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SD thinks I hate her mom

New_to_this's picture

So, SD15 told DH that she felt like I was "against" her mother. She didn’t want him telling me. I guess she just wanted to let it out to her dad, plus I think she wanted attention from him. I'm not sure exactly how DH responded to this, but I'm sure he handled it properly. And, of course, DH was going to tell me. We don't keep things like that from each other.

DH knows my true feelings. I'm not "against" BM. From the start, I wanted BM to be the type of mother the kids needed. I still do. Honestly, I don't want to be these kids' mom. They have a mother, which they remind me of when they don't get what they want, so why would I want that role. But, of course I hate her BM. She never took responsibility for the kids physically or financially. She knew that DH was afraid of losing his kids (I don’t know why), so she manipulated him constantly with no boundaries and I was involved in this for nearly two years. I've aged and gotten gray hair from all of this. Meanwhile, all I could do was try and give these kids the structure and stability that their mother didn't provide them through my own manipulation of getting their father to man up to his ex and provide it himself regardless of her. It wasn't just me...DH's therapist and friends were also constantly advising him to get a lawyer and get custody of these kids – she just was not a fit mother. I spent those two years trying to convince DH that life had to change, that we couldn't live the way we were with BM in our lives.

Then, things did change. BM screwed herself by not following the custody agreement (she left the country for over a year) and therefore lost physical custody of the kids. We finally had the upper hand. We had a good routine with the kids since they had been solely with us for over a year. They were prospering and she could no longer manipulate DH. Without being able to manipulate DH, she calmed down. Now, I hardly hear anything about her from DH. She is now like an aunt to her kids, not a mother. And, I think she prefers it that way. Just like before, when we offer her additional opportunities to spend time with the kids, she doesn't take it, but then calls the kids up and tells them that she can't see them because of the custody arrangement, but she misses them greatly. I think that she thinks that we bad mouth her in front of the kids, but that is far from the truth. We never tell the kids that we offer her a chance to see them and that she declines. In fact, we would try not to tell the kids when she says she plans to see them until the day of because she cancels on them so often. If anything, we generally make her look better than she actually is. She does all the damage herself, but blames everyone else.

So, I bring it up to SD and she gets really embarrassed. I explain to her that I'm not "against" her mom. That DH and I have rules in our house and how we raise them, which are different from her mom's rules and how she raises them. That, I cannot be objective when listening to her talk about things that her mother does, so she should instead bring those things up to her father or her therapist. (The things that her mother does to SD that cause my blood to boil basically involves treating SD like her best friend – She tells her 15 year old daughter about her boyfriends, dates, pregnancy scares, infidelities, etc.) I tell her that I also don"t want to hear about her mother's past life with DH. That is the past and I'm sure DH would not want me to constantly bring up my ex-boyfriends, so when SD brings up her dad's relationship with her BM, it's the same thing. DH come into the room at this point and said to her that he also really did not want to hear about her mother's life unless it was directly related to SD and SS. He also joked that although I may not hate BM, he sure does.

SD seemed to figure that now that she's brought up her mother she can do what she wanted, which was talk about her mother's specific problems. I’m not sure how I should feel. She's 15 and likes to talk. I know she wants to be able to tell me these things, but I sure as hell don't want to hear it and I won't stand around and hear it anymore. I've done enough of that in these three plus years. She says she doesn't want to talk to her therapist and I know DH is not going to give her the advice that she's seeking. She's seeking me out as a confidante and I won't have it. I'm finally in an okay place in this relationship and I'm not going back to the hell that it was before. So, SD will just need to find a listening friend, get comfortable with her therapist (though I'm sure SD doesn't want to tell her therapist because her therapist probably already thinks poorly of BM), or manipulate her dad to listen to her. Whatever she decides, It's not going to be me that she can talk to.

Comments

New_to_this's picture

Lol! I think SD has some sort of wishful thinking that she can talk to me about her mother, like her mother talks to her about her boyfriends and that I'll have some nice cordial relationship with her mother. I'm trying to keep BM and my life as separate as possible!

hereiam's picture

If she thinks you are "against" her BM, why does she want to confide in you about her mother's personal life and problems?

New_to_this's picture

Right. I don't think she really thinks I'm against her BM, as much as she wants to be able to talk to me about her BM. Or, maybe it was that she was trying to have a heart to heart with her dad. Though he also doesn't want to hear any of this - he's just better at not getting emotional like I would. I think part of it is getting the attention that she wants at this stage in her life. But, I'm not falling back into that drama.