#FamilyDrama: π¨ Need Help! π¨ AITA for suggesting to my brother that he talks to his kids without his wife Jen present?
So here’s the scoop: my brother has been struggling to communicate with his children, Kyra and Landen, who have been through a lot. They’ve been dealing with bullying and learning disabilities, but they just won’t open up to Jen, their stepmom. I told my brother he should talk to his kids alone, but he thinks it disrespects Jen as their “new mom.”
I need your input, guys. Did I overstep? Or am I onto something here? Let me know what you think! π§ #FamilyDrama #ParentingDilemma
Comment below with your thoughts and let’s figure this out together! ππΌπ₯
NTA. His kids needs are way more important here. Fix the imminent things happening to the kids, then they can work on the relationship with Jen.
She needs to back up and let them deal with their issues if she really loves them. She canβt force a motherly relationship on grieving children. Theyβll just hate her and the damage may already be done
Was giving my basic and correct advice (that has also been given by the doctor they see) too far (after they asked for my advice)? No, OP, it was not.
NTA
But if professionals are saying this as well and he still isnβt even open to the idea, this is probably going to go nowhere, sadly.
NTA. You’re essentially telling him what everyone else but Jen is also telling him.
NTA. It seems your brother is simultaneously asking for and rejecting advice. Like saying “give me advice, but only give advice that validates what I want to hear, not advice that would actually help.”
NTA – i’m a stepmom and have always respected the need for my stepkids to speak with their dad alone. Also, if he ever has anything of importance to say to them, he always speaks with them without me and then if needed, we can also speak about the topic. It doesn’t undermine my role. Even when both adults in the home are married and the kids are their bio kids, sometimes a child is more comfortable talking to one parent over the other. You never shut down the child’s need to communicate because they only want to speak to one parent. You don’t allowing a bullying or learning situation to continue in the name of both parents (whether bio or step or adopted etc) being present.
NTA. He needs to start dealing with the kids he has, not the kids he wants. Itβs a shame though arenβt the same people.
Be blunt. These are the these of issues that make kids unalive themselves. Can you talk to the kids without Dad or Jen? Just having someone listen might be the lifeline they need. Poor kids.
NTA. Heβs putting Jenβs feelings above his childrenβs needs.
βDisrespects her place as their mother figure?β Your brother is totally wrong. The kids donβt see Jen as a mother figure. Your brother needs a reminder that his PARENTAL OBLIGATION TO HIS MINOR CHILDREN predates his relationship with Jen.
NTA
NTA
Your brother prioritised his new wife’s feelings more than his own children’s well-being.
Just because _he_ has moved on from his late wife, doesn’t mean the kids did too. He sounds like he wants the kids to just erase Mary’s existence from their lives and just accept that “Jen’s your new mommy now.” That’s really messed up.
Nta he asked your advice, you gave it. Along with the trained professionals he’s not listening to.Β
NTA – Jen is thoβ¦ sheβs pushing the agenda βIβm mom, I need to be involvedβ.. sheβs made it clear to your brother that there is no other way. She needs to let go of whatever the need for her to be βin chargeβ of this situation is. Likewise your brother needs to βjust do itβ and give the kids the chance to talk to him alone. Apparently they have expressed this need and are being ignored.
NTA, and gentle reminder (if it helps if you talk with him again) that itβs pretty common for kids to have 1 parent they confide in more than the other.
NTA – Your brother and Jen are putting their own agenda and egos above what is best for the children. Besides sometimes kids feel more comfortable only talking to one parent even when they are both bio parents.
Your brother needs to wake up and do right by his children because this could bite both of them in the ass when the kids get older and decide to go LC/NC with him and Jen.
NTA. You told him the truth and exactly what he should do. He needs to stop being a doormat in his marriage and take a stand for the benefit of his kids.
OP give your brother an example of just wanting to talk to one parent. When you get your period you might just want to talk to your mom. When you have trouble at work you talk to your dad. Im sure you can think of a time with your birth parents where you or he only wanted to talk to one parent. If his wife is really a parent she wouldn’t be this insecure.
Good luck
NTA not the sharpest tool in the shed is he?
NTA.
And frankly he should hear that bio parents in intact families don’t have to have all conversations involve both parents. Sometimes kids just want to talk to one or the other.
By forcing this, they are actually damaging the kids’ relationship with Jen. It is counterproductive.
NTA. Sometimes people need someone to hit them upside the head with the truth. You did that. If your brother can’t handle it, that’s on him, not you.
On top of that, your brother is a stiff-necked fool. His elder kids are struggling, and they need a parent’s help. Rather than helping them, he’s insisting that they talk to their stepmother alongside him … and his kids are suffering for it.
If he wants to include his wife, he needs to let her know that he loves her, respects her, etc., but that his kids need his help and so she might feel excluded. Now, if there’s something where he wants Jen’s input or ideas, he could always speak to her separately about the issue after the kids raise it.
At your end … the only thing I might suggest you do is reach out to the kids separately yourself. They need to talk to an adult, and they may be more comfortabel with you than with their stepmother.
NTA – sometimes even bio kids with have a specific parent they prefer to talk to about specific things. Heβs over reacting because she is their stepmom.
He is failing these kids. They have told them they need him and need to speak to him and he is refusing to speak to them without her.
So for 5 years, his kids have been upset and don’t really talk to him. He’s only got 4 years or less until the girl will go NC and 6 until his boy does. All because of his insistence that “jen” is their mother now. NTA. But make sure your brother knows he is driving his kids away.
Put it to him straight. β look, I know you love you pr wife, and your kids, thatβs very clear. But using your kids lives and emotional problems as the way to prove you love your wife or that that she should be there mom is not ok. Is about what you consider important. Your wifeβs feelings or your kids future. It seems your kids are on an extreme downward spiral and all they want is their dad. And you donβt care because they should just want new mom because you love her and donβt want to hurt her feelings. You are literally ignoring the professional therapist and youβre hurting kids because you think they should like having a new mom and new half siblings. Well when they either stop talking to you or kill themselves, you and Jen can say your love for each other was stronger than all. Even your kids lives.β
Ask both him and Jen why her feelings take priority over two children who are clearing asking their father to listen to them. Two kids who have been through traumatic loss of their mother and neither these so called adults can put them first.
He is lucky he still has the ability to help his children, but if he continues, he is going to be the reason they leave home at 18 and never speak to him again.
Send your brother this whole post. If he still can’t accept his kids’ feelings, then he is a failure of a father.
Your brother is a selfish AH.
Even when both members of a couple are the biological parents sometimes the kids open up more to one or the other (depending on the issue).
He is putting his wifeβs ego (not her needs even) above his childrenβs welfare.
I am thrilled if my children open up to anyone trustworthy – aunty, grandparent, trusted family friend, husband. Itβs pure ego for the wife to insist she must be there.
I donβt need it to be me and Iβm the north mother. Itβs pure ego from that step mother.
Nta
Nta. The kids (and you by extension) have told him exactly what they need, he’s just too obtuse to listen
Nta. The kids (and you by extension) have told him exactly what they need, he’s just too obtuse to listen
NTA – could you offer to talk to the kids if they won’t talk to your brother and Jen?
NTA. How much clearer can they be? He and Jen need to put those kids first and have her back the fork off. They didn’t ask for a replacement mom, and they barely had any time to grieve their mother before he set up house all over again with Shiney New Mom. He has done serious damage to his kids, and he needs to get it together.
I wonder if your brother ever talked his mom or dad 1:1 or if he was forced to have any conversations in a group? I might ask that and also point out that they are inadvertently teaching them that because Jen came into their lives, they no longer have a Dad OR a Mom. They now only get a DadJen blob. Itβs not allowing them to develop trust with her individually or learn that she isnβt actually a huge disruption or further proof that their life will never be the same. And as a result, they are alone. And will logically attribute the loneliness to her presence. NTA. Itβs the most normal thing it he world to feel more comfortable talking to some people than others. My dad is great, but when I got my period, I went to my mom. That wasnβt me not respecting him as a parent. It was me feeling more comfortable talking to mom and knowing the relationship was good enough that he didnβt need to monitor every conversation I had. Went the same way in reverse – when I got sick, I told him first because my mom is very emotional. Itβs not a dig or rejection. Itβs just having a different relationship and recognizing that each of them have different strengths.
NTA.
The kids, the therapist are all saying the same thing. They do not want Jen there when they talk to their Dad about what is worrying them
Jen is their stepmother, that is immutable and by trying to force some other relationship on the children is cruel.
NTA. I am always baffled by these step parents who over step. Clearly she is dadβs wife and not a mother figure. Anyways, he will lose them if he does not act right.
Jen isn’t going to be much use as a mother figure when the kids go no contact and move to the other end of the planet.
NTA
I will never understand why people think that just because they donβt see a family member as being βstepβ or βhalfβ then everyone else in the family unit also has to think and feel the same way.
Your brother and his wife are huge AH and forcing a fake motherly relationship between Jen and the older two kids will only a) make things worse and b) prevent them from developing a loving relationship with Jen on their own terms.
Im saying all of this from the position of having a step mum myself who never forced a relationship with me, and I love her very much. I am also a step mum myself, my step daughter (26f) and I have a good relationship and I even waited a while to have bio kids (now 7f and 8f) with her dad as we didnβt want her to feel like she was βbeing replacedβ during her early teenage years.
Your brother and Jen are the adults in this situation so they can suck up their selfish feelings and put the needs of the kids first, which is what parents are supposed to do. I hope you show him my comment.
NTA – but honestly i donβt think you werenβt honest enough. He needs to have the truth in the harshest way possible. Ie βstop prioritizing the feelings of the grown ass adult you married; and start being an actual parent to the minor children you have, and meet their needs were they currently stand before horrible something happens that would completely be the fault of the two parents whose first priority seems to be their own egos.β
NTA. Your brother moved on very quickly from the death of his first wife. He was married two years after her death (which may well have been fine for him, but he made a unilateral decision for his children on false pretenses).
He has been told repeatedly, by professionals, that his kids want to speak to just him. However he’s put his own fantasy and the wants of his new wife before those of his children.
His children are drowning and are asking him for his hand to help them up and he’s actively swatting their hands away and telling them to reach for his wife.
I don’t think you went far enough some one needs to knock some sense into his head ) metaphorically speaking of course). The solution to his “difficult” problem is obvious… and not difficult. NTA
Side note. HE keeps getting called because daughter is GETTING bullied at school. This does not sound like a her problem. It’s the school’s responsibility to provide a safe environment, and it does not sound like it is. It’s not her fault for getting bullied, but it sounds like the school is treating it as such. As a parent that raises red flags to me. And makes me wonder about his son’s treatment if he is at the same school.
My ex and his new wife (ap) tried to do this with our three children. When they became adults they all went LC with the pair of them. The day after his funeral was the day the kids went NC with ap and she was banned from any further contact with what she thought of as her grandchildren. The grandkids were young and had zero emotional ties to her and the kids had ample real grandparents. The grapevine says she (ap) still canβt figure out what went wrong.