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SS telling dad the weekends are “too long”

Biostep7777's picture

DH was taking the kids back to their mom's this morning and SS starting saying he feels like the weekends at dad's house are "too long" DH tried to probe a bit and find out what's up but he just kept saying he doesn't know. He just feels like it's too long. DH just basically said this is the schedule and we are sticking to it but let me know what I can do to help you feel better. At what point though do you give up? I mean, HCBM is awful. Like.... over the top awful. DH is fighting with all his might to hang on to these kids but they just want to be with mom. They don't want to be here. I could see if they were abused or mistreated but my god! These kids are treated like royalty! They have everything they could ever need/want. They have friends in the neighborhood, they have beautiful rooms, games, electronics, DH spends so much time with them. They do fun things, they go to friends houses and have friends over, we spent time together, cook together. I mean, my kids frinds all want us to adopt them because we have such a loving home but these are the only two kids that just don't want to be here. There's NO REASON. Except for their mother alienating them. When do you finally say enough and give up?? This is soooo stressful! 

Survivingstephell's picture

I suppose spending all your time on sports and not going away on trips is getting to them.   I'd probe a bit more and have dad ask if they didn't have sports what they would want to instead.  There's nothing wrong with helping them figure out how their mom is controlling all aspects of life for them.  How long does dad want to continue to play BM 's games?   
The thing is that when you drop the rope, my DH did in response to violence,  there is a mourning period that your DH will go through and he will be no fun to be around.  Get him into therapy and you won't be as burdened with nursing him through it if he does decide to let go.  

Biostep7777's picture

Well apparently that's all they want to do is sports. Nothing else. So being here and spending even an hour with us is "too much" I don't know!!! DH agreed to these sports (not all of them but he's taking them to the things him and BM agreed on) We don't play games because we are just trying to live our lives and make the best of what we can control on our end but it's CONSTANT games with her. That's all she does! So we just can't keep up with her antics. We just can't. 

CastleJJ's picture

My SS is turning 9 this year and he has made comments like this, that visitations are too long. We see this kid for 6 weeks a year on a long distance schedule, with the maximum stint being 2 weeks. We have asked in the past if he wants more time with DH and he said "BM said I can't handle being away from her for longer than 2 weeks so no."

It's PAS at its finest. Don't allow your DH to "guilty Dad" where he pulls out all the stops to make visitation fun. It doesn't work in the long run and skids grow to expect it. If DH can't shower them with gifts, money, trips or fun things, they will refuse to visit. Don't let DH fall into this trap, it makes the grieving harder. 

My husband and I have gone through the mourning of loving SS and BM manipulating and abusing us by exploiting the love we have for him. We have gone through the mourning of knowing SS doesn't love us like he does her; that he doesn't miss us when he is away from us for 46 weeks of the year, but can't handle being away from BM for longer than 2 weeks. We have gone to court and lost and mourned the failure of the mother favoring system, which continues to allow PAS. We have experienced the grief of feeling like we have failed skid. In reality, we did all we could. It was out of our control. 

My DH and I kind of dropped rope. We don't participate in anything school, sports, or medical related. We leave all the actual parenting to BM and just take SS during our court ordered visitation. When she emails about an update, DH just responds "Thanks for the update." We don't question or challenge anything anymore. If she screws SS up through her parenting, it's on her. It was just too painful and too difficult to try to coparent with BM. 

We know a time will come where SS won't want to visit anymore and when that day comes, DH said he will drop rope fully. He can't handle dealing with BM; she has caused a lot of trauma, depression and anxiety for us. DH always says he doesn't know how he hasn't dropped rope already. I see that day coming when SS is around age 12 if not sooner. But if SS ever came back as an adult, DH has all the court documents, documentation of allegations, and thousands of emails to prove that DH fought for SS, but BM was the reason they didn't have a strong relationship. 

Biostep7777's picture

Yeah she tells SS "you are old enough to tell dad how you feel and he should respect your choice" well when it comes to COURT ORDERED schedules, there is no choice. She is making these kids believe that dad is "forcing" them to come here and that she's tried everything and he just won't budge. Ugh!!! DH is so hurt. 

CastleJJ's picture

Then DH needs to rebutt BM's comment. He needs to tell the kids that there is a court order, ruled by the judge that sets visitation, NOT DH. But he also needs to ask if they still want to visit and that they need to be honest. If I remember, your skids are older, so the judge may take their wants into consideration due to their ages. 

I wouldn't fight for kids who don't want to be there. It is a waste of money and it doesn't allow your family or DH to heal to keep going through the motions when kids don't want to be there. He can absolutely drop rope if they don't want to keep visiting, but they need to know that there will be no more visitation going forward. NONE. 

If he does drop rope, he is going to need time to grieve. You all will. Your situation has been highly traumatic and you will all need time to decompress and get to a new normal that doesn't involve daily BM shenanigans and skid troubles. Therapy helps. 

Lifer33's picture

By chance, with a text hotline of stuff they're Missing at hcbm House? Or perhaps she just fills them with such things before and after their visit? 

Biostep7777's picture

Yes they have phones and they text the entire time. The kids are constantly asking for picture of their dog at mom's house. They have never once asked for a picture of the puppy at our house that THEY HELPED PICK OUT. So they don't even like their dog here but they LOOOOOVE the dog at mom's  house? What the hell? There's not really anything they are missing out on. We live less then 15 min apart. They still get to see the same friends, go to the same sports ect... that they would at her house. Although, some of their friends don't come here because she talks bad about my husband and I guess the parehts believe her lies. Who knows! We always have a house full of kids here! My kids and all their friends and the neighborhood kids love our house! But ONLY stepkids and selected friends that happen to be friendly with mom thinks there's something wrong with our home. It's sickening!!! 

Lifer33's picture

Kids having phones young is just perfect for pas from bm. Ss here would keep saying he's bored, or all of a sudden his mum would be coming to collect him early without our knowledge. Turns out she was constantly texting him pictures of stuff she'd bought him that day, step dad would be messaging what a big fat pizza awaits when he gets home. One day his mum messages him that they are out with his step sister chosing the family a rabbit. Really? Is that something you'd not wait for him to be included in? His face just went like a slapped bum the rest of day and he kept asking what the time was (to go home)

Dh pulled bm sorry backside into meditation over that n other pas. No more contacting him or the phone gets taken. It's been thousand percent better since Xmas now, he's not once mentioned her, them or being bored 

JRI's picture

Tell your DH those weekends are too long for you, too.  Lol.

Finally, a topic where you and SS can agree!

Biostep7777's picture

RIGHT!!??? I honestly wish he would just give up. I can't stand it. My kids miss their step siblings though. It's really heartbreaking for the kids. 

Rags's picture

You and DH have to commit to purging BM and any of her influence from your home and family.  The "I don't know" bullshit is pure BM PASing your Skids from their father and the family you and your DH have created.

Time to confront the Skids on this bullshit and put it directly on their BM.

"I am sorry you feel that way son, but, you will visit per the schedule and we will have our own traditions that are different than what you have at your other home.  You need to clearly understand that and enjoy yourselves here regardless of what is said when you go back to your mom's."

Lather.............. rinse............... repeat.

Biostep7777's picture

They will scream and cry that it's NOT their mom. She manipulates them so badly they truly feel that these are their own thoughts. She is beyond sick in the head. 

Rags's picture

If she is allowed to worm into their heads unconfronted there is zero chance that they will find clarity and the truth.  Better to confront it and let them cry that mommy is not the problem while continually countering her crap and baring her ass than to let her continue to rot these kid's brains.

IMHO of course.

My SS would return from SpermLand visitation with all kinds of crap that the shallow and polluted end of his gene pool had planted in is head.  At first, we were at a complete loss over how to deal with it.  My DW was convinced that if she would just be nice to them that they would not burden SS with their toxic crap.  Wrong, the more she ignored them, the more crap they loaded SS up with.  Eventually I was able to get the message across that they were taking their frustrations out on SS regardless of how non confrontational she was with them.  When that clarity set it, she went all mama bear on their asses and no infraction they perpetrated went unconfronted as painfully, expensively, and as embarrassingly as we could bring to bear.  They learned to stay under their slime covered rock at the bottom of their shallow and polluted gene pool or suffer.  We supported the kid with the full, complete, and total facts any time he would come home with some crap they had attempted to manipulate him with. 

Eventually he started to recognize when they were lying, manipulating, or loading him up in an effort to demonize his mom or I.  By then he was doing his own research in our Custody/Visitation/Support file cabinette and would call them on their crap immediately rather than bring it home with him.  Our son is now 28yo. He asked me to adopt him when he was 22.  We made that happen.  He has put his SpermClan far behind him and does not expose himself to their crap or tolerate their shit.  They attempted to manipulate him even after he aged out from under the Custody/Visitation/Support CO at 18yo.  That took the form of applying guilt in an effort to get him to have a portion of his pay direct deposited from his USAF income to the SpermGrandParent's account in order to support his three  younger also out of wedlock SpermIdiot spawned half sibs.  After that, he did not speak to them for several years.  Now, he does speak with his younger sister upon occasion.  Spawn #3, his eldest of two half brothers, is in prison and #4 is not far behind #3.  He never speaks with his SpermIdiot.  We are proud of the man that our son is and that he has succeeded in his life as an adult in spite of their shit.

Confront, confront, confront and give the kids the facts. The most effective counter to manipulation is the truth, the facts, and zero tolerance.

IMHO of course.

Dogmom1321's picture

I honestly feel the same SD10 is always asking if she can go back to her BM early. We have 50/50. If it were up to her, she would definitely pick to live with BM. We honestly cannot figure out why. She complains about her older half-brother at her BMs, her new boyfriend, and also his kid. BM works nights and she doesn't even get to see her much when she is there. 

DH is very lax when it comes to parenting SD at our house (no screentime limit, few chores, eating junk food & sodas, etc.) He has guilty dad syndrome for sure. 

We are thinking SDs behaviors/preferences are just years of PASing from BM taking it's toll. Or maybe she just truly dislikes us that much. Either way, that is how it is. 

SD makes it miserable for everyone when she comes over. Constantly complaining, being defiant, asking DH when she can leave. It's exhausting. DH has said "I know what's best for her, so I won't just 'let her' go live with BM" WE have a baby otw and the thought of them going back to court makes my stomach sick. The money and also emotional/mental energy involved. At what point do they just "let it be.?" 

I personally feel on some level, that at least when SD is older, she should be able to decide. Keeping her 50/50 (with guilty parenting that is doing her ZERO favors) is only going to cause resentment in their relationship. I guess that shouldn't be my concern, and not for me to worry about, but SD is sucking the life out of our household. The thought of this lasting 7-8 more years is exhausting. 

Biostep7777's picture

Oh I know!!! It's so hard. I rather them just stay with her. My kids want their step siblings here. My husband wants his kids here. Stepkids don't want to be here. BM doesn't want them here. Who wins here?? Someone will be hurt no matter what. 

Dogmom1321's picture

Have you told DH how you feel and your opinion about the whole situation?

I haven't yet! I am trying to just stay completely out of it so that way I don't get any of the blame... hard to say how long I'll hold my tongue though for!

Also, I don't even want my DS to think "Does ____ don't want to come over because of me?" He should never feel like he's causing a problem for simply exisitng. I think our SD had these tendencies before, but announcing our pregnancy has definitely magnified it. 

Harry's picture

Much power and control?   He was order to come over to his DF hous for visitations   That it, no choice,  No where is it said that SS must be happy all the time.  If BM puts him in sports on DH time.  He might not make it every time.  That called life