Ask Amy: Partner contemplates future with awful children

[conuly]

Dear Amy: My boyfriend of eight years has raised perfectly awful children.

They lack basic kindness and empathy toward their father -- and toward others in general.

I have raised two children of my own who volunteer, assist with nonprofit organizations, and are wonderful and caring individuals.

We mainly spend time around my family; his children are in college.

We don't spend any time with his daughter. She won't accept that he is even dating me (I ruin her perfect picture of what a family is), and his boys are very selfish and self-centered.

Their behavior leads my daughters to question why I would stay with my boyfriend and tolerate his kids' behavior.

We don't live together, and I try to distance myself from much interaction. But when I hear his children speak to him disrespectfully, it leads me to doubt whether we can ever be together because of the way they act.

My boyfriend and I are in our 50s and have been working toward a combined life for some time. His kids cause me to question our future.

Before moving ahead in selling houses and possibly marriage, I would like to know how to reconcile these differences in my own little brain and be OK with one set of offspring acting one way and the other one acting completely differently. I wonder how I can manage to tolerate this if I stay with my boyfriend.

-- Worried

Dear Worried: Overall, your judgment (your children are wonderful/his are awful) reveals a lack of empathy toward a set of young people who may be hurting, lashing out, or perennially angry. Where is your empathy? Where is your kindness?

If you have been in this man's life for eight years, and his kids are in college, then the two of you have had plenty of time to try to influence these young people.

If your boyfriend didn't influence them because he let someone else (presumably his ex-wife) raise them, then he's a neglectful parent.

If your boyfriend did raise them, then he's a deeply flawed parent. And in letting his children reject you, he's demonstrating that he's a flawed partner, too.

Many college-age people go through a self-centered jerky phase. It is possible that these young adults are still maturing, and may actually grow and change.

However, the person at the center of this maelstrom is your boyfriend -- not his kids. For whatever reason (probably many different reasons), he has not been an effective and positive influence. And because you are so judgmental and their father is so passive, these young people have no motivation to change.

When you think about your future, take these last eight years and then lay another two decades or so out in front of you. You will be facing a lot of rejection, a lot of frustration, and the burden of your own harsh judgment. That's a lot to manage.

https://www.arcamax.com/healthandspirit/lifeadvice/askamy/s-2313201?fs

Comments

[cereta]

You know, I was reacting negatively to Amy's advice until I did the math, and yes, this LW has been a part of these kids' lives since they were pre-or-very-young teens. And there's nothing in the letter about change in behavior over time, or even any feeling of awareness that they were children when this relationship began. Has LW always limited interaction with them? In all this work to blend LW and the father's lives, what sense has there been that the offspring would be a part of that blended life? I get no sense of it in the letter.

It's entirely possible that these young adults are just unpleasant people. But my own child is the age that one or more of them must have been at the time this relationship began, and let me tell you: her father and I are her security. We're the ground she plants her feet on. And yes, of course there is a future coming where we organize our lives more or less independently of her, but if we were to start making plans now that seemed to actively exclude her, or at least make her feel unwelcome in that life, well, I wouldn't blame her for becoming hostile.

[ellen_fremedon]

I don't blame the kids for being hostile, but I'm really wondering what other relationship issues LW is using the kids' hostility as cover for. If she stayed with him through the first few years, when presumably the kids were around a lot more, why is she balking now when they're grown up and a lot easier to avoid?

[ambyr]

I realize this is wild speculation, but usually LWs in this position bend over backward to explain that their partner and their partner’s previous spouse separated before they came into the picture. The fact that this LW did not, combined with the intense hostility from the children and the eight year wait before getting married (there are lots of reasons to date a long time before marriage, but one of those is the legal barrier of an existing marriage...well, it makes me wonder.

[minoanmiss]

... oooh. *contemplates*

[xenacryst]

This. 50 years after my dad's first marriage ended, my half brother still cannot forgive my mother for what he sees as wrecking his life, and that was a lot less of an overlap of relationships than this sounds like it could have been. I was going to say that there is a lot not said in this letter, and your guess as to what it is sounds pretty spot on. Parental breakups are pretty hard on young teens, and the fact that LW isn't even mentioning that phase of the relationship is ... suspect.

[cereta]

I will admit that this thought occurred to me.

[lavendertook]

You and he mainly spend time with your family and you wonder why his kids are hostile? He fled them along with his ex and you allowed this or even encouraged it. You helped him abandon them for 8 years. And yet they persist . . . to exist. And you worry about how you can endure?

Though the advice is good, this all needs to be spelled out.

[mommy]

This feels like the stepparent take on "My children are estranged from me and I don't know why!" If it's been eight years and the daughter still won't acknowledge you, then her rudeness probably isn't the issue.

[cimorene]

It sounds like the LW is a jerk and she and the partner are both bad for his kids. But she should probably still break up with him, which would also probably be the case if she had innocently stumbled on a guy who was then revealed to be a completely horrible parent whose kids either loathe him or completely lack any manners whatsoever. In this case, even if she and their dad deserve each other, I find it hard to believe that his kids deserve this shit.