Mom unable to financially support the children
Hi All,
i am seeking advise. My husband has 3 incredible teenage daughters. The relationship with their mother is strained between us as a couple and her. Normally my husband deploys a lot and so has been super flexible with when we are home with the girls coming over, but simply doesnt communicate well. We dont know anything about the girls re school/ issues/ health unless it requires us financing it. She maintains a super strong relationship with my new family which i completely accept as that is their decision, though until about a year ago she demanded they do not have a relationship with me, which the family pushed back on. This is the background. As covid as hit, my husband cant work so i am covering all the agreed costs in the divorce (mortage/bills/school fees/medical insurance/clothing etc). I spoke with my mother in law and she told me they are having to give the ex wife money to buy groceries. She has not communicated to my husband she is struggling, just messaged to say we can have the children who we have had for 2 weeks. Now i am worried they are not going to get fed properly when they go back to their mom's house, we are not going to be communicated about it and i am going to get "round about" info through the family and pressure to given her money. I dont mind supporting the girls but i am not prepared to pay for her and her parents that also live there. Should i wait for her to effectively co-parent and speak with my husband, suggest the girls stay with us part of the time so we can take on the costs or keep quiet, when the girls may suffer. Would be keen to hear what others would do. Many thanks
Don't enable!
A lot of us SMs started out full of hope and determined to be good team players, but failed to establish healthy boundaries and ended up losing ourselves. In steplife, you HAVE to be able to stand up for yourself and take care of yourself. You have to understand what your role is and is NOT. You have to stay in your own lane and not overfunction for your partner. Remarriages are different than first marriages because each half brings separate baggage and obligations with them. Finances are different as well.
I realize that we are living in extraordinary times, but to be clear, it is not your responsibility to support your H's kids or his ex. Your money is not his money. He needs to have a discussion with his ex, find out what's up, and they need to work out care for their kids. The onus is on him, and this includes making the effort to be involved in his kids' education. He should be contacting their schools, teachers etc directly.
I agree with Petronella - paying cs for him is probably best in order to avoid legal problems, but you should not be covering anything else. It sets a bad precedent and can breed resentment, which is a relationship killer. Do not offer yourself up for exploitation, don't enable, and always insist on being looped in on decisions that affect you. Don't cut BM any slack, because if you do she'll take a mile and before you know it, you'll find yourself raising and supporting skids while the parents don't.
Here is a line from your
Here is a line from your post: “. . . about a year ago BM demanded they do not have a relationship with me, which the family pushed back on. This is the background. As Covid as hit, my husband can’t work so i am covering all the agreed costs in the divorce (mortgage/bills/school fees/medical insurance/clothing etc.).”
Where are your needs in all of this? Where is your value? Are you going to get reimbursed from someone for taking care of someone else’s children that you, by the way, have absolutely no obligation to? Are you assuming anything you do for them will be appreciated or reciprocated? Because, as a SM, I assure you, you cannot make that assumption.
Is this “family” you are referring to insinuating that you have to chip in or else the girls will starve? This “family” seems to have a lot of power and pull. If they agreed with BM and wanted you out, would your DH have gone along with that? Poor BM and the girls, BM and the girls. . . . Again, where are you in all of this?
As a bioless SM myself, I’m just going to say that you are getting royally screwed here. You are giving and giving, but what are you getting in return? Sounds to me like BM is going to make sure, one way or the other, that her daughters are not going to have anything to do with you. Her daughters’ loyalty will be to their mom regardless. And, DH supposedly, “simply doesn’t communicate well.” I’ll take that to mean that he is the typical divorced-dad wimp.
So, here you are shelling out the dough, and you have the almost guaranteed for life step hell scenario going on of manipulative, controlling BM and weak, enabling DH. BM and the “family” are going to be controlling you AND your finances for years, while DH just sits off to the side and lets it happen. I see that coming.
Now, you can claim you don’t care, you’d be willing to give it all up for the dear-girls; however, this is not about you not being reward for your good efforts; it is about you being punished for your good efforts. The “family” will come to expect you to bail them out every time, do as they say, and mind your place behind your DH, any of them, and BM. When you don’t or when you get burned out to the point that you have to start putting your foot down, they’ll resent you for “abandoning” them.
Let bio-dad and bio-mom handle 95% of anything to do with their children. You are dad’s wife, and you deserve respect for being dad’s wife and for what you do for the girls when they are in your and your DH’s household. That’s it. You do not deserve to wind up being this family’s servant or lackey or bank or taxi, etc. That is the JOB of mom and dad, and if they don’t have monies or whatnot, none of that is on you. What would they do if you weren’t there? That is what they should be doing now.
Well..
It seems to me that Dad can’t afford to support his kids either.