To the Scottish gal living in Spain wondering about moving in with her boyfriend and his 11 year old son....

I see your thread is deleted. I had typed out a response for you but when I hit post there was no thread anymore. I have no idea why the thread went away but maybe you're still browsing here. I'll post my answer anyway. I hope you come back.

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"You are wise to think about all these practicalities before proceeding. So few do. So you're ahead of the game. You have, indeed, identified a key list of what ends up driving stepparents to this board in great distress.

The dishes: I can attest this will drive you out of your mind. An 11 year old who has no chores or no expectation he is to help maintain the house turns into a teen who doesn't and then into a failure-to-launch 20 year old you can't budge off your couch. In the meantime, you will resent deeply your nice clean kitchen you used to have and even your own ability to prepare food for yourself becasue a giant stack of crap is filling the sink. You can't find the pan you want and you feel too much anger to wash what the playstation warriors have let slide for days. You will eat out more and hate the whole thing.

Your boyfriend has already shown you a dynamic that is lethal to relationships. That is that when the child is there, the world stops and you are expected to shrink yourself into someone small. You are not allowed to have any needs or expectations of your own during this time. This will mess with your mental health. It is at least part of the reason you were sobbing. You may not have named it yet but it does indeed feel terrible to be shrunk down from the exciting, valued partner you were yesterday to someone who has to be shunted to the couch or out of sight altogether etc today.

Some people will say you had him all week so now you have to step aside for the child's time. But that is not the problem at all. It is the nauseating whiplash of being wooed and desired one day to being cast off and stripped of dignity the next. It leaves you in a sobbing heap. Yes, yes, it does. Your boyfriend should be able to integrate his relationship with you with his role as Papa. That's what normal parents do. Moms and dads still married to each other do show children that the marriage is important and child is not center of attention at all times. And healthy steps do this, too. But you are right off the bat expected to cut off your needs and shrink. It feels worse and worse the longer you do this. It is a bad red flag.

I would also not be jumping at the chance to live with a man "because he has to move anyway." His invitation to you should be about his strong feelings for you, his desire to create a future with you, his urgent need to keep you and be with you. You need a very strong bond to survive and thrive in steplife and this "landlord is forcing me out" bit doesn't demonstrate that.

I would politely decline until the feelings are stronger AND you have been integrated into the boy's life in your true character as his partner, not his sofa warmer. Just tell him "I don't think we're ready yet." This should alert him that he needs to up his game. If he flat out asks you why, tell him it will be a shock to the boy to sleep in his own bed. You don't want to be responsible for that. Should motivate Dad to move the boy into his own bed all on his won. Wash rinse repeat. I wouldn't say all the things at once. Men never react well to that. Just keep it light and cheerful and mention one thing.

Hopefully over time this process will bring you 2 closer together and will put the boy on to a better trajectory as well as reconfigure the dynamic among the 3 of you.

If it doesn't work, then it was never going to work. Better to find out now, save yourself years of misery.

Welcome to ST. Glad you came. You're doing great by looking at the realities before diving in. Let us know how it goes.

Oh, also, kudos for the 2 extra languages! Awesome!"