Broken Promises
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So I am with my wife and she has a 7yr old daughter. The stepmother with her dad said they would pay for the child to goto cheerleading.. Well they come back and say they can't pay for it. My wife doesnt want to hurt the childs feelings and not see that the other parents broke a promise. should we rescue them and pay for her to do the cheerleading or let her see the truth about her dad breaking promises.
What about a compromise?
What about a compromise? Suggest that you guys split the cost of cheerleading. It means that the promise is kept but that no one carries the sole burden of the extracurricular activities.
supposedly the dad is
supposedly the dad is negative on his bills, he hasn't paid for anything for her extra activities.. He definitely gets to goto her games and such when she is involved in them. He says that the child support covers her extra activities. Well my wife's dad just foot the bill on the cheerleading. I don't think that the father of the child should be able to be there to see her do her cheerleading since he isn't willing to pay the bill. My point of all this is that he isn't wanting to put any effort into paying anything. my wife and him made a compromise already that we would pay for the soccer and they would pay for the cheerleading.
If a compromise has already
If a compromise has already been made and they aren't upholding their end, then I suggest a conversation with them that they need to explain to the kid that right now they can't afford to pay for cheerleading like they promised and that as soon as they can they will. You shouldn't be expected to bail them out all the time, especially if you are already paying for an extracurricular activity for the child. It's a slippery slope here. If you two are not going to pay for cheerleading for whatever reason, it should not be left to you to explain to the child why. They made the promise, they are breaking it, their responsibility to give the excuse.
Child support does cover
Child support does cover extracurricular activities on your wife's time. If he's paying CS regularly, then he's already contributing. In an ideal world, where two parents are together, they would provide for the needs of the child, then the wants as they could afford them, however, child support takes into account things like extracurricular activities (at least in my state). If your wife feels she's not getting enough CS, then she should file for more. She may or may not get it.
My SD does ballet on our time, which we pay for, but we would not be paying for things on BM's time.
Biodad shouldn't have said he'd pay for it if he couldn't, and I know it puts you in a rough spot. There have been weeks when we really couldn't afford the $30 ballet lesson, but we either a.) suck it up, or b.) offer the SD another fun, cheap alternative (such as movie day or something like that).
In our case BM is always promising the kids things that she KNOWS she can't afford, since CS is her only income, and she's not getting that much, since we fight her asking for more pretty aggressively.
My thinking is that she is 7
My thinking is that she is 7 years old. If you can afford the cheerleading, if a compromise couldn't be reached, then I would pay for it if this is something she really wants to do. BUT I would not say that "because your dad made the promise and can't pay for it, we're paying for it..." --- she doesn't need to be in the middle of that. Soon enough she'll figure out Dad makes promises he can't keep. I have not said a bad word about my daughter's dad to her, but she has figured out stuff on her own. I didn't have to say a word.
He's promised her so many things over the years -- I would say things like "don't get your hopes up" -- which I suppose could be construed as bad about him, but I just simply didn't want her to get dashed yet again. But I footed the bill for most everything for her, not him, and I don't get child support from him either. It's okay, I don't care because while I'm not rich I plan in advance and keep money in savings for things that may "come up".