure of looking after his child?
Next time he tries to guilt trip youi, point out that guilt tripping someone is equivalent to blackmailing them and that it is not an honest thing to do. And do what YOU want with your life.
Heh interesting question!
Heh interesting question! That was a constant thought running through my head when we moved in for a while. I felt used... like I was played just long enough to get "trapped"...
I think back then was a very large difference in what we wanted that probably he didn't admit to himself. Honestly, I'm betting he just slipped back in to his "old" habits that he had from living with the ex, and it made me have a bit of sympathy for her side of the story - despite the specific "crossing the line" challenges we were having at the time.
Regardless, that wasn't ok and that needed to change. So it did.
Nowaways I think it's a mixture of three things:
Sometimes he genuinely wants me there.
Sometimes he just wants the help/company.
Sometimes he just doesn't want me to feel excluded.
I hate admitting this, but in all three cases, my feeling is the same - worst case scenario is that I'm dying and drained inside.. best case scenario is that I'm super proud of myself for surviving the evening with minimal emotional and mental casualties. If I don't go at all, then I feel extreme guilt - and I'm trying to piece together if he's STILL guilt tripping me, or if - like shock therapy - I'm so afraid of when he USED to guilt trip me, that I just feel guilt tripped anymore, regardless of whether he does or not.
Hrm....
BM and your SO should not be talking like that
Thing should be throught e mail or texts. Your SO is not parenting his kids, he there friend, there buddy. This normally does not work out when the kids get older. He is going to drink and do drugs with them , he going to be buying the drugs. How do you try to tell your kid what is right when you got years let them do what they want, when they want.
Fortunately I don't have alot
Fortunately I don't have alot of worries about my SO + drugs (yay, one thing I DON'T have to worry about!). But the drinking, yeah. He basically already admitted that he started at a young age, so he wouldn't put it past his kid to do the same. It all just seems so whimsical and I feel like I'm holding on to a runaway train that's just going to get worse and worse.
There are few things I regret
There are few things I regret in life.
But what I 100% can say I regret is wasting "life" on someone that did not deserve it. I kept trying and trying and trying to make a relationship work all for nothing. And in doing so, I "gave up life" during that time. I made sacrifices in my career. I was so busy helping someone else financially I didn't meet my saving goals, etc. I didn't DO the things I wanted -travel, vacations, eat what I wanted, paint my damn living room... because I was always trying to "keep the peace", "make things work", blah blah blah.
I feel like I have completely wasted 12-15 years of my life.
You have been struggling for 3.5 years trying to make things work. Stop. It's not going to. Ultimately, you and your boyfriend want different things.
Sometimes love is not enough.
Be happy. All the time. Life should NOT be a constant struggle.
Oof... you've just
Oof... you've just articulated my biggest fear in all this.
Listen to your instincts,
Listen to your instincts, they are very likely right.
OP, you are going to find
OP, you are going to find that there a lot of different ways to be a stepparent on this site, and these are implemented with varying degrees of success. Some feel that they have to be an equal part of parenting and making rules, etc, and others, like me, are disengaged stepparents that act more like a "fun aunt" type figure in the child's life.
My DH was/is a strong parent (SS is 19) who had no trouble setting rules, being the primary parent, and standing up to his ex. He was not the "fun dad", in fact, he was the "strict dad" to BM's "fun mom". His ex, IMO, is personality disordered, was very upset about the divorce, and ended up alienating his son from him for over 3 years.
My DH never wanted me to parent, which worked well for me, because I didn't see that as my role. I still think, personally, that stepparenting works best if the bio parent takes the lead as the primary parent, while at the same time viewing his spouse as an important adult in the home who must be respected regardless of the role they choose. It doesn't work for the stepparent to be the heavy while the bio parent is the soft, fun parent - the kids just end up resenting the stepparent and he/she resents them right back.
Anyway - the biggest red flag that I see here is your experience that the very day you moved in, he decided you were the parent and disengaged from parenting himself, going so far as to ignore you and his child.
To me, this is a bright red, glowing, flashing flag. Unless he's done some deep work to figure out what the hell happened there, and can articulate it for you, I don't see how you guys can ever progress in your relationship.
As SteppedOut said, 3.5 years is a long time for things to not have moved the way you want, and in fact, when they DID move the way you wanted, the relationship failed miserably. He told you something there about who his is, and unless he wants to change that, you can expect the same experience the next time.
I really think you need to
I really think you need to cut your losses and move on- if moving in together didn't work..and it's 3.5 years..yes time invested but 3.5 yrs is not 5 or 10 or 15 where you are miserable?
Go find yoursel a nice single guy with no kids with whose parenting values align with yours better. This isn't the relaitonship for you. He isn't going to change it seems.
This sounds like a waste of
This sounds like a waste of time. He, his mom and YOUR mom assume you’re Mary Poppins now? You don’t want kids - why should you be so involved in his, particularly when you don’t have parenting styles that align. I love my DH dearly but our relationship wouldn’t have even gotten off the ground if he has 1% of these expectations for me re skid. I do nothing for ski beyond make extra food when I make dinner for everyone. Educational activities and bonus rooms of toys? Seriously?!? Cookies at 10?? You will find someone else to deeply love. Love will not last in this situation.
I think if you're on here
I think if you're on here asking when you're going to break, then you've probably already broken. Love isn't enough.
I am hearing the "could be"
Everything would be ok, 'only if' wishing things were different. I totally understand how you could be aligned in many ways and how wonderful that is. The divergence of your parenting styles, his inablity to acknowledge issues and have a reasonable discussion will only get worse as the child gets older. You have lived together and got a taste of what that could be like. It is easy to think things are good when everything is going well. Its how you navigate as a couple when things are not working. I do not hear alignment in how you both connect here. So, what does the future like like with him? Is that the future that YOU want? What about you and your life?
There is something called the fallacy of sunk costs, that you are losing what you have invested. I was with my XH for 17 years - 10 years living together and 7 years married. I wanted to get married because we had been together so long. I learned alot in those years in couples and individual therapy. I would say imagine your life with him and his child in the future. You are not aligned now and it appears he has no interest in finding common ground with you. If this is the best it will be, usually when you are dating and not married or living together, what does the future look like? What if you are together for years, older stressed out, perhaps a financial or health event changes the landscape and you CANNOT leave, how would that feel? This is the question I answered when I finally left my marriage.
If you keep reading and processing, I believe you will find what will work for you.
I think you've gotten a lot
I think you've gotten a lot of good advice already. I was in the same place when I met my boyfriend. I was always very against the idea of dating anyone with kids but we got along really well. I definitely understand the thought of if the kid didn't exist this would be the perfect relationship. Here are some of my thoughts from everything I've read.
1. in terms of your relationship to the kid I think it's best to be more like the cool Aunt than the parent. this means you make sure that they're safe when you're alone with them make sure that they're not disrespectful but the bio parent handles all of the discipline.
2. Stop fantasizing about how this is the perfect relationship if he didn't have a kid and an ex. It's not the reality of the situation and I can say from experience since my step daughter is alienated if she's not in the picture your boyfriend's just going to be really sad and you're not going to have the relationship you thought you would. On the other hand considered that if something ever happens to the biomom this kid could end up living with him full time. What would you do then?
3. You need to figure out what boundaries you'll feel comfortable with, set your boundaries and whatever compromises you need to make with your boyfriend and put your foot down. If it doesn't work, if he's not willing to compromise, if he starts backtracking guilt tripping and making excuses move on don't waste your time.
For me things worked out overall I ended up having a good relationship with my stepdaughter until she ended up being alienated and me and my boyfriend have a strong relationship still now 11 years later and a kid of our own. I'm grateful for the relationship I had with my stepdaughter because in the end it made me realize that I did want kids with my own.
Having Chewed on This for a Bit...
Thank you so much for all your perspectives!!
After having chewed on this a bit, I have a couple thoughts...
The best my bf and I have ever been is early on when I had established a "fun aunt" level of engaged in our relationship, but disengaged with the parenting. This was BEFORE he started getting lax and non-present. The kid knew to respect and listen to me, but no one took advantage of me or took me for granted in terms of filling a "parental role" - anything I did there was purely bonus or out of extenuating circumstances.
Somewhere along the way (literally overnight when we moved in together, and then iteratively worse over time from there), two things happened:
1. My boundaries kept getting pushed further and further back from that "healthy" line - and to many of your points - those boundaries should have been kept firmly in place. Shame on him for pushing them, and shame on me for letting them be pushed. Honestly, I think it was a pure "wearing over time" that led to them moving... or "frog in boiling water" syndrome. You don't wake up one day and realize that your boundaries are 1 inch farther than they were yesterday. But some of the most startling moments I had were when I would see friends I hadn't seen in months (or in some cases, a year or so), and they would make a comment to the effect of, "are you even allowed to come out anymore?" I'd know they were being sarcastic... but also, they had a point. I'd swear to myself over and over that I'd make time and space for myself to regain the ground I lost - but every time I'd be so worn down and exhausted that it was very slow progress to regain what had been lost from us simply moving in together - and eventually required us to move back OUT to even have a chance. If there's any chance at all of us moving forward, I think that line has to come back further still - and probably not only with my bf's expectations of me, but also with the guilt that I'm still placing on myself over reclaiming what I should have never lost in the first place.
2. My boyfriend switched his focus from "building a healthy relationship" to "appeasing the kid and the ex". I can't even count how many conversations we had about boundaries, and agreements, and where the line was, and what was appropriate and was not, and ok behaviors and consequences for not ok behaviors, and what were the house rules, etc. There have been literally hundreds of conversations trying to discuss and align and resolve our visions of how to handle both the kid and the ex. And despite all these conversations, there's always a backslide, or undermining, or he changes his mind, or he decides on the fly that there is an exception. And time he presents an excuse that it is "for the sake of the kid," or "so the ex doesn't get mad and make things more difficult," or "he has so little time with the kid, he just wants everyone to be happy." I just can't work with that. If every time I go visit, I'm going to watch bad behaviors get REWARDED... that is just going to grate on my nerves until I want to leave and not come back. And if every time we visit his folks, or his ex texts or calls, I'm once again reminded that *she's* always going to be the permanent fixture in their lives, and I'm just the expendable add-on... that is just slowly going to emotionally numb me as well. And if I try to talk about the things we need to do differently in order for me to visit/stay/give-a-darn, but no action is followed through, then I may as well not waste my breath in the first place. So I suppose I get to decide if I (and he gets to decide if he) really want to be in a relationship where we're frequently disengage. And I don't think I really want that constantly - I think I really need that to change. And honestly whether it's me in this position or someone else, I think he's going to have to deal with that sooner or later if he wants to keep seriously dating. That's a tough one... because I can't force him into action... and I certainly have tried and I'm just worn out and bashing my head on a wall at this point.