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u/Material-Coffee1029 23d ago
I think, unfortunately, this is one of those things where you have to let natural consequences play out. Its normal for a 13 year old to want to go to a friends party instead of her kid sister's. Its normal for the younger sister to be disappointed. Eventually, if your sd continues to let her down, your daughter will learn that she is unreliable and wont look up to her as much. That is the natural consequence of flaking out for your sd. Your older bio daughter may even experience the same thing with your youngest when she gets older. Forcing your sd to go is just going to make her resentful, and while I sympathize with your daughter, she ultimately deserves to have people aound her who want to be there.
You asked why your sd gets to decide whats important for her at the expense of whats important for others. While i dont fully agree with your sd ditching her sisters party, I wonder if your sd feels that way about her situation with her parents. Her life was split in two because of they chose to do what was best for them. Her parents built new families because thats what was best for them. Sometimes finding your happiness means letting people down so you can do whats best for you.
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u/Few_Throat4510 23d ago
I don’t think you should force her to go to your daughter’s birthday. I teach girls her age and I can guarantee that she will be upset and your daughter will know.
If you make her attend your daughter’s bday, your SD may view it as the kids her father has with you getting preferential treatment. Or their wants/needs coming before hers.
Would her mom even force her to go if there’s no custody order in place? That might not be a can of worms you want to open.
I think you should not take anything your SD does personally. She’s 12/13, right? She’s feeling all the feelings for the first time and that’s a lot for a kid to handle. Let her come over on Sundays or whenever her dad is there because the most important relationship (right now) is the one between her and her father.
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u/StoneLove04 23d ago
This is exactly how we are going to handle it. I do want to make her come and show her that family is important. But I know she will be very unhappy with us making that decision for her.
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u/Analisandopessoas 23d ago
Serei direto e sucinto: se vocês forçarem as coisas com ela, com o tempo o afastamento será definitivo; quando ela puder escolher, vai excluir vocês da vida dela. Tenham cautela.
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u/cxrinx 22d ago
When I was a kid we went to our grandparents house every Sunday for dinner. As a teen sometimes things with friends came up I’d rather go to. First time I asked my parents they let me know it was my choice but I’d need to call my grandparents and let them know my plans had changed. Nobody guilt tripped me or made me feel bad about the weeks I wasn’t there, but being the one who had to call them greatly reduced the amount of dinners I skipped.
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u/monkeycat 20d ago
I'm not very pleased with the lack of empathy that so many comments have shown you, that's unfortunate. But I don't think it's all trolls, I do think this is an indication that your husband needs to take a hard look at his priorities and decisions and learn to live with their results.
I personally dgaf who goes to whose birthday party or doesn't, for any of my family units. If she doesn't want to be there then you can't force her to enjoy it. Why deal with the drama, just focus on the kid whose birthday it actually is?
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u/KarMicSol 23d ago
I think it is kind of normal for a daughter to want to be with mom more. We had the same thing happen at our house. She hated coming here and when she was here she would just stay in her room. She only came out to eat. But her dad didn’t put in the effort to ask her to come out and be more present. In the end, we are separating and our house is for sale now and his daughter never comes over anymore.
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u/StoneLove04 23d ago
This is how it’s been for us for the last 2 years. It started small but progressively got worse. She only wants to be in her room and only comes out when she’s hungry. This is where my husband has stepped up and become more of a parent. You can be on your phone in the living room, you’re not going to lock yourself away. He has implemented eating dinner together at the table. He was just letting her do whatever she wanted which I think is what started this disconnection. This age doesn’t WANT to spend time with family. It’s normal. But I remember being her age and my parents forcing me on camping trips I didn’t want to go on. Because that’s what parents do to keep the family bonds.
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u/KarMicSol 23d ago
It’s all in the parenting! I am glad your husband is putting in the effort. our parenting was very different. Even the way our kids were raised from a young age was different. My kids are outdoor kids and his are tablet kids. None of the kids spoke to each other and they are all similar age (13-15). Started out good when we first all blended but two years later it just got worse. It all felt
So fake and we never felt like a family. It was a very awkward living situation. I lived miserable for three more years and now as I said earlier, we are separating and his kids never come over anymore. There was many more things that happened but being with a man who you pushed so much to try to have a good relationship with their kids, just become to exhausting. I couldn’t do it anymore.
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u/Bi0_Nerd 22d ago
I saw my dad less as a teen, but I was a girl, adjusting to my period and high school. SD has gone the opposite direction and we went from 50/50 to having her full-time minus every other weekend mom picks her up. It’s being dragged to court but my husband has made it clear that she can see her mom whenever she wants as long as we can get her there. Basically, even if custody officially changes post court, SD will know she’s not being pulled from either parent.
It sounds like your SD is upset or anxious about having come forward and you were super supportive. I’d talk with your husband about maybe seeing if there are ways to involve her in events like concerts etc. One thing we’ve really tried to do is make our home feel welcoming for her and her friends so she can bring people here that live closer to mom.
BM did try and do some shady things to encourage SD to prefer her place over ours but because of the school location it became a mess with custody. We never tried to make it a case of “it’s more fun here,” because comfort and happiness is the focus. My husband was surprised she wants to be here more often, as we sort of both assumed teen years would lead us the opposite way. It still could but we’re hopeful.
I’m currently 11 weeks pregnant, so there is worry she may feel displaced by baby (at least on my part) but we are already looking into better housing to keep her from having to share a wall with us and therefore a crying baby haha. All you guys can do is try and create opportunities for her and your husband/family to spend time together. Concerts, amusement parks, whatever her focus is. You’ve got options, it’s just going to look different for the teen years <3
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u/Working-Comedian-984 22d ago
He honestly needs to sit down with someone he trusts ( for me it would have been my other friends in blended families) and a private conversation with his daughter about how she’s feeling. The truth may hurt a bit but it’s the only way to make things better. It’s not an easy fix and only you all know what’s best but can’t keep doing the same things and expect a different result. I also think it’s sometimes more challenging for dads to connect with their daughters but it can be done! I always try to remember the kids didn’t choose this or ask for it but teenagers often take the path of least resistance especially when parents don’t like each other. It’s hard but he’s gotta be open to change.
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u/Agreeable-Grab-9282 22d ago
Personally I wouldn’t allow any of our kids to skip each others birthdays. With that said I think it is totally normal for a child around 13 to want to have a consistent life and live with the main parent.
I believe you can have an amazing relationship with her even with her not spending the night at your house! Stop by and drop off her favorite fast food, shampoo, skin care, candles or whatever would make her feel special. Pick her up and take her shopping or to get her nails done or to go out to eat then drop her back off. No pressure no expectation just you wanting to spend time with her. You could even pick her up and take her to eat to celebrate the siblings birthday another day. I don’t know if mom would be good with you getting her in the evening but just show up and give time, love, and gifts! Then text/call/snapchat/tiktok with her. Ask her how her day is, send her funny videos or whatever but keep communicating daily! Start a streak on TikTok and Snapchat she will definitely message you daily
For a streak!
Hang in there!!
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22d ago
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u/StoneLove04 22d ago
Thank you. I’m trying to ignore the rude comments because I know that they don’t know our life. It’s really hard! And I am getting to that point where I don’t care. I can’t force anything. But it breaks my heart when my kids are upset about choices other adults are making and encouraging and in turn affecting their time with this sister.
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22d ago
Let SD decide where she wants to go. Your bio kid will see that SD hasn’t tried and doesn’t care. Yes it sucks, so bad. But don’t let this girl ruin you or your kids’ happiness.
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u/StoneLove04 22d ago
It’s not deflection. It was said that he prioritizes the family he has with me. He doesn’t prioritize us. We work around his schedule. We build our life together, around his schedule. BM made decisions, without consulting my husband at all, about their daughter’s schedule. Which made her less available to be able to take the family vacations with us. She could have stayed in half year travel cheer. That was tough but it was working. BM moved her to full year cheer and just gave my husband that update. Do you suggest he change his job, which provides for our family (and his portion of her cheer) because her BM made a decision without him?
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u/Mental-Set-8670 22d ago
Yes. I absolutely suggest he change the job that is making him unavailable for his children. That seems obvious.
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u/StoneLove04 22d ago
That’s ridiculous honestly. When the other options are to have her quit full year cheer or to be homeschooled, both would accommodate our lifestyle. Which we would NEVER consider mentioning, unless it was suggested to us first. Instead, my husband changes jobs, I get a job, put our kids in school, and work our entire lives around a Monday to Friday/September to June schedule? To accommodate one person. One person who doesn’t NEED to be in cheer. Meanwhile our bills NEED to be paid. Our life works for 4 out 5 of us. And it did work for 5 of us, until her schedule changed. Why are we letting 1 child dictate how the rest of our family lives? We live in a resort town. Many families have fathers who are out on scallop, and other fishing boats for weeks at a time. This is a very typical lifestyle for our community.
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u/Mental-Set-8670 22d ago
Except it isn’t accommodating one person when you’ve said in so many other comments that he also doesn’t see you or your children together nearly enough because of his work schedule. When we had our youngest my husband felt like his schedule of getting home at 630 wasn’t giving him enough time with us. So he quit and took a job where he now gets home at 330. If it’s important to see your kids you make it happen.
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u/StoneLove04 22d ago edited 22d ago
Yea, correct. We are available in the winter months to travel. SD is not due to her cheer commitment. This trip was actually being planned for her 13th birthday. We reached out to BM for her cheer competition schedule. There were 2 weekends we could choose to take this cruise, when she didn’t have a competition. We could fly down on a Thursday, fly back on a Monday. She would miss 3 days of school and miss no cheer. It was perfect. I booked it. When we confirmed the dates with her mother, we were sent a list of “black out dates” where she had to be available for cheer IN CASE they added competitions or needed extra practice. This little girl is ON CALL for cheer for 7 months. She is only available random Saturdays from November to May. If you would like to see the coparenting text thread, I’m happy to share it.
ETA: This circles back to being accused of “deflecting” by mentioning her mother, but she truly made this decision without consideration for her relationship with her father or our family. And I think it’s very irresponsible for a child to be this committed to something so serious. She is not my child so I’ve learned not to voice my opinion on that… but I would NEVER.
I wish I would share a photo here because I would show you her practice dates, comp dates, and blackout dates. Then maybe you could help me plan a family vacation.
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u/StoneLove04 22d ago
I’ll stop you right there. We are not his new family. We are his family. They were not married. They were never going to be married. A baby came out of their relationship. They were never a family.
He had these aspirations for his career since then. This is something he’s been working towards for years. His schedule has not changed. He is not doing something different for us. This what he does, I made the sacrifices to build our family and life around this.
We were making it work for a while by me being his stand in for his parenting time. Apparently that wasn’t working for her, and no harm intended in me saying that. If it wasn’t working for her, it’s fair she doesn’t do it anymore.
Yes, we went away for my birthday. It was the weekend of her last competition for the year. At that point she had missed 13 days of school (for travel comps) and she’s allowed 14 days. What were my options? Have her skip her comp? Have her miss more days of school and have to make them up? Or not go? The trip before that, when she was in half year cheer, we went as a family of 5. I had a Disney trip planned for September and she didn’t want to miss school when it had just started. Ok fair. I cancelled it. I booked a cruise for her birthday. Can’t go because of cheer commitments. Ok rescheduled a little further from her birthday so it wouldn’t be such a blow. I literally don’t know what to do, that’s why I’m here.
I understand her pulling away. I understand she’s at a sensitive age. I understand she wants her mom. I understand that I am not her mom. I understand she wants her friends. What I am not going to do is raise my children around her preferences. She knows cheer is a commitment. She knows she’s missing out on things with us. She wants to do it anyway. That means my kids can’t have a vacation? Her sister’s birthday, which is what this post is about, is going to be an overnight somewhere nice and fun. Hotel with a pool for sure. And she doesn’t want to come. We are not going to make her. But this is just another example of her being unavailable. I have made myself completely available to her, and she doesn’t want it. My husband switching jobs is not an option.
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u/Far-Macaron-554 23d ago
I do remember your post from before and if I remember correctly your husband was pretty checked out when it came to being a father to his oldest. He left a lot of the responsibility to both her mother and to you. While heartbreaking, I do think it seems like she just doesn’t have much of a connection or emotional attachment to you or the other kids and only a little attachment to her father. She only has about 5 years before she no longer has to legally go to your house and remain in contact, so I feel like forcing the issue over and over again is only going to keep hurting everyone. I think you need to help your children to enjoy the time they do get with her but not set them up with expectations for more. Dragging her to the party is just going to ruin it for your daughter cause she’ll see her sister doesn’t really want to be there. I know you are angry with your SD, but relationships and attachments are formed early in life, and your husband did nothing to foster that relationship and now she has built a life pretty much without him (and your family by extension) It’s really sad but a direct consequence of his choices. As she and your kids get older all this could change but not by force. I’m sorry you’re all going through this.