That does seem to be the general theme in this relationships... The second wife is supposed to be the doormat and shoulder to cry on while voicing none of her own feelings.

Disengage ..... next time SS visits and something is wrong or he needs a doctor, smile and say BM you can come and collect him... I'm not taking him and DH is at work....

simply disengage and only pay attention to DH.... give it a couple off months and tell him straight, either he 's scared of the consequences if he ignores you, or he separates from you and take BM back seeing he's jumping every time she snaps her fingers...

So why didn't MOTY worry about taking her child to the clinic/dr's office Friday. If Dad has the kids starting after-school or there shortly after when he gets off work, the kids are still on BM time during the school day.

BM would have been called when the school accident happened. The school is responsible for what goes on during outside recess and anyone hurt/injured on their time. That child should have been taken in before the school bell even rang and it all became Dad's time.

But the kid finally sees a dr on Sunday. Taken by you. And your thanks? BM wings out on you and DH accuses you of making him more stressed out than the b*ll BM causes/does.

Honestly? Those two (BM/DH) are so busy playing 'gotcha' and trying to out do each other whether it's 'I am in control' , 'No, I am' or it's 'do as I say, not as I do'...neither one of them is worth a flying fig when it comes to either of these children.

I wouldn't have been as concerned with her seeing the "inside of my house".. if it was clearly him doing a fairly tight shot of his mouth and his talking head. Now... If I saw him panning the camera or computer around to take detailed views.. different story.

I don't know.. it sounds like your DH causes just as much of the drama by intentionally "not responding" or bickering back and forth and being passive aggressive.

I see you trapped in between.

I do see how she might initially worry about the antibiotics prescription because she might not know if the DR at the urgent care was aware of the allergy and you might not have known about it either. That doesn't mean the doctor would have been stupid, just that he wasn't aware of the history. She couldn't know whether he knew since she wasn't there.

Would you have preferred if she had come picked up the kid to take him vs you? I'm thinking I personally would have preferred that if my DH couldn't have taken the kid... but in your situation, not sure how you would have felt about her intruding on your life by coming to pick him up.

It sounds like this all just doesn't work for you.

Sounds like the BM in my life. We had a similar incident two weeks ago, where SS11 was convinced he had a concussion and BM was sending frantic texts about DH needing to take SS to "urgent care" because this "was a serious issue". Of course, by the time SS returned to her home - less than three hours later - BM was over it and didn't rush him off to the hospital.

Some thoughts:

1) whichever parent the child is with at the time, is the parent in charge. if that parent in charge decides to consult the other parent, fine, but the parent not currently in charge has no business inserting him/herself into decisions that are the responsibility of the parent in charge without being asked. Fortunately, my DH is in agreement with that are largely ignores BM.

2) children who engage in involving the parent not in charge, in decisions, without consulting the parent in charge, should be told that their behavior is not ok. This is one where DH and I disagree. In our case, BM always inserts herself into the discussion because SS will call her if he is unhappy with DH's response. I think DH should tell his SS that doing that is completely inappropriate. When SS is with DH, DH is in charge. DH is capable and BM does not need to be consulted.

3) if the parent not in charge feels as if the child will need something based on something that happened when that parent was in charge, he/she should notify that parent at drop off, not at a later time when it will become an unnecessary fire drill. We've also had texts from BM to DH at 10pm on a Saturday saying "SS needs XYZ. He wanted me to text you because he doesn't feel comfortable asking you himself." Um, both BM and SS knew that SS needed XYZ before DH picked him up on Friday evening. I will not rush around late at night to get a non-emergency item for a child old enough to ask his dad for something, especially not because I've asked both SSs multiple times to let me know what they need to feel comfortable at our house or what they have at BM's home that they would also like at our house. Those moments are the time to ask for things, not at 10pm when you call you mom to say "I know Dad won't buy this for me, so I don't want to ask him, but I also feel sad in advance that he won't get it for me, even though I never asked him." I feel like those kinds of moments are "gotcha" moments so BM can say to DH "SS needed XYZ and you refused to get it for him." So, over the drama. I feel like if I were in BM's shoes and my child was calling me from his dad's house to complain that he didn't have something, but didn't want to ask for it, I'd tell my child to march in and ask his dad for that, instead of bothering me about it. However, that is impossible for BM, in my case, because she would like her children to think she is the only parent who matters.

The fxxk are we supposed to do everything to help then and keep our mouths shut too? Take care of their children and don't cause extra drama because they have enough with BM???? They need to step the fxxk up and deal with the little people THEY helped create.

And these moms with their GD medical emergencies, faaacck. Talk about the sky is falling. My ss has had a cold off and on for about a two weeks. It almost go away completely and comes back. No fever. So BM says why haven't you taken him to the doctor. (The doctor she has on and HIM is 25 miles from us and now over 60 miles from her and she won't change it.) And then the next day when she has him for her 2 days a week, no doctor. So when he get him back he's crying and holding his ear. I figure his sinuses are now all lights wack maybe ear infection so we take him get anti biotics just in case because in the almost 3 years ice been around I've never seen him act in so much pain. And when we get him back she doesn't return the medicine. She went to school to be a medical assistant (not that she has a job doing that or at all) but you can't just do antibiotics for a day or two and then stop. But I didn't say anything. Except that this morning he wakes up crying holding his ear again! So now she has to drive all the way up here to drop the medicine off she should be brought two days ago or yesterday when she dropped off his school stuff she forgot. Andd she freaking out about him going to school. We are not going to drag him crying holding his ear into class.

But really your DH should never make you feel bad when your helping. His ability to handle stress should have nothing to do with you being able to voice your thoughts as feelings.

Tank - you're considering being done because your BM acts in a way you disagree with, and your DH responds in a way you disagree with.

You mention a lot that you take on "parenting" for ss...

simple solution. Stop. Let DH handle it. Don't get involved.

SS is not your kid - DH and BM seem to make this clear to you - just based on your posts.

I know you think you're doing right by the child - and you might very well be - but you might be the source of your own issues... so what if BM does stupid things. Laugh it off like you would a neighbour's decision or a coworker's decision.

So your DH gets stuck having to take care of something... oh no. Welcome to being a parent, buddy. Let him.

Unnecessary fire drills.

OMG we had that too. It was crazy. DH had to finally say BUZZ off. BM was screaming at the top of her lungs on the telephone telling HIM what HE needs to do during HIS visitation time.

LISTEN HERE BUDDY, her famous words. YOU better do this BUDDDDDDYYYYYY

Who the hell is buddy?

Best to disengage and let DH handle the parenting. The more you act as a "buffer" and parental authority, the more it enables DH to be the "BFF" parent at your house. Sounds like he just doesn't want to deal with the BM and who can blame him, but instead of the ostrich in sand approach, he needs to get enough spine to stand up to her.

Of course there WILL be fallout but you'll just need to do the standard response:

"MMMHHMMM"
"Oh that's a tough one, I'd hate to be in your shoes."
"If that happened to me, I'd feel the same way."
"That's interesting."

Is it annoying to see enmeshed BM treat SS like a BFF and a spousal equal? Yes. Is it annoying to see SS get spoiled, coddled and bribed beyond belief? Yes. I was nauseous at the way Chef was trying to compete with the Girhippo to see who could spoil their brats the most. I disengaged allowing Chef to come in full contact with the monsters he and the Gir had created. Only then was he able to stand on his hind legs (but very s-l-o-w-l-y as in baby steps)

Tank, Secret is correct. Bio mom and Bio dad are 100percent responsible to parent their children.

Did someone tell you Tank that YOU should OR that YOU are required or that YOU YOU YOU take over for MOM now that you are a step parent.?

"Tank, can I Have a coke"?
YOU---SS, your daddy is outside please ask him.

SS-"My mom is giving me 15.00 a week for not drinking soda"

YOU-"that is GREAT, do you miss soda?. It's yucky. What ya going to do with your loot"
SS- What are you giving me TANK for not drinking coke?
YOU- HUGS for sticking with it SS....I am very proud of you SS.