My boyfriend and I have been together for over a year and I have just recently met the kids(he has 5 year old twins) briefly for an hour or two. I also live in the same apartment building as him( he moved in to an apartment below me after we had been dating for a month)His ex wife has never met me, refuses to meet me and has name called me to him. She did not want me to meet the kids and was angry when she found out I did. She recently had a talk with him and said she doesn’t want me to see the kids until she meets me but she said it’s too soon for me to meet her. She said she feels like I’m intruding on their life even though their divorced and have been for over two years. I already feel uncomfortable that he goes over to her place 2 nights a week to make the kids dinner and do bedtime where they sometimes have dinner as a family.She is also trying to plan trips with him where it’s just the four of them going together. I told him this all makes me very uncomfortable but he doesn’t want to cause problems with her but agrees she’s a difficult person. I love him and want to be with him but this is a lot of baggage for me to deal with. I don’t have any kids or an ex husband. He keeps telling me I don’t understand their dynamic because I don’t have kids or an ex husband.
TL;DR My boyfriends ex wife keeps asking him to go on trips and do things together as a family while trying to completely ice me out and not let me even interact with the kids, even though we’ve been together over a year. He keeps telling me he just doesn’t want drama with her. Am I being unreasonable wanting him to have clear boundaries with her?
Comments
“hey boyfriend, I need you to vent about ex-wife bullshit to someone else. I don’t need to know she is speaking badly of me and demanding I meet her to spend time with the kids. Sort out your shit with her and let me know what I can expect. This stuff negatively impacts me and our relationship. I expect you to handle it away from me, while treating me with respect and care”
I’m going to take a shot in the dark here- let me guess- No court ordered custody arrangement?
It’s too much baggage for you to be dealing with. Your bf is not ready to bring someone else ino this situation with him, his ex wife, and the kids and stand up for them.
When you’re dating someone with kids, you DO have to deal with baggage. Stuff like them doing family trips, family dinners, etc. However, I wouldn’t date someone if I wasn’t allowed to be involved in those activities after a year together.
My wife and I each have a kid from a previous relationship and I also have an ex husband. Occasionally I’ll meet up with my ex husband to walk our dogs alone (the dogs are siblings and we each have one of them in the divorce), but my wife is welcome to come. We do Christmases and zoo trips with our sons dads, but again, we’ve always planned this stuff together.
On the note of family vacations with an ex, I am POLYAMOUROUS and would still be annoyed/upset/feel like a boundary was being crossed if my wife tried to go on an overnight vacation with their son and baby daddy and I wasn’t invited.
But like… your boyfriend needs to be sticking up for you. We also didn’t want our kid around his dad’s new girlfriend until we met her — but WE kept offering to meet her and she kept avoiding meeting us. As soon as we got to speak with her, we lifted that restriction and we’re fine with her being around the kid. Honestly, he’s so worried about not rocking the boat with her that he’s being kinda disrespectful to your relationship.