'AITA for reminding my ex I'm only responsible for our children and not all of his kids?'
"AITA for reminding my ex I'm only responsible for our children and not all of his kids?"
My ex-husband (40M) and I (35F) have two children together (12,11M). We divorced about 10 years ago now because I feel like he regressed as a husband and a father during my second pregnancy and he was even worse when our younger son was born.
He was acting like a high school or college kid or a single 20 something with no kids. He spent more time with friends than with us. His friends were also treating me more like his mom and expecting me to pick him up from their houses when they needed to get on with stuff.
He fought for 50% custody of our kids which he wasn't given and for the first two or three years he had every other weekend and a two week period during the summer with them as well as alternating holidays.
He started being more involved and eventually he did get 50% custody. It was at that time I found out he got some woman pregnant and he realized with three kids he needed to get his act together. He ended up with full custody of his third child. Then he met his wife.
They have two more children together now. There are two kids in her life, but I don't believe they're her biological children anyway, who she is also partially supporting. Those two kids don't live with them but apparently she/they pay for stuff for this child.
Ex and I started getting along better but then his marriage was rocky. As his marriage worsened he started treating me like a co-parent to all his kids. He'd bring his other children to custody exchanges and expecting interactions between me and his other children.
Then it was requests to babysit for him and his wife, which I never did. Then it was comments about our boys old clothes at my house being sent to his house for his other kids and how we needed to make sure they had adequate clothing.
I told him there was no we in that and he said of course there is, we're co-parents. I said of our two sure, but not his other kids. It was requests for me to have his children in my home or to take them out to eat with me and our kids. And finally it has turned into back to school craziness. I bought supplies for the boys and he told me I hadn't bought nearly enough for everyone.
I was like hold up, what's that supposed to mean and he pointed out that what I bought wouldn't be possible to share evenly between all five children. I told him we don't have five children, we have two, the two I bought those for. I told him I am responsible for our children not his three others.
I told him he has a wife, they share two of those children, the other is in their home, so it's up to them. He told me that I know they don't have a lot of money and I cut him off and told him that still didn't make his children my problem.
He said I can't possibly take care of just two of them, not when we're co-parenting and all five kids live together 50% of the time. He said I should be a part of the community to help raise these kids and keeping my distance like I do is so dang cold. AITA?
Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's post:
AJSCRPT
NTA, obviously. Curious to how your boys find it at his house. With his entitled attitude he is clearly a cruddy role model. I’m sure it won’t be long until the kids wise up and want to stay with you full time. They’re nearly at the age where most places will take their choice as a major deciding factor.
Plus-Front-2690 (OP)
They don't love being there. They love their dad though. So it's complicated for them. If they had a choice they would prefer to see their dad but not live with him.
charmedphoenix39
NTA. I would label your kids items/clothes so he can’t take them and give them to the other kids or if the kids go to the same school, do that to avoid the teachers sharing it because their dad said so. But keep standing your ground of only parenting your two kids, never give them the slightest inch, it’ll only be worse.
Plus-Front-2690 (OP)
I always do because my boys like to use our label maker on their things.
Shichimi88
Nta. Keep record of the conversation and regain full custody of the kids if he can’t take care of them. Not your kids, not your problem.
Adventurous_Byte
NTA. How could you ever think you might be...?? Good thing you dumped that freeloader a long time ago - I'm sorry you still have to deal with him! Maybe you can try and revert the decision about the 50% custody, if he clearly admits he doesn't have the finances to take care of all 5 of his kids?
mdthomas
I would tell him "if you expect me to provide financially for your other children, you will need to get a court order directing me to do so. Until then I will provide for MY children only. You made the choice to have more children with a different mother. I did not." NTA.
Bfan72
Watch out. This happened to my cousin and his ex wife. She actually told a judge that she needed more child support because she had other children. You need to know what is going on in his house when it comes to your boys.
Therapy for your boys might be necessary to them being honest with you. I strongly suggest that you don’t have them bring anything that you bought them to go to their father’s house. Chances are your ex will make them share it.
Especially expensive electronics. Possibly clothing. My poor godson is still dealing with this as an adult. He knew that his mother was using him to get more money. Your boys will see their father doing the same in a different way.