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Dh always gives in to BM1 ...what to do?

Maria10's picture

So yesterday DH and I had our third blowout this month. The reason? He keeps making decisions with me( after all sorts of time spent arguing) then turns around and does the opposite. When confronted he tells me i dictated the decision he made and circumstances changed. These decision changes always happen when BM1 makes him feel bad about not doing anything as a father.

Examples:

1. Dh recently came into some money. We agreed that bm1 was not to know about any of it. (A relative passed and left dh and ss12 some money- SS12s money were already allocated before DH got his $). I asked DH to take a chunk of his money and pay off back child he owes(which he was paying on fro paycheck). He did. BM2 received the child support and called DH sking where the money came from.(making sure its not from ss12 money he was getting separately- she of course was making sure she was going to get the maximum amount of money to spend). She basically accused DH of stealing from his kid! To this DH responded by telling her everything about where the childs money is and about his money. When confronted about telling her his response was" circumstances changed! She already knew! And you dictated how I should act!"

2. This on is a bit iffy admittedly. After the past blowouts we argued for a few hours. He agreed amongst other things that if BM calls for any favors to tell her no.(he said his response would be " you just got xxx child support so now you gotta step up").

Bm has been obsessed to send ss12 to a particular private prep school( costs more than a year of state college!). Dh and I agreed that we will not be paying for any of this school.(ss12 has pretty poor grades and she does not make him do homework so it would be wasted money for him to go bc ultimately he can learn/not learn the same things in regular school) We also agreed that we would not be participating in the open houses or anything to do with this school except to help him with homework at our house .( this is the iffy part as I would like ss12 to have a good education). The open house happened to fall last weekend during dh time. Dh and I agreed he was going to switch days so ss12 could go. Then came the mornig of the open house. Ss12 informs us that his mom was just going to drop him off and he was going to be alone at this open houses . DH counters with "i can be there with him". I remimded DH that he told me if she is not there to take him to this open house he will be bringing ss12 home. Dh was snappy with me all day then when asked he denied everything and once again told me "circumtances change". I told him that he did male it possible for his son to go by switching days.

I should mention that BM does the following when she wants something:

1. Figures out what she wants.2 gets her kid interested in what she wants by various manipulations.  3. When the kid is interested in that she tells DH that the kid is interested on his own. Thaen she guilttrips DH into paying.

So by us not going we are avoiding the guilttrip as she is already saying to DH " Its only your son's education!" To which he always responds by opening the wallet.

Note: Ss12 had experessed he does not want to go to this school bc. all of his friends are going to the public school. (He has had a lot of changes in the last 2 ys including the death of a close relative, a new sibling, a new step dad, a new step mom and a new house). His dad felt it would be detrimental to take him away from his friends and put him in an entirely new environment after all these changes.  This was a factor( of a few) in deciding to not go to the open house.

What can I do. I keep trying to show to my husband I am a team with him but I feel he is not reciprocating. Is there a way I can approach this differently. 

Comments

lieutenant_dad's picture

Disengage and do your own thing. Let him raise his son how he wants and spend his money how he wants.

Your job isn't to change your DH. He has to want to do that on his own. What you CAN do is express your displeasure, and when he doesn't care, use that to weigh whether this is really the relationship for you.

I don't fight with my DH on much anymore regarding the kids. I express one time my thoughts, and if he disagrees, so be it. I go totally hands off. He knows where my hard lines are, and knows I'm serious about those things. I left a marriage once before, and I'll do it again if things get too bad.

Really, if it doesn't directly impact you, I would let it go. There is no sense in arguing with him. If his actions show you a person you don't like, then that will tell you everything you need to know about your marriage.

notarelative's picture

Prestigious private schools are fine if you have the money to pay or if your child is able to get an academic scholarship. Otherwise not so fine. Non custodial parents should not be eating at the soup kitchen so the child can attend fancy school.

If BM actually wanted the kid attending this school she would have picked up the boy and taken him to the open house. That she didn't speaks volumes. She's more interested in blaming DH for something (kid not attending great school)  than she is in the child attending the school.

 

Maria10's picture

I agree with this. He will have our help to earn getting in and the GPA needed to keep it. He will have to pass the entrance exams and get scholarships( neither of which we think will actually happen due to her neglect of his education until now). Its too little too late as far as entrance exams( next week).

The CO states she makes all schooling decisions and pays. I am afraid that if my husband sees my Ss12 so excited all of these decisions will go out the window and he will " find a way " to pay. This will make a huge negative impact on our lives. And all she has to do is say that it's for his son. (She has used this particular method for 12 ys. With excellent results)

 

 

    

 

 

 

Harry's picture

This school ?   Time to separate finances,  set up accounts.  Rent, or mortgage, electric, heat,water,insurance.and food and clothing, car gas , loan car  repair, ect. Also Vacation and data night accounts  DH has to put X amount into each account each month. What left over  it’s his. 

tog redux's picture

He has 2 BMs? Dear god. One is all I can handle.

I have to say, I kind of agree with him. Can't he change his mind about something without running it by you? Just let him do what he wants in regard to his kids. If he asks your advice, give it, but don't insist he follow it or micromanage how he handles things. It took me a loooooong time to get this skill down and sometimes I think my head will explode from holding in what I want to say, but if I don't, it inevitably ends up in a fight.

They are his decisions to make.

Maria10's picture

House is in my name. Bills in my name. He pays half of both direct transfer to my bank account. Separate bank accounts. Separate taxes. (I have school loans/ he has cs). I manage the household expenses. He pays half of those.

His CS is directly deducted from his paycheck. It is quite a lot. Bm1 is married and just had a 4th baby.

My dh it seems cannot have a conversation with this woman without getting out a wallet or giving up parenting time or somehow giving in to her. 

It makes me sad that this woman's acceptance is worth more to him than our marriage.

 

 

 

Disneyfan's picture

While I agree he shouldn't ageee to pay tuition, agreeing not to participate in anything school related is ridiculous.

He

He's the kid's father.  He should be as involved as he can regardless of which school the boy attends.  Instead of going along with silly request, he should make it clear that his opinion differs and he is going to do what he feels is best for his son.  The boy being a poor student should justify/play a role in dad not participating in school events other than homework.

Maria10's picture

 

 

Sorry i did not make this clear! I was only targeting the issue i was having!

CO actually states BOTH parents are supposed to participate in providing the child time for homework!  Bm has never followed this!!

We make sure that he does his homework. We make sure he studies. We make sure that he has what he needs for school. He is in 3 extracurriculars ( 2 sports and boyscouts). We  participate in those. We are EOWE and every tuesday. 

Bm is the one who decided every single one of those extracurriculars. Then she dropped paying her half and taking the kid to them or scheduling any extracurriculars on her parenting time. ( we pay half or more of the extracurriculars tho NOTHING is stated in the CO about them). 

She gets a pretty big chunk of DH paycheck.  Always sends the kid to our house in small clothes. Never buys him shoes or gives him haircuts. (See my other posts for these things). The CO states she must. Ss12 has everything he needs at our house. 

Ss12 is also expected to take care of all his siblings when she is not home. This is exacerbated by the fact that she just had baby number 4. Then after the siblings he is expected to do chores and make the other kids do chores.  Cps was called on her awhile back( anonymous caller we still dont know eho it was) when things got really bad ( yeah worse than THIS!)and all they did was make sure she has enough food in the fridge! No followup no nothing!

She will fight us tooth and nail for custody and it is a battle we are not willing to put ss12 thru as he has had so many changes in the past few years already. 

 

 

 

 

 

Maria10's picture

The relative newness of the gaslighting( last 3 weeks) makes me think it might be stress related. I am trying to see if he will try to use this method again( we did have a conclusive talk but who knows circumstances might change Lol)

Dh is normally pretty reasonable except when it comes to his BM1. She uses the guilttrip and he falls for it. If you see my other posts all she has to so is say " its only your kid" and he jumps at the ready. She has even used this to get him to buy her beer one night. He sees these as iaolated incidents and refuses to acknowledge the larger pattern.

If he does use this gaslighting  method again I now have disengagement. It will not be pleasant for him(i am pretty involved if you couldn't tell. My involvment is a choice not an obligation.). See how he reacts when circumstances( not just BMs mind) DO change. It will be difficult to not say" HAHA Circumstances have changed!".