Am I making the right choice? A very long post!
First let me start off by introducing myself. I am a 19 year old college student who madly fell in love with a man 12 years my elder when I was (barely) legal. I started Community College a little bit early when I was 17 and him and I became good friends from the beginning. I had a very tough home life and a few days after my 18th birthday I moved in with my boyfriend. He has a 9 year old daughter and because of that we kept who I was to him under raps for about a month before we told her, first I was just a roommate. I am the first girl he has ever introduced to his daughter as I was the first girl he has been in a relationship with since his 7 year relationship with his daughter's mom ended (had been around 8 years since it ended). At first it was very difficult because his daughter was a total brat when he wasn't around and an angel when he was. I am seriously convinced she's got a problem with lying, boy does she like to lie! Anyways, we got trough it and it wasn't long before she started liking me, a lot. I am one of those people that kids always love so I knew how to approach her. She now loves me so much she begs to stay with me instead of her mom during the week. I help her with school work, make her dinner, wash her clothes, do her nails, I act like her mom. I didn't mind it but now I am having second thoughts. First of all I am 19 years old, I don't want to be a stay at home mom and that is what my boyfriend wants me to be. I feel like 3 days a week is overwhelming but not my boyfriend was me to have all 5 days by myself. We had talked about having her full time before but I never realized that meant me alone not "us". Because my boyfriend makes so much more money than me he wants me to quit my job and devote myself to taking care of him and his daughter. I would go to school in the morning then pick her up after school and spend the whole day with her. He goes to school full time and works full time so the earliest he will get home will be after 10 PM when she is already in bed. I mentioned it to him and he said he knew he wouldn't see her and because of that would push to completely remove any custody from her mother so we would have her all 7 days. First of all I think taking full custody almost completely alone would be scary for any stepmoms not just young ones but that's not the only problem. I am ready to transfer to a big university and while he "supports me" going to the best premed program possible he guild trips me if I plan to even go out of the county. I have always dreamed of traveling and spending a semester abroad but he says it's not fair unless he can leave his daughter with me alone for a few months while he goes away. Hello! She's your daughter! It's different, I hadn't even met her a year and a half ago. I am sacrificing my life plans for him and his daughter and I would be okay with it if we were married and I had security in the relationship but I don't. I have told him marry me and I'll stay here for them, no regrets, I love them. However, he says he does not believe in traditional marriage (usually he refers to alimony as a example) and accuses me of not being committed since I won't just take cohabitation for the rest of my life. I've also always dreamed of someday having children but he says he won't help me with it if we have one. He says that he has done it before and wont do it again and warns me that since I'll have a career I better have money for nannies. After all of this I think why stay and sacrifice my whole youth if I will never get what I want? Because of his daughter, she loves me so much and I love her. She is so incredibly sensitive that she still cries about one of her friends dogs that died years ago (she has therapy because of how sensitive she is) if I left I feel it would devastate her. I don't want to hurt her and I don't want to hurt him and yes I am very much in love with him as well. It is so hard to make the right decision. I feel so selfish even saying I want to leave to be "young". How do I know what's right? For you stepmoms that have been in this situation in the past, what would you advice? Would you change anything? I would love to hear your stories.
Just for reference she does have a mother who very much wants to be in her life. She is not a bad mother but she is not great so my bf wants to cut her out completely (he views her as bad).
i only read the first
i only read the first sentence and i stopped.
because my answer is run for the hills. now. fast.
I should have stopped reading
I should have stopped reading at I'm 19,but did not. I couldn't make it pass the part about him wanting to leave kid with you for a few weeks while he travels abroad.
This guy is looking for a full time nanny and maid who he gets to have sex with. He doesn't want you to work or go anywhere because he wants to control you.
Get out of that relationship ASAP. Go to school, do the semester abroad and date men your age without children.
Leave, N O W.
Leave, N O W.
You are 19 and this guy
You are 19 and this guy sounds like a controlling freak. Take a step back and look at what he's expecting.
I was 20 when I met my husband who is also 12 years older, but I NEVER gave up the security and freedom of having a job/income and my husband NEVER asked me to, he knows I'd deck his teeth in if he did. He helps me almost 50/50 with our daughter, etc. Don't. You have your entire life ahead of you, don't waste it on a guy who wants to fulfill his dreams but not yours.
Well he is smart. I just quit
Well he is smart. I just quit one of my jobs that I hated and he turn it into "now you won't have to work so much and you'll have so much time to study, you can focus on school". Which would be true if I didn't have his daughter with me...
Yeah, he's smart enough to
Yeah, he's smart enough to manipulate you into the stay at home maid he wants. Girl, you are better than this. You know it. Because you have to realize you might not even finish school and once you do, he might not let you pursue a career.
How can you want to be a with a man, above all else, who won't share in the joy of raising a child together because he's been there and done that? How could you do this to yourself and any children you may have? They will only get one father in life, so please pick a good one. One that will love them and raise them and be there for them, which your BF sounds like he won't.
My daughter is almost 19. DH
My daughter is almost 19. DH and I would be horrified if she willingly lived like this. Good effing grief.
Personally, I would not stay
Personally, I would not stay with a man who was trying to take custody away from a mom for no reason.
Absolutely you cannot put your life on hold for someone else.
I think you know what you want. Don't feel guilty about it. No you don't want to hurt her, but that doesn't mean you have to live the rest of your life being miserable.
She does have a past of being
She does have a past of being very irresponsible and was in a very unstable unhealthy marriage for children to be around BUT now that she seems to be getting her act together alone, I think she should get a second chance. It is her daughter after all and she is working hard to make up for wasted time.
About face ~ and double time
About face ~ and double time it out the door.
You are going to throw away any dreams you have n resent the hell out of him n his daughter.
Get out !!! Being a full time SM at 19 to a 9 yo ~ this is older you talking to you. Stop n high tail it out of this nightmare.
You ran from one bad home to
You ran from one bad home to another. This is very common especially for girls who feel very vulnerable out alone in the world. It's an understandable feeling and I feel uncomfortable for you.
To end this short string now you've got to get out as quickly as possible. You owe it to the little girl also. The less attached she gets the better. You see you're needed only as long as you've got your legs spread for him and soon enough he'll find a new temptation. As others have said you literally need to RUN.
At this point you're nothing more than a cook, chauffeur, babysitter (long term while he explores the world apparently) and most important of all a hot little sex partner.
He wants to get rid of the mother? ROFLMAO. There is no way he'll get the mother out of her child's life unless he can literally prove she's a crack whore walking the streets. But the more he can tie you to his sex bed the better he'll feel and promising you that you'll be needed by everyone is one way of doing it - he hopes.
God girl - please - get the hell out of there even if it means moving back with Mom temporarily.
I'm going to lay it out there
I'm going to lay it out there in the cold, hard truth. You are a cheap Nanny that he is allowed to fuck.
And that's it.
Seriously? He doesn't "believe in traditional marriage"???? Are you seriously naive enough to fall for that?
He says "If you get pregnant raise it on your own and don't ask or help"? At least he admits he's a deadbeat dad and a jerk.
Come on. You left this kind of life behind. You are nothing to him but free labor and a tight body. Go do better.
I have no issue with your age
I have no issue with your age difference. My bride and I married when she was 18 and I was 30. Like you and your BF we met in college. It was the last semester of my 11year undergrad adventure and her first semester of college out of HS. She was the one who brought the spawn to the relationship. We married a few months after I graduated with my BS and a week before my SS turned 2yo.
My advice and guidance to you is that regardless of your age difference you are an equity partner in your relationship with your BF. That makes you and equity parent to any children in your home regardless of the biology of those children. However, that does not make you the live in nanny and beck and call girl to either your BF or his spawn.
As for the stay at home mom thing. Not no but hell no! Unless of course that is what YOU want. One thing that is a tenent of the marriage between my bride and I is that we support each other in our personal, educational, and professional goals. Since we married my bride has completed a dual major BS with honors, an MBA with honors, and is a CPA with a successful and profitable career. I finished an MBA and work as an executive.
Having read your story and balancing your situation against that of my bride I would say go young lady. You have no children, your future is bright and ahead of you, and your SO is a controlling personality. Go live your life and when you find an equity partner who will commit to you without limits and directives then you can make a life and a family that will stand the tests of time. Your BF wants you to commit to him without a marriage... ever, raise his daughter, keep his house, not have children of your own, and abandon your educational and life goals at the age of 19.
Get out now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Good luck and stay in touch. I would like to hear how your life unfolds.
Or lets put it another way.
Or lets put it another way. You really want to go to school, spend the 10s of 1000s of dollars that you will be paying off for the next 20 years with....what money?
Sure, that sounds like a great plan. Stay with this man, don't pay off your debts, never accrue your own credit or equity in a house or anything. And then when his daughter is gone, 18 years from now, he drops you like a bad habit and you're almost 40 with nothing except a 10 year old car and lingering debt from your school that was never finished, that your ex won't have to help pay for since you were never married anyway....
Trust your gut on this one.
Trust your gut on this one. You wouldn't have posted your concerns on here if you thought all this was right.
Like MamaFox says, in 20 years he'll dump you and you'll be like some women that I know that stayed home their entire lives: no work experience or up to date work skills. And you won't get alimony because you were never married so you won't even have that to fall back on.
Never trust someone that wants you entirely dependent on them.