The BM tells the children terrible lies about me....
:jawdrop:
This woman hates me, and she is doing her best to make the kids hate me too. She fills the kids heads with lies such as I touch children in 'bad places', she tells them I get little kids taken away, serious stuff that she conjures up in her twisted brain.
The kids (three girls ages 4, 10, 12) are troubled to begin with. The eldest two were adopted at 3 and 5. They were sexually/physically abused by thier biological AND foster parents, as well as being born addicted to meth. They suffer with developmental delays and a certain degree of mental illness.
The experience the girls have spending time with my daughter and I have ALWAYS been positive, happy and fun. So they come for thier visit with thier Dad (my fiance) and I, they have a great time, then they go home and hear constantly what a monster I am.
I have never 'defended' myself, simply allowing their experiences tell the truth. I would never say anything derogatory against thier Mom (to them, or when they could hear).
These kids are SO CONFUSED! They like my daughter and I but are consistently told NOT to like us. They are told that I want to take their Daddy away from them, that I don't want them around...etc, etc, etc, etc.
We are ready to take the next step in our relationship, but we want to do that according to the timeline that is best for all the children. How will it EVER be ok with the kids when thier Mother feeds them these lies?
We have been together more than a year, we prefer to live together a while before getting married. How and when can this transition take place? What should I do about the lies these kids believe about me? Anything at all?
Any and all advice/perspective is greatly appreciated!
Thanks for your time...
You and your OH need to
You and your OH need to correct their perception of you and the things BM has been saying.
What BM is doing is PASing them - this is a form of abuse and its little wonder your sd's are confused when their mother is saying things which no one is denying.
We went through this with my own skid and my DH didnt correct any lies BM told ss because he didnt want to place ss in the middle of his parents/step parents, and the obvious tension that existed however when ss's attitude progressively was getting worse, it was affecting his moods and happiness AND it was affecting me - because BM usually said something nasty and untrue about me. It was affecting our family relationships and I told DH that unfortunately he wasnt being given any choice in correcting ss because it was hurting him and his mother was putting him in that position, not us.
So we would correct the things he would say e.g. "Mum told me that you dont want me around...." US: "No thats not true, if we didnt want you around you wouldnt be sitting here now, nor would your dad be picking you up every weekend..."
You have every right to protect your relationship with these girls and ensure they are aware of the truth. If they ask why their mother is lying/saying these things, then you answer honestly "I think your mother is angry because your dad is with me now and not her. Perhaps these lies make her feel better about herself, but as you know lies arent nice..."
I would also point out that if you dont correct these lies and demonstrate your disapproval of this then your sd's will get a sense that lying (they are probably aware some things are correct) is acceptable and will learn from their mother, something which will remain unchallenged if you and your OH dont correct this and tell them how unacceptable/hurtful it is...
p.s. you wont be bad mouthing BM by doing this either. You are simply telling the truth without being nasty/derogatory about BM.
Thanks so much for sharing
Thanks so much for sharing your experience! This point escpecially opened my eyes, "....and its little wonder your sd's are confused when their mother is saying things which no one is denying."
Also, I would hate for them to think telling lies is acceptable, SOMEONE needs to guide them in the right direction, even if it can't be their BM
How did things turn out with your ss?
Thanks again for your time.
I agree that what the BM is
I agree that what the BM is doing is not correct. I do not agree with telling the children "I think your mother is angry because your dad is with me now..." Please that may be your opinion but in reality you do not know, you are interjecting your opinion, into the situation which is just as terrible as what the BM is doing.
I would respond with "I really don't know why" but I assure you I enjoy you and your company.
Oddly enough, you are blessed
Oddly enough, you are blessed to have older girls who "get it" and lies which are blatant and can be defended. My bf's exw is not so blatant, so we can't say "that is not true." She puts down, shuts out, gets rid of, etc. anything that bf does for his kids. She is sending a message that "Daddy is bad, he does bad things, he does not know what he is doing," etc. when the complete opposite is true. If he did something that she thought was a great idea, she would still poo-poo it, just because he did it. His counselor flat out told him that people like her NEVER change. So while the bm you are dealing with is insane, at least everything is out on the table and not just mind games that can't be explained to little ones. You do need to make sure the girls know the truth. There is a way you can do that without saying bm is lying. They will figure that out on their own. Good luck!
Well once we started
Well once we started correcting what he had been told he perked up, he was less confused and happier. My relationship with him did improve (although at a later stage his mother changed tactics and things deteriorated, however this was nothing to do with putting ss right with what he had been told about me).
My DH also ensured he would talk about me positively to him, particularly when they were alone and would talk about his feelings (when he would say, which was rare as he was more of an introvert) about what his mother was saying.
The Behemoth is totally like
The Behemoth is totally like this. Appears "co-operative" in public but as soon as she's on her own she recruits her entire family to trash GG and me. In the beginning I was 1000% behind GG and tried to warn him of what was going on just below the surface. He would have NONE of it and would prefer to trust the Behemoth and clan over me.
So be it.
Just do your best and if the PAS starts to take hold and biodad won't do anything to back you on it, then you'll either need to disengage or exit the relationship.
This sounds like @my.kids.mom
This sounds like @my.kids.mom the problem we have!! We can do so many positive fun things with the skids and she will turn it into something negative, for example last year we incubated some chicken eggs and I set up a little pen for the chicks in my daughters room and had the skids over, we each chose names for them and it was lovely and all the kiddies loved the experience. They got to hold the chicks, and I let them take the empty egg shells home in a little plastic box that their particular chicks hatched out from and took loads of pics and put some of them on disc so that the skids could have pics of their chicks as they grew. They loved it, the chicks were happy and friendly (and are now happy friendly chooks)and the (s)kids all love them. BM however told the skids that I was cruel for "shoving my camera in the chicks faces and stressing them out" ...er zoom lens + curious friendly chicks = cool pics! Also that I was disgusting for having chicks in the house... like I was going to let them run riot over my daughters room or something! And generally tried to make negative comments, purely because she knows how much the kids loved the whole experience. She wouldnt even let them bring the little egg shells into the house and they "accidentaly" got blown away outside the front door! ...But its ok, because I gave them a load of fresh eggs to take home and get mum to cook for them for breakfast last wknd
Same thing when we took them to the Tower of London. I'm a bit of a history buff, and was telling them all cool facts about the Tudors etc which they went home and raved about to BM, and took home a family pic we had done of the 5 of us (me, him, SD, SS & my BD). As it turns out, BM is also into the tudors.... So the next time the kids saw me, they had all these clearly rehearsed "facts" (or made up rubbish that BM told them) to tell me about Henry VIII trying to make out she knows more than me or something....
She also prevents us from doing fun things with them too, apparently camping (I go every year with my BD) is too dangerous and they arent allowed over night stays with their dad because he's in a house share and she doesnt know the other people in the house, even tho hes been living with these people for nearly 3 years!!
She wouldnt even let us have them for the day to take them to the seaside last summer, and told them that daddy said he didnt want to take them out and was working instead!! ...Daddy told them the truth that he had asked mum if he could take them out for the day and mum said no... he asked her infront of the kids and she text him her standard reply of "no they are doing something"!! (it turns out that they went for a walk around their village that morning and also played video games)
Sorry for my language, but the woman is an ARSEHOLE.
We have dealt with it with BM
We have dealt with it with BM and SS and SD. SD is out of our lives for now, having been completely PAS's by BM. SS is not. He will say things and we just counter with the truth and that we don't know why she would say that. She lied to him about a lot of things and DH finally started showing him emails that she sent. He screened them, but when she called SS a liar, DH had to show him. I still disagree with the level it went to. But, BM forced DH's hand. Now SS doesn't want to live with her and is with us full time.
You have to counter the statements they make every single time with the truth. Don't be mean, just truthful. I always finish it with "Why do you think your mom would say that?"
Makes them think....
I sure appreciate all of the
I sure appreciate all of the feedback I've received. I appreciate everyone's perspective and experience.
Thanks for taking the time to help me sort this out! I'm CERTAIN I will need more advice as time goes on in this crazy journey of step-parenting and blending families.