'AITA for kicking my daughter out of her room for our new baby?'
"AITA for kicking my daughter out of her room?"
My wife and I live in a 4-bedroom house. We have two boys, 2 and 4. I also have a daughter, 12, who lives with us for 4 weeks in the summer and about 3 cumulative weeks during the school year. Right now, the current sleeping arrangement is: Bedroom #1: Me/my wife; Bedroom #2 : 2yo; Bedroom #3: 4yo; Bedroom #4: 12yo (though unoccupied 45 weeks of the year so it’s also my office).
But we are pregnant with another baby. My wife and I want her mom to move in with us both so she can help out with the kids and so we can help her mom out with her health issues.
The most logical option is clearly to put her in B#4, especially because it’s also the only other bedroom with an ensuite so she’ll have privacy. Her mom will also benefit from the ensuite bathroom being a little bit easier from a mobility POV than the shared bathroom.
The baby can stay in B#1 with us for a while and then eventually move in with 2yo in B#2. Daughter will move into B#3 with 4yo. We sat down daughter and gently told her this was the plan.
We did say she could still keep as much of the decor as could fit in her part of B#3 and we can try to get a bookcase or a partition so it feels separate, but the reality is that her room is very heavily decorated and furnished and there's no way all of that stuff is going to fit into even half of bedroom #3.
She was very upset about giving up her room and said some not nice things about my wife’s pregnancy (wishing she wasn’t pregnant, saying she hated her mom, that kind of thing) and being here in the first place. She threw a fit and slammed the door and is now refusing to talk to any of us.
She called my ex, who called me to yell at me about shoving my daughter aside and said that my daughter was now saying she didn’t even want to visit. And I will admit that when my daughter is here she spends a lot of time in her room so I certainly understand why it’s not ideal for her to share a room with a 4yo but I don’t see an alternative.
There’s no other living space we can curtain off to make a pseudo-bedroom and we can’t afford to build an extension/add-on or move at this time. Even if we put her on her own in B#3, it doesn't make sense to cram 5 people into B#1 and B#2 while B#3 is unoccupied 45 weeks of the year. AITA?
Let's find out.
parishilton7 writes:
YTA. You can’t make a 12 year old share a room with a 4 year old. You are the parent, you decided to have this many children, you are the one who should be sharing your room. Or getting a bigger house. Again — you made your bed so you need to lie in it. Next to your toddlers’ beds.
classicalspecial writes:
YTA. Depending on your location, having a 4yo boy and 12yo girl sharing a bedroom may not even be legal. Yeah, your daughter only uses the room a few weeks a year, so in a strictly local sense, it seems reasonable. But humans aren't strictly logical.
They have emotions, and you've chosen to put everyone else's ahead of your eldest child's. You are acting like you have no other choices, but the fact is that you chose to have another child and invite your MIL to live with you, while knowing exactly the space you had to work with.
Your daughter probably already feels like she's on the edges of your new family, and now you're taking away the space she has in the home. Don't be surprised when she skips her visits altogether.
affectionatetruth9 writes:
YTA. I do hope you realize not having a space for her could cost you your relationship with your daughter. You are 100% pushing her to the side for your new family. It isn’t her fault she is with you so infrequently, it’s yours and her mother’s. I hope you fix this before it’s too late.