I can totally empathize with you on this!

One time my SO went to the races and his DD and I had plans to spend the day shopping and what-not. On the way out of the track from dropping off SO, BM calls. She tells BM that we just dropped "daddy" off at the races and were headed to do blah blah blah.

BM lays into her about that she needs to get home right this minute and study because her grades were slipping. So she says "okay" and tells me what she says. Then SF calls her and wants to know when she will be home. It's 11 AM!!!!!! What's she going to do? Study for the next 9 hours?

So she tells SF that she'll be home around 1 PM because I promised her we would go spend a gift certificate that would expire and this was the last day to use it.

So, by this time, we were both bummed and I was P*SSED. I couldn't have SO handle it because he was at the races and couldn't hear his phone. Besides, he had no idea what was going on because he thought she was in good hands with me. As far as he knew, his friend was going to drop him off at about 5 PM and then we would all have dinner together before taking his DD home.

So I took her back. Only to find out that BM was at work and so SO's DD was going to stay with her SF. So what was the difference in making ME bring her back? So it's okay for her to be with SF, but not me? I guess so! I guess that's the double standard.

Poor SO! He came home and found all this out. He was so angry! But, really, he couldn't do anything because I had already taken her back. And posession is 9/10 of the law, right?

Love, I think this would fall under the ROFR that KKNY is always talking about. While it's ideal for a child to spend their time off with their bio parent first, I think spending time with a s-parent in the event the bio has to work is more ideal than childcare.

Ashley, I can understand your frustration. But as a woman who has been the SO of a man with bio kids, and been the mother of a bio kid with a man...this is my opinion.

Races come second to childcare. My dd's father would have her two days a week. One of those days, or sometimes both, he would leave her with a babysitter or a friend because he had training for sports and "had" to practice. When I was a SO-parent (would that be a SOP?) my boyfriend would have things he wanted to do in the evenings/mornings and I would be the caregiver. That was fine with me and his dd as we got along, but the time really should have been spent with father/daughter.

I don't understand why bio mom would want her to go home unless she feels threatened by her relationship with you. That said, if you are in for the long haul with this child you two need to build a strong relationship too.

Personally, I would not answer the phone anymore when you see it's bio-mom. Just let it go to voicemail, then check right away to make sure not an emergency. When my dd is with her father I check in, but certainly not daily, and usually let the correspondence be instigated by dd.

I think she is unreasonable in her demands for your DH to work less. In nowadays economy one needs to work as much as one could, but I am not sure if I understand somehting....

Her DH leaves HIS daughter wiht her mother. So his daughter is wiht the parent. It is not BM's DD (unless I didn't understand) so it is not up to her to decide where her DH's kids will live. Her DH's kid is going to be with the parent, right?

But SS is her son. So there is the difference.

I think that Bm is concerned that SS does not spend his time wiht dad. of course there is a different standard. She is concerned that her kid does not spend time wiht dad, but is not concerned that her DH's kid does not spend time wiht dad.

Although it does sound like a double standard if DD would not spend time with dad I would be concerned, but I am not as concerned about other kids not seeing their fathers. i am not happy about it but I just cannot be as concerned about it.

"Her DH leaves HIS daughter wiht her mother. So his daughter is wiht the parent. It is not BM's DD (unless I didn't understand) so it is not up to her to decide where her DH's kids will live. Her DH's kid is going to be with the parent, right?

But SS is her son. So there is the difference."

Yes, but her issue is mostly with my DH. She lays these huge guilt trips on him about how he's not spending enough time with his son, blah blah blah. Yet she was the one that insisted on having a wedding reception that she and her DH can't afford. So when he got the job offer to go work in Houston for 6-12 months, BM really pushed him to do it.

I just think it's ironic that she thinks it's "terrible" how my DH isn't seeing enough of his son, but she has NO QUALMS about her husband moving to another state and not seeing his own daughter.

"of course there is a different standard. She is concerned that her kid does not spend time wiht dad, but is not concerned that her DH's kid does not spend time wiht dad.

Although it does sound like a double standard if DD would not spend time with dad I would be concerned, but I am not as concerned about other kids not seeing their fathers. i am not happy about it but I just cannot be as concerned about it."

I would NEVER encourage my husband to DUMP his son and go work in houston for 6-12 months. EVER. Working longer hours or more days is one thing, but to not see your child for months at a time? Not cool, unless there are SERIOUS financial reasons.

sorry, finedreams, this IS a double standard any way you look at it.

If my DH told BM he were moving to Houston, and was only going to see SS every couple months for a quick visit, heads would ROLL.

Silver - I agree about the phone thing, but it is her own phone so I have no control over that. I'd love to just break the damn thing, but that's not for me to do.

BM was at work. Not her say as to who keeps her daughter while she's in the care of her father. She used SO as a babysitter while she was at work for years. If he had something to do and needed to be without his DD for just a few hours, should he have to call BM and get permission for his DD to stay with me? Should he have to take her over to SF?

SO is not, by any means, an irresponsible person. He NEVER gets any time to spend with other men, mainly because he doesn't have many friends. He spent most of weeks working and the weekends with his DD so that BM could work on the weekends. This continued after the divorce and for the first 5 years of our relationship. He never made any dates with me. Any of the very few nights we had alone during the first 5 years of our relationship were completely accidental. Once when BM had told SO that their DD would be with her on a Saturday night, I ordered a Lobstergram and paid the extra $30 so it could be delivered on a Saturday. His DD calls and asks if she can come spend the night and he says okay.

So when his friend asked him to go to the races with him, I JUMPED at the chance to have a girls day with his DD and let him do something fun. What's wrong with that?

Of course she felt threatened by me! He was starting to stand up to her and she thought that I was stealing her control over him away. She thought that she was no longer the holder of his b*lls. She wouldn't continue to get her way the way she had for all the previous years. She HAD to do something! So......she took his kid and moved away. NOW she has his b*lls back!

"BM was at work. Not her say as to who keeps her daughter while she's in the care of her father"

this is so true.

When DH and BM went to court, the GAL and the judge told them that when their son is with the other parent, they don't have ANY say in what goes on. So, for example, if my DH wanted to send SS to aftercare at school on his days, that is HIS right. Same goes for BM. If she wants to hire a babysitter, leave SS with his SF, or another relative, that is HER right.

It is not BM's concern as to how much time her son spends with his father. That's none of her business. That's an opinion.

Sh*t! Anyone could say that about me! I don't spend enough time with my kid. I work and I'm away from him 12 hours a day. He spends those 12 hours with other people. I only see him for 2-1/2 hours before he has to go to sleep. So should I give custody over to X because of that?

I'm a bad mom for it! Just like Lovehadley's DH is a bad dad!

No way would I ever tell X that he needs to spend more time with his kid. He's involved to the extent he's involved. Not my business after that.

But the most important point here is that we're talking about 50/50 custody. NOT EOW! We're talking about a father who has his kid the same amount of time the BM does. NOT EOW!

BM SHOULD STAY OUT OF DAD'S HOME!!!!!! What goes on while the kid is at dad's is not the mom's business unless there is a danger aparrent. And that's not an issue here.

It is wrong to encourage your spouse to not see his kids. Very wrong, but how do you know she encouraged him? Did she tell you?

I agree that mom is out of line with demanding your DH picks his son from school. It is just not doable and not needed.

But i still think it is irrelevant what her own husband does. You have no ways of knowing why he does what he does and it is their home and their life.

I swear we are dealing with the SAME woman!

Last night, my DH got a call from BM. This weekend is a 4 day weekend so SD is to be with BM from Friday until Monday. Well, BM says she can't keep SD on Monday so she's going to send her back with grandma & her sister and she wants DH to pick her up from grandma Monday after he gets off work. (He works a few minutes from grandma's house) She didn't offer to let DH pick up SD Sunday evening. That's fine. He is working Monday and BM says grandma wants to spend time with SD, I know it's NOT because she doesn't want me to spend the day with SD. Right? Well, then DH tells her that SD will not be in school on Friday so she can pick up SD at the regular time from my place of business. (We also run a family owned business and all hired help has been let go due to the economy, so I am now working 7 days a week there and running my business from that office) Well, BM yells at him "NO WAY! The order says I am to pick her up at your house and she'd better be there!" The funny thing is, my work site is closer for her. She has to drive an extra 7 miles our of the way & another 7 miles back (passing my office) to do that. DH started to argue with her (which is what I guess she wanted) but I told him it's okay, I'll come home to meet her on time. He tells me that if I'm late, she's gonna start trouble because last time I was 2-3 minutes late and she had already started calling him and leaving nasty messages. He's pissed a little because she isn't even keeping their daughter all weekend but he's not going to stoop to her level and 'force' her to keep her daughter. After all, he's working too and she is grandma.

Other examples of BM's **double** standard:

**She has SD call BF 'dad' but constantly reminds everyone that I am not her mom, she is.

**The day she got the paper from the court, telling her how much child support DH had to pay her, she left a nasty message on his voice mail, telling him he's in arrears and if he didn't write her a check the next day when he picked up SD, she would file contempt charges and have him arrested. (an empty threat that we knew she couldn't possibly do.. but nonetheless, it was a nasty message) Now, we've had SD in our custody for almost 18 months. We didn't pursue support for the first 8 months (during which time she paid for nothing) and it has now been 10 months of support that she is behind in and still telling family support she is NOT going to pay.

**If we don't take SD to the doctor for every little thing that BM tells us to take her for, she calls CPS. When DH asks her to take SD to an appointment (for something that happened at BM's house anyways) she refuses.

**She has a fit because SD could overhear my tv shows (unsolved mysteries type shows) through the wall and closed door and my shows give SD 'nightmares' but she watched 'lady in the water' and other R rated scary movies at BM's.

**She had a fit because SD told her that she was left home alone (we were outside doing yardwork & SD was in the house alone, not left alone) but BM leaves her home alone all the time... with her 12 year old sister of course) and of course now it's okay for SD to ride her bike across town with no adults but at our house, she can't go play outside (on our 6 acres) without an adult supervising her.

It's all about BM wanting to control. I don't think it is so much a double standard because only a nut job would truly think it's okay for them to do one thing and it's not okay for the other to do the same thing. That isn't about the kids, it's about wanting to control the ex. (and I'm sure ex husbands are guilty of doing this too)

I only read the OP and not the replies so if I double up that's why..

Lovehadley, BM does not get to have a say on how you guys arrange things. It is nothing to do with her how much your DH works and who is home with SS. This is your life and you guys make the decisions, BM can make those decisions regarding her own life/home/family.

Maybe you'd be better off not giving SS choice whether he goes to BM after school or have you pick him up. It is nice of you guys to be that flexible and in a normal situation this should work. But unfortunately not with your BM, because you are d*mned of you do and d*amned if you don't. As you said. So I would probably just pick SS up if I were you, it's less disruptive for SS and there is less need for communication.

We get this with BM all the time.. The skids often ask me why I'm the one that looks after them after school/in holidays/on Saturday mornings. They tell me their mom says that it's because I'm the one that wants to take over as a mom. She also says I want FDH to pay less CS to her so therefore we want to see skids more. They sort of half believe it but not really. Pfff..
Anyway, we are not going to jump through BM's hoops and try and 'prove' that FDH is a responsible dad who loves to see his children. We just keep doing what we're doing, and BM can have an opinion on that all she wants, stiff sh*t!

You don't need to prove yourself to BM, there is no point trying anyway because she'll always find fault with something if she's in that frame of mind. You just do what you need to do, and of course DH will end up working extra to keep the business going. That is life and that is responsible adult behavior. I hope you guys will hit better times soon.

I think that we are forgetting one very important thing here...how the kids feel. I used to worry about how DS felt staying with SM on the weekends while ex worked all weekend. So I finally asked DS one day, how he felt about going over there and ex being at work. DS admitted that he did not like that ex was gone so much but DS would rather be there to be able to spend a little time with ex when he got home than not being able to spend time with ex at all. After that, I did not worry about it anymore because I knew that ex was doing what he had to do and DS was getting to spend time with ex even though it wasn't as much as DS would have liked.

The only time I truly got upset was when I found out later that ex was out of town for the weekend and SM would keep DS like it was HER weekend. I would not be told until I found out from DS when he got back. I did put a stop to that because I do not believe SM (and I blame her because SM was the one that I had all communications through per her request for years) should have kept it from me and I also work with very little time with DS myself. If I can get an extra weekend with DS while ex is out of town, then I want that extra weekend.

The funny part now is that after years of SM and I going at it about alone time for ex and DS when DS was at their house and getting nowhere with SM, SM is now throwing a fit with ex that DS is getting more time than their DD since their split. I told ex that I wish I had all of the emails of SM totally defending ex's work and the time that needed to be spent with both kids rather than one-on-one time so that ex could send them all back to her in reply to her constant nagging. It is funny how the tables have turned and I do not feel sorry for SM. I do feel sorry for their DD because whereas DS was not old enough to remember the divorce, she is 11 and is not dealing well at all. I hope that they learn to get along before SM makes their DD hate ex as much as she now does. I think SM will be one that is bitter for a long time and whoever ex decides to settle down with better be prepared for their life being made miserable by SM--maybe even after their DD is grown. I almost fell sorry for ex--almost!!!