Do secondary divorces affect coparenting?
Hey there! Hope all is well and everyone is enjoying the holiday weekend. Thanks to everyone for reading my story as it comes and the awesome advice that is helping me navigate this life. My new question is do secondary divorces affect coparenting relationships, if so in what ways?
For those that haven't seen my posts, my awful behaved SD freaked out when DH and I had our 4th child but first girl together. She refuses to speak or see my DH and there has been heavy PAS going on for years. Well recently, BM kept telling my DH that he needed to prioritize SD and her by making time for the 3 of them together in order to get SD to see him again. BM is asking for lunch/dinner dates and time to just hang out just for them. The day after we had our daughter BM freaked out on my husband for not caring about them and he wasn't trying prioritizing their family of 3. She also started demanding more money weekly.
BM married in 2012 after a few weeks long romance with a man in the military. She went on to have 4 more kids with her new husband. I told my DH that I thought it was disrespectful and was uncomfortable about her demands for him to start spending alone time with her and SD. He agreed and told BM that he has a family and will not be setting up time for the 3 of them together only SD. I always wondered what BM's husband thought about this and now I guess I feel like I know since he has just filed for divorce from BM.
BM has not told us the news but upon DH checking their open court case status and seeing if BM filed anything new online, BM had a new case under her name for dissolution of marriage. It shows her husband filed about 2 weeks ago. My DH thought it was funny because SD's step dad used to insert himself into their coparenting and threaten my husband when he refused to give up his visitation time. Now my DH says the step dad will have to deal with BM as a BM and not a wife so he will get to experience first hand how awful BM is to coparent with.
BM spent years telling SD that her step dad loved her more and was more of a father to her than my DH. She told SD if she ever wanted to do anything with us she needed to ask her step dad and her first since they are her "real" parents. She also had all SD's text messages forwarded to her and the step dad's phone so he would intercept all communication between SD and DH. SD told DH how much she loves her step dad and he is her real dad and she wants him to adopt her. SD said she was lucky to have a true dad because all she ever knew was a "deadbeat".
I'm now wondering how this will affect coparenting even how it will further affect SD. My SD has been estranged over 6 months and my husband keeps reaching out to hear nothing back. He has no clue how she is handling this or if she even knows. BM has yet to speak on the matter but judging by the past few weeks of her telling my husband he wasn't prioritizing "their family of 3" I now feel like she had ulterior motives. I just want to know or get an idea how this is going to change things. Sometimes I question if BM will come around and start pushing SD on us so she can be free to go wild like she used to in the past. Or will she keep SD away and have her stay home with her Grandma all the time to help take care of the younger kids like she has been the past 5 years or so. Has anyone else experienced this? How did it change the coparenting dynamic or affect skid?
BM has no family of three.
BM has no family of three. Her DH just filed for divorce.
Your DH has not been part of her family for years.
Delusional apparently.
The fact is, BM's 8 yr
The fact is, BM's 8 yr marriage produced 4 kids and now BM's husband wants out. In anyone's book, that's unsettling for all kids concerned including your SD.
My own DD's marriage ended 5 yrs ago, they had 2 young children at the time, who are now 6 and 10. She made a decision not to look for another partner, but her exH started living with someone else almost immediately. This relationship ended a few months ago, now the boys are having to come to term with not seeing their father's partner or her son, any more - I understand they were quite fond of her. They have gone through a difficult period as a result, not helped by their father moving back in with his parents.
It might keep her busy and her attention on him for awhile
I hope so anyways. She's got to PAS those four kids with husband #2 and that's got to take a lot of energy.
That's what I'm thinking. She
That's what I'm thinking. She threw a fit when she found out about the birth of the baby and told DH he was responsible for ruining their daughter. DH wasn't having any of it and put his foot down ever since she has been absolutely silent. She went from texting him constantly to go hang out for the sake of their daughter to nothing. Now she has to deal with poisoning her kids against her soon to be ex husband so she will be pretty busy.
One thing I’m curious about
Where was she planning to stash her other kids while she played out her happy first family of 3 fantasy?! Lock them away in the cupboard for a bit while mummy goes to la la land with big sis?
She leaves the kids with
She leaves the kids with whoever will take them. She splits them all up for days at a time or when she is out of options SD and grandma are responsible for the whole bunch.
Ah, so that explains a lot.
Ah, so that explains a lot. It's not uncommon at all for someone with a personality like BM's to try to circle back to an ex when her current relationship goes sour. BM here went complaining to her ex-husband when DH left her - and she had alienated her daughter from that ex.
Your DH needs to keep his boundaries tight with BM and hang in there. This is why BM is so freaked out about you and DH having a daughter, something only she had done for DH previously. She may well allow SD to come back if she meets a new man and wants time for him.
We had a similar situation
When BM divorced the replacement husband she had lined up after DH. I think she thought she had a third in line at the time, but that fell through, and then Sks got ugly winner and told her they didn't want to meet all her men, so that was a thing.
DH actually used her second divorce as cause to reopen custody. SK wanted to move to our house, too, so between the two, he had an excellent case. HCBM stretched it out for 2.5 years (!), but finally agreed for older kiddo, which resulted in him getting primary custody of their older kid and 50/50 overall.
I don't think it hurt that HCBM's XH and his XW were on our side, both willing to testify to her horrible behavior...
BM's relationships always had
BM's relationships always had an effect on the boys and/or DH. When she's single or mad at her boytoys, she's flirty and up DH's arse about the stupidest things. When she's happily coupled, she either is cold to DH or she's pawning the boys off on DH. She's also usually worse off financially when she's partnered than when she's single.
YSS also shows signs of distress based on her relationships. You can tell when her relationships aren't going well because YSS starts getting really anxious and angry (likely mirroring her behavior). He also took it really hard when BM divorced XH#2, since she billed him as "Daddy" for most of YSS's life. I think that has damaged his trust in relationships, to the point that he's not sure if he ever wants to get married or have kids or live with anyone (he's 14 so it could be age, but he and OSS both seem really hesistant to consider a future that involves another human being).
So, yeah, I think it can affect co-parenting.
That is really sad those poor
That is really sad those poor kids. Yeah BM seems sort of unhinged lately and all this talk about their family together and spending alone time together speaks volumes to me. My DH just thinks it is funny and it's karma coming back to bite her in the butt for all her shitty behavior. As far as SD, my husband doesn't know what to think about it because she won't talk to him. BM promised SD that they were buying a new home on several acres of land and SD would have her very own bedroom, bathroom, and office. She made this big deal about it being their forever home and now those plans are gone. BM moved everyone back in with her Grandparents last year so it's been a house with 11 people under 1 roof for a long time. Even though SD is a pain the constant moving and change of everything can't be good for her. DH and I have lived in our home for almost 10 years and consistency is really important to us for the kids. We thought we could provide that one constant in her life but she could care less. It's a sad situation all around.
None of this has anything to
None of this has anything to do with coparenting or SD's relationship with your husband. The BM wants to break up your marriage and is trying to use SD to do it. There is absolutely no reason for the 3 of them to spend time together. Hopefully, he is smarter than that. If my husband entertained that kind of trash, that would be it for me. He knows it too.
Agree
Agree
With BM about to experience
With BM about to experience the absolute failure of her second marriage and expanding her failed family performance I think that you and DH need to take the time to sit down, brainstorm her most likely efforts to interfere in your life, marriage and family. This has to include her most likely manipulations of SD. You and DH need to do as much as you can to take SD off of the table as BM's pawn. This will be painful for everyone. But... SD needs to have her nose rubbed in BM's manipulative and failed marriage stench. SD is old enough to hear the common denominator speech about how her mother is the common denominator in running off both of her dads. Full court press to put this entirely on BM and keep SD focused on BM as the root cause of her own pain and frustrations.
Though I am no expert on the BM in your blended family world, you and DH are. It is pretty obvious that BM's recent tactic of referring to her, SD, and DH as "our family of 3" that she has every intention of attempting to reconcile with DH and get him back.
You and DH need to be ready to laugh in BM's face as brutally as necessary to get her to STFU and to crawl under her twice divorced, root cause of her failed families rock and stay there.
It may be time for DH to sit down with SD and inform her that her mom is getting divorced again. Show her a print out of the court schedule, and let SD know that he understands that will be a very hard thing for SD and that he, you, and her younger WwCorgi7 sibs are there for her.
A balance between zero tolerance of any crap from BM and SD and being sensitive and reasonably supportive of SD's upcoming emotional train wreck over losing the "Daddy" that BM has been marketing as her REAL dad is IMHO the way to go. In that balance I would ere on the side of zero tolerance over tolerating any crap from either of them.
DH needs to be sure to keep the message that there is no DH, BM, SD family. It has been over for more than a decade and BM needs to knock her shit completely off.
That you, DH and your own kids are the stable element in SD's world is about to give your side a huge advantage in the ongoing BM shit show of manipulation and playing of SD as her pawn for polluting your life and family.
Use it to full advantage.
As for the STBX StepDad.... what are the odds of DH contacting him to start to build an alliance for getting BM under control? I have a good friend who built a friendship with his XW's XBF who gave him a deposition on the XW's crap. The XBF met with my friend's attorney and spilled volumes on the XW. Interestingly, XW and the then XBF reconciled and eventually married. The XBF has begged for my friend to destroy the deposition. He of course has not destroyed the deposition. Just in case.
BM is starting to give you and DH a whole lot of leverage. Use it.
IMHO of course
Good luck.