1st Post, curious about boundaries b/w exwife and my husband

Forums:

Hi there! The background: I'm a 24 yr old female, married for 4 months so far to a great guy who has been divorced about 2 years. I have a 6 yr old stepson. All is pretty easy going in our situation; the exwife is relatively friendly and tries not to make things difficult. She has some slight control issues with my husband, but that is an entirely seperate topic!

I've run into a few issues since I've become a stepmother. My issues mostly lie with the ex and figuring out when to put my foot down and when to grin and bear it. Like I said, it's pretty easy-going... I'm lucky I don't have to deal with a psycho ex. But I suppose that sometimes everything seems a little too friendly. When she's around, she and my H will joke about things from when they were together. At Easter they talked about their first house together in front of my sister, her BF and kids. It was enough to make my sis uncomfortable. She's a divorced mom and thought it was completely inappropriate. But she also wouldn't think having an ex around is appropriate at all. I just tell myself (and everyone else) that it's for my SS sake; my H says all the time that it is important for his son to grow up seeing that his parents get along. My H is extremely pleasant to his ex, and he acts as though it's so as not to "make waves". He worries if he's anything but completely compliant that she'll be spiteful and make it more difficult to see his son. So when she tweaks the schedule in her favor and complains if he has some switching to do... he doesn't speak up b/c he's afraid of her. Again, I have seen this woman to be nothing but pleasant and simply concerned with her son at all times. I guess I just don't know her well enough. Friends and family of my H say that she has always sort of undermined his role as a father... just enough to make it seem like her role is more important. So I guess my first question is, what is appropriate conversation for exes? I don't want to be a jealous person, but I don't want to be disrespected.

This is all extremely difficult and confusing for me, because there are no BIG, difficult issues. I feel like those are almost easier to fix. There are just several minor issues...

I also read tidbits from an awesome book called Ex-Etiquette. I sampled it on 'google book'... it answers a lot of questions involving divorce, remarriage and stepfamily. Maybe the book will answer my Q's, I just haven't read it all yet lol!

welcome!

You sound like you are much in the same boat as me, except that my DH was married to ex for 10 years and we are all a bit older, but the skids are still young 7 and 9. But in our situation too, the ex is not psycho in the sort of way that you hear about on this site, she is a relatively normal and "nice" person who wants the best for her kids and takes good care of them. But after 4.5 years with DH and 1 year of marriage, boundaries with ex are still a continuing issue, because ex wants everyone to be one big happy family and she doesn't understand that certain behaviors are no longer appropriate as part of the ex-spouse co-parenting relationship.

Over time I have talked gently and not-so-gently to my DH about this; we went to pre-marital counseling about this; and the good news is that lots has changed. It's still not perfect, by any means (I'm pretty unhappy with DH right now, in fact, and disgusted by certain BM behaviors). But I try to work on ways to approach this constructively, help my DH understand where I'm coming from and what behaviors from him are needed to meet my needs, which are important. Respect for the SM as a new wife is very, very important; so is keeping a cool head and working through issues over time.

There are a few resources out there on the web re: co-parenting communication that you might find useful to share with your DH. The gist is that even when the exes are "friendly" co-parenting communication should be relatively "business-like" for two reasons: (1) because "too friendly" (i.e. good emotional) communications opens the door to negative emotional communications that is too much like the marital relationship that didn't work out, and thus creates conflict and is bad for the kids; and (2) out of respect for the new marriage, and to avoid conflict in that relationship that is bad for the kids. Cordial and "friendly" is one thing, friendship/emotional intimacy is another.

In your situation I think the conversation you describe was inappropriate. The best I can say is try to continue to see the big picture to keep yourself sane, and work with your DH as gently as possible to help him change *his* behavior, i.e., him not responding to inappropriate subjects of conversation at joint events and artfully changing the subject, out of respect for you.

You sound balanced and strong. This will take time and courage, and lots of support and growth from both your DH and you. The key is for you two to be a team.

Welcome to the site and for my own sake I say please keep posting, b/c I need more "gray area" folks like me around!

Thanks for the substantial

Thanks for the substantial response! I appreciate the input about "business-like" interaction. For the most part, this is the case. Email exchanges regard scheduling or their child only. I guess it's just when we get into family gatherings that this gets blurry. Esp. gatherings involving her family... there is so much history there, you just can't control what 5 or 6 people want to bring up or talk about. Her parents, siblings etc... there is always some story coming up about their past. I am going to post about this somewhere else but thanks very much for the response!

It depends....

It depends on the context of the conversation I guess.. Myself and my ex husband remained friends and family for years after we divorced and I remarried that is until he married my ex best friend, who was also his little brothers ex wife.. Now I have not spoken to my ex husband in 2 years and he has nothing to do with our daughters at all..

Myself and my ex used to talk and joke about our history in front of our kids and with my ex hsuband present..Didn't bother my ex husband at all! I am still close to my ex husbands family, in fact, HIS mother was just here and spent 12 days with our family in Germany. In that time she and I talked alot about my ex, our history, and issues we have with him..Again..doesn't bother my DH at all..

It's a part of your DH's history..Him and EX have a history and their conversations doesn't sound inappropriate to me at all. I don't feel that you were being disrespected, at least, it doesn't sound that way to me..Sounds like they have remained good friends and that is best for their daughters..

Now if their being "too friendly" that's a different matter..

Been There

Although the BM in my case is a demented twit, my husband was REALLY sweet to her and she to him, almost like they were still in love. I found out that from many arguments with my H that he was afraid taht she would take the kids away for good. She also acted like she was oh so concerned about the kids until I put my foot down and told my H that he had to stop talking to her like they were lovers. She would call H to tell him about her day at work using the excuse that she would be a better mother if she had a way to vent. I finally told her to call her own friends and that she was more than welcome to talk about the kids and only the kids when she called. My H realized that she was only trying to control him and finally stopped. It took about two years all total. The most important thing that helped me was to never let HER know how her behavior effected me. I always laughed at her and never let her know how bad she crawling under my skin. It angered her greatly but hey, that's just not my problem. Love all my kids.