Dealing with his ex-wife - PLEASE HELP!!
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Dealing with his ex-wife - PLEASE HELP!!
| Tue, 11-09-2004 - 2:14pm |
This is kind of lengthy, but I feel the background info. is important. I have been dating a wonderful man for two years and have lived with him for 7 months now. Things are great between us and we plan on getting married in the next couple of years. The only big problem we seem to have is his ex-wife. They split up because she cheated on him (side note: he was husband number three when they divorced, and every marriage has ended this same way) and is now living with the guy. We aren't sure whether they are married or not, but he has asked and has never gotten a straight answer. He and I met as they were splitting up, went out for a while, and we cut things off for a few months, as I did not want to be the "re-bound girl" and neither of us wanted to be together for the wrong reasons. Over time, as he dated more and learned to cope with his divorce, we found our way back together and things could not be better. He has a three year old son, however, whom his ex tries to put inthe middle all of the time. He has tried really hard to show his son and his (ex) step son that this is not their fault and that we are all civil to one another. We have invited her and the new boyfirned over with the kids to have dinner so that they may see us interacting in a positive way. My problem is that she cannot seem to get it through her head that he has moved on, and that if it weren;t for the kids, he would have nothing to do with her. She is constantly trying to get him to go out for drinks with her under the pretense that they have to discuss their son. She takes every opportunity to point out to him how I do the wrong things, and tries to demean me. She denies him extra days with their son when he asks for them, quoting the divorce papers and the visitation schedule, but when she wants to stay out in the bar or go out with her friends, she suddenly calls on Sunday night and asks if we want to keep him an extra day. Now my boyfriend wants to have her and the boyfriend over again "so that we can re-iterate our civility" He says we should be the bigger people and not play the same games she does, and that we have to show his son that it's okay and we are friendly toward one another. I explained to him that I would have no problem with that, IF that's the way things actually were. I also explained that I dont think it's fair that she can be so petty and vindictive, and we jsut deal with it. When is fasir to demand that he get angry and put his foot down? Is he handling this right and am I just being catty? I am not sure of the appropriate way to handle this. i am walking a very fine line between knowing what is a reasonable expactation and what is not. Please help me - any insight would be helpful. I do not hate the ex or want to make things bad for thier son, I just want to understand when I am being selfish and when I should speak up. (My boyfriend is very good at understanding my feelings and opinions, but is also still trying to get the balancing act right here).

If he is setting appropriate boundaries, then I think you just need to let this be. He can't control HER behavior, he can only control his.
If he's not, then you can let him know you think he needs to do so and make suggestions as to what you feel the appropriate boundaries are (but I don't think him getting angry is the solution...it's being FIRM and consistent).
Sheri