“Should I have told my husband his gift for his son might not be well-received by asking if he was sure about gifting a scrapbook full of memories that includes me and our kids, given that his older children have shown no interest in having us in their lives? #FamilyGifts #StepfamilyDynamics #Relevance #StepchildrenRelationships“
Nta your husband is living in fairy town. Let him give the book as is. He needs this wake up call.Â
NTA
your husband is an AH to his kids.
NAH. You are respecting your step kids wishes and trying to save your husband from a painful rejection. He doesnt want to hear it and that is ok too. You have done what you can. Just let it go and hope for the best. Â
NTA. Your husband is in major denial re: how his kids feel about you and their half-siblings. That said, if he’s bent on giving this “gift”, he can knock himself out…but his son will probably rip out the pages with pictures he doesn’t want (best case) or it may put a rift between him and his Dad (worst case). I truly don’t understand what your husband is thinking here.
I feel like his willful blindness to their feelings is what’s either causing, or at least exasperating this issue to begin with.
NTA
NTA. It’s critical to have open and honestly communication, especially when it comes to family dynamics. You’re coming from a place of insight into a delicate situation, and sometimes being honest can seem harsh, but it’s necessary. Your husband is likely trying to create an idealized version of his family, and while that’s understandable, it’s not in touch with the current reality. You’re simply being the voice of reason, and that’s important, even if it’s difficult for him to accept right now. Support him, but don’t back down from your perspective; it just might prevent a bigger heartache in the future.
NTA your husband has his head buried in the sand.
Have you all done family therapy?
NAH – the scrapbook is filled with your husband’s fond memories. Including photos that he knows his son won’t appreciate is wishful thinking. Hopefully his son will appreciate it, but your pessimism is understandable.
NTA. I think you have handled this in the best way you possibly can. You have no delusion about your relationship with his children and the relationship they want to have with you. But unfortunately your husband is still operating under the idea that you have successfully become one happy blended family. Its sad that’s not the case but its good you can see that clearly. I say let this lie, you have made your opinion known, if he still follows through with giving this gift then its on him to deal with any disappointment he receives from them.
Remember, it doesn’t matter how clearly you can see this is not a good idea. If he believes it is then let him do what he wants. Telling him how his kids will react will only breed animosity towards you even if you are proven correct. Its best to just let the kids tell their dad how they feel regardless of how sad and disappointed you think he may be.
NTA but your husband needs to stop pushing you and the half siblings on his oldest son. He needs to visit him for his birthday & spend one on one time with him alone. Then just the two of them could go through the book talking about his childhood & happy memories of his late mother. Having you & your children there would diminish the special moment. You can visit a different time.
NTA. Sometimes, you got to look reality right in the eye and deny it. That’s what your husband is doing.
You’ve said your piece and should move on. You are unlikely to convince him otherwise and can only end up being the “bad guy” if you push it. I can’t imagine that he did not recognize these red flags before, and if he is willfully ignoring them nothing you say is going to change that.
Be prepared, though, that this may be the straw that makes his son go NC with him.
NTA … Can’t wait for the update
NTA
Is your husband delusional or just being purposely obtuse?
How could he not “get it” by now? It is obvious that you are their father’s spouse, and your kids are YOUR kids. Nothing with change that at their ages.
Tell hubby to accept and move on, so you all can just be at peace with the reality of life.
NTA. Your husband is obviously being willfully blind about his offspring’s treatment of you and doesn’t want a confrontation. You’re only “negative” because they’re so openly negative about you!
NAH. Your husband is free to give the gift he wishes. You’re free to feel the way you feel. His kids are free to decide who they have and maintain relationships with. No part of this story makes me go: “Wow, what an AH!”
NTA. You’ve said your peace now let your husband deal with the fall out. He has been in denial for years. Something needs to snap him out of it.
NTA; your hubs is in denial, as others are saying. I think it might be best to let it go at this point though. Hopefully the son doesn’t destroy the scrapbook.
Has your husband ever acknowledged your step kids aren’t interested in a relationship with you and there half siblings or has he always been in denial?
NTA. Your husband is in for a rude awakening. Or maybe he’ll just stay in denial. If I were you I would just apologize and let the situation play out.
NTA. Your husband is in some very serious denial about how his kids feel, and it’s going to turn what would have been a very thoughtful gift into something else entirely. The situation isn’t ideal, but it would be better for him to accept reality and work within it, especially since you are willing to do the same.
I would LOVE to hear the side of the oldest children.
And I think it’s ridiculous that your husband won’t spend time with them alone, but always had to drag you and your childrem along, while you clearly don’t get along.
NTA. It’s sad how badly your husband failed his first children and continues to fail.
NTA, but do come back and tell us how it plays out, coz I’m nosey.
….not just a river in Egypt.
I think we just figured out the reason his kids do not like you, and it is their father pushing this unwanted thing on them. You may not have, but he just flat out dismissed their feelings over you and your kids, like he is blinded by love. Man refuses to accept they simply want no bond with you, and that is okay to not want it.
NTA, but he needs a serious sit down.
NTA. It looks like you have a good understanding of the dynamics, and your husband is living in a fantasy land where he’d like to have a great family, but it isn’t the case.
You seem reasonable, but have you ever discussed your relationship with the kids on a one to one basis, even without your husband knowing? Could there be some huge misunderstanding that’s lingered on over the years that nobody’s addressed?
INFO – why do your step-children dislike you and the younger children? It seems weird that a 23 & 24 year old would have any reason to dislike young children. Have you ever point blank ask them why they feel that way about you and your children? I feel like there is more to the story here.
What happened between them being kids and adults? Was it a gradual dislike? There’s so much we don’t know. How did they treat you? They were about 9 and 7 when you married? Did you automatically take over the mom role? Dole out the discipline?
I would be frustrated in your position. You aren’t trying to force a relationship that your stepkids don’t want, but your husband is pushing them on your behalf. It will totally seem like you’re the one pushing this. Why else would he be so hellbent on forcing everyone together if you don’t want it and the kids don’t want it? It’s frustrating because your husband’s actions are going to do the opposite of what he intends, pushing you further apart rather than bringing you closer together, and it’s going to look like you’re the one behind the curtain pulling the strings. I can imagine the relationship between you and your stepkids might improve if they understood that you respect their stance and you aren’t pushing for them to fake being close with you.
Scan the scrapbook before gifting it- if the son destroys it, your husbands hard work won’t be lost forever
I wouldn’t say another word about how it will be received- he needs to see it for himself- but when the son inevitably does show his true colors, remind your husband that these scrapbooks were a beautiful reminder of HIS memories, and he has many more to make with all 4 kids, so maybe he should just keep adding to it and expect to leave it to them when he passes?
NTA he’s both in denial about his kids’ feelings toward step family AND that this gift is more for his sentiment than his son’s.
This isn’t a smart birthday gift.
NTA
Oof. I hope for the best…but this may not end well. I once received a box of photos roughly for my birthday as a ‘surprise’ by a family member who thought I’d appreciate them. It was like a punch in the gut when I opened that box with no prior warning – and I only have grief tied to it. Not entirely sure the emotions your step children would have.
What strikes me is ‘he couldn’t wait for us to go through it together’ and including moments ‘heartbreaking ones, like the loss of May.’ His stepson may want to happily celebrate his birthday- and while stepping away you can say the gesture is sweet….you have to know your audience. This may well leave stepson feeling violated feeling forced to feel emotions he does not want to sort through at the time of getting a birthday ‘gift’.
Just make sure he dosent blame you somehow when it does happen.
NTA
Husband is in line for a serious reality check.
NTA
I really hope for your husbands sake that his adult kids just gracefully accept this gift that clearly means alot to your husband, even if it only ends up sitting in a cupboard somewhere. They do ofcourse have the prerogative not to like it, but the decent thing to do would be to not rip apart someone’s carefully crafted gift, even if they don’t appreciate it.
Please keep us updated, and I hope hubby doesn’t get his heart broken.
NTA. Hubs is a clueless delulu, seems 🥲 wish I could hear the kids’ version of this situation
NTA, but back down on the subject. You’ve stated your opinion, based on the reality you live in and your husband has chosen to believe his idealised fictional family is the reality. Pretty sure your husband is going to need to be whacked on the head with the truth by his kids to see it, if then.
Let hubby give his son the scrapbook, you can’t really stop him anyway. Let him deal with the immediate fallout of having you and your kids included, and then support him. If hubby is insisting on going through it ‘together’ I’m assuming he means you and the younger kids as well as him and his older kids. If that’s the case, apologise to his son, letting him know you warned him that the gift wouldn’t be appreciated the way your hubby wants it to be.
It sounds to me like hubby has been trying to force the idealised blended family relationship the whole time. That’s what has prevented a decent relationship between you and his kids and their dismissal of their younger siblings. Perhaps you just didn’t notice, perhaps he deliberately kept what he was doing away from you. You seem to have been willing to accept whatever relationship the kids wanted with you. That may explain why this didn’t appear to be a real issue until the kids were adults. They’re angry and resentful at their dad, his actions prevented them getting even a little close to you, but they realised you weren’t at fault. So, they kept quiet while minors to not make things harder for you, then distanced themselves as adults, when they have the right to choose who is in their life and who isn’t.
Your husband is on a dangerous path if he wants to maintain a relationship with his older kids, though. If he keeps shoving you and the younger kids down his older kids throats like this, he will lose both his older kids. If he’s giving this scrapbook to his son now, it sounds like that’s his plan for all the kids, to gift them their scrapbooks on their 25th birthdays. And it sounds like he’ll get the better reaction from his son than from his daughter, whose more likely to just come out and say it. The son may just lose interest in the scrapbook as soon as they get to the parts that include you and then shove it somewhere he can forget about it, ‘accidentally’ leaving it behind if he moves or chucking it out during a clean out. He sounds more passive in his rejection of the new family. The daughter, on the other hand, she already destroyed family photos, she’d do the same with her scrapbook.
Drop the subject since your husband is determined in his course, but be there for him when it doesn’t go to plan. Maybe use the aftermath of this ‘gift’ to try and dial back your hubby’s pushing a relationship that doesn’t and won’t exist. His kids are adults now, after all, they can completely cut him out of their lives if they wish to.
Updateme
NTA. I also want to give another perspective I haven’t seen yet on the thread, though I know you’re overwhelmed with comments. Still, I hope you see this one. My father recently gave me a bunch of sentimental items (pictures, newspaper cut outs, etc) that he and my deceased mother had collected over the years. She passed away over 15 years ago, he’s been remarried for over 10 years to a woman who despises me and who I have to assume pisses ice. Regardless, giving me these items really felt like him saying, “I don’t want/need/care about these things anymore. The part of my life where I was your father has ended.”
If your husband has been carefully curating these albums for himself, passing it off to his son at this point in his life will probably feel very similarly. It’s something to think about.
NTA. Your husband is though, and extremely unrealistic.
>But both my stepkids have been pretty clear that they do not have a fondness for me or for their half siblings and they have no trace of us in their homes.
As is their right. Their father chose to marry you, they didn’t choose you to be their family. Their father has a relationship with you. They do not. Nor do they want one.
>On their social media they post family photos but funnily enough they never have me or their half siblings included. They never acknowledge us online at all.
Because they don’t consider you their family. Their dad is. But the rest of you they only see as their dad’s family. Not theirs.
>My stepkids both also said they’d like it if their dad didn’t bring us because if he’s visiting they’d like to see him and only him. My husband brushed off that comment by saying he could stop by on his own too but they’d never see the rest of us if we didn’t visit.
Because they don’t want to see you. How clueless is your husband? Serious question. His kids have tried time and time again to make it clear that you are not family to them and that they don’t want you or the other kids around.
Why does he keep pushing it? All thats gonna do is make them start pushing the dad away too. You can’t force people into emotional connections with other people. That’s not how any of it works. You can create lifelong resentment towards yourself if you keep pushing it though.
>The kids never spoke out against us getting married or brought any issues to me or my husband about us. And we did talk to them. It really only became apparent after they became adults.
So they didn’t make trouble for their dad choosing his relationship with you, but their dad won’t give them the same courtesy as adults in choosing who they associate with and care about and consider family? It sounds like his kids were actually super mature about it, far more mature than either you or your husband is being about it now. And I don’t think they have a problem with your husband’s and your relationship. That’s between the 2 of you, and none of their business. They just have no desire for a personal relationship with *you* or your kids.
>I asked him if he was sure and he was like why not, his son would love it and he couldn’t wait for us all to go through it together. I told him I wasn’t so sure he’d love all of it given his refusal to have photos of me or the kids in his home. He told me it’s not like he could remove them. He asked me what I expected and then asked if I thought he’d rip those pages out or something. I said yes.
Sure his kid can. He can tear out all the pages after the death of May, or where they start with you. Or he can throw the whole thing out. Honestly if my dad kept choosing to be *this* tone deaf and dismissive of my very clear desire to not be involved with his girlfriend and their kids, I’d literally give him the option of taking it back, because that’s an album of *his* family, not mine, or ripping the pages that I don’t consider my family out himself so it is actually an album of my family. And then in that situation id ask my fsther and his gf/kids to leave, with the caveat that only dad is allowed back to visit.
Harsh but your husband seems blind to politely trying to get him to eff off with pushing you on them. This is legitimately ridiculous behaviour. Your husband lives in some sort of fantasy lala land where he refuses to face the reality that his family (you and your kids) isnt his other children’s family and will never br. His kids are adults, they no longer have any obligation to be around *any* of you, including their dad. That they’ve put up with it this long is honestly impressive.