Married Life
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Re: quick vent...no big whoop
Yipes, you misunderstood me. You said that you guys can't afford these extras and sometimes not getting what you want is part of life. It should be okay for him to say that you can't afford gymnastics or cheerleading or whatever. Then his family feels bad and pays for it. Then he pays his family instead of letting them just do what they want. That's the nut he needs to grow.
This is what I was going to suggest. Have your H talk to DSD about the situation, explain that he cannot continue to pay CS to her mom, which DSD doesn't receive a dime of, pay for her extracurriculars, add cheerleading on top of all that, etc. Explain to her that it is not her fault, he understands that she wants to go to school with her friends, etc. And then explain to her that, in an ideal world, your H would have custody over DSD so that he wouldn't have to pay CS every month to her mom who isn't using it as it should be used. Promise DSD that the living arrangements can stay the same (DSD can continue living with SIL), but something has to change if your H is expected to continue to foot the bill for everything in addition to supporting his XW. DSD should be old enough to understand this, as well as be old enough to be able to say "I want to live with my Dad now, not my Mom" and then the court order can be changed, as well as the CS agreement.
So I'd either do that, or I'd have your H stop paying for everything. Pay CS only, as well as your travel costs to have DSD every other weekend. If MIL and SIL are going to pick up the tab for things regardless of whether or not your H pays, then let them. Maybe they will in turn put pressure on XW because they know that she is getting a check every month that isn't being spent on DSD...
i appreciate the sentiment, but i feel compelled to say that she's really not. she's like every other kid and says, "can i try out for cheerleading this year?" and we all say,"...uuuuuuuuuhhhh....sure??" she doesn't really act entitled and she has been told "no" on lots of things. for example, she got invited to the prom at the last minute last week and we just couldn't pull it together for her to go, so we told her she could go to after-prom activities with her friends instead.
i'm with you on the drama queens and chicken thing, though.
I love you for this. My stepmom was a total assshole and I like reading things like this. It's obvious that you care about her.
ok, sorry, fair enough
I just got a "never say no to the poor little girl because her parents are divorced" vibe from your post. I was maybe reading too much into it.
That seems to be the vibe that the the MIL and SIL have, about her. One of DH's sets of grandparents, treated him like this after his parents divorced when he was about 2. He apparently was a complete shiit to his cousins until he turned about 10-11, and realized that he needed to cut the crap, if he wanted to be friends with them.
How can the Preacher-Dad not get any custody? Why does the loser mother get full custody?
This makes no sense!