Making a Second Marriage Work

This is an offshoot of my previous post/tangent. I was pleasantly surprised by those of you who agree on parenting issues with your ex, but what do you do if you don't on an issue? I have noticed that my dh and his ex just kind of agree to disagree and the kids may do one thing at one house and another at the other. I think my ex and I are the same way (I think we have disagreed on bedtimes, for instance).

For example, what if CP does not believe children should be watching rated R movies, but NCP does not see the harm in them and lets the kids watch them. WWYD? Just wondering if we are really that out of the norm...

What I've done is teach my kids that I need to see a movie before they can... I don't say "don't watch it at dads" I say "let me see it before you do to make sure it is appropriate."  And it has worked so far, they just tell their father "no" to some movies and games.. they're 6 and 8.

The reason I do this is because dad doesn't deal with the fall out of some of the scarier things .. .well, scary to our over imaginative 6 year old, at least not often.   He has nightmares and if he sees something he thinks is really scary he won't go anywhere by himself for a while.  Dad has let them play violent video games that included zombie's.. yeah, that went over well.  I did talk to dad, but he seems to think, like a lot of people from blended families, that his house is fine to watch those things in... well.. when it affects my house, no, it isn't. 

The kids told me about a month ago that he let them play world of warcraft... i told them that it was unacceptable (first of all my kids are talking to strangers and second of all, even fantasy violence and monsters are not always good for the youngest)... recently my son said dad asked him if he wanted to play and he told his dad "nah, it's too much violence"... dad just laughed, but didn't force the issue...

I also teach my kids what is and isn't appropriate for them... dad sees them 4 days a month and I am responsible for the other times and do feel that what I'm teaching them shouldn't be overridden (or is it overrided) for a few days a month.  What is and isn't appropriate doesn't change simply due to location of their bodies. Or the fact that I'm not there.  Same goes for things besides movies/games... I expect them to be respectful (to my standards and those are pretty high) even when I'm not around, I expect them to brush their teeth when I'm not around (dad isn't big on hygiene)...just because I'm not around doesn't mean that they should be be able to ignore what I've been teaching them for a very short period of time.

Most of the time I don't really interfere w/ my ex's parenting decisions. I would only make a big deal about it if it was something major. This is also vice versa. Recently I did call my ex because for years, he has been cutting DS' hair himself. This one time DS was quite upset that he thought his father cut his hair too short and it was only a few weeks before school started. I did call to ask in a humorous why he did this kind of haircut and said that DS seemed upset by it. He said that before this time, he had told DS that he would take him to the barber and DS really made a fuss and said no. So that gave me the info and the chance to say to DS that if he didn't want dad to cut his hair, then he had to go to the barber.

My ex was one of those who will allow DS to watch movies that I probably wouldn't take him to, but I figure that no lifelong harm is going to come. He's 14 so we don't have the issues that the last poster has w/ little kids being up all night cause they are scared. Also, my ex has always had the kids almost 1/2 the time, so I couldn't really get away w/ telling them that these are the rules if dad says something different.

the other big thing is that ex is more religious than I am and he likes the kids to go to church every week. I compromise by sending them to religious ed, which is now on EO Sunday (used to be after school). But I admit that I don't take them to church. He was kind of upset by that, but this time I said, well you are free to take them to church but you can't really make me go when I don't want to.

But other than that, we generally agree on the major points of parenting, like the fact that school work is important and that the kids should be raised w/ certain principals.

Hot topic for me and timely. Mine (ex) doesn’t parent - period.  We easily agree on the small scheduling stuff, but things like bedtimes and movies are simply out of my control when they are there.  Yeah they have watched movies I don't approve of.  I enforce my principles when they are here which is getting to be more and more as they get older.  

For me the biggest problem with ex is on the issues which at their ages 12, 15, 18 are often about teaching them how to be an adult, he has no clue or desire to deal with. Easier to leave it to me.  He doesn’t think of the messages he is sending when for example he condones the 18yo going on food stamps. Or bailing him out of difficult situations.  Sadly the boys seem to have inherited his lack of motivation, and it is upto me to work on motivating them, a little difficult when he doesn’t have the backbone or desire to back me up on the biggies. I have had to really work on not letting this kinda stuff get to me – a work in progress!  I just keep telling myself I cannot control or change his ignorance and lack of parenting, all I can do is work on my reactions and know that I have the (much) bigger influence. Now they are older and have social lives, sitting in his small place watching tv or xbox most of the w/e is not enough for them, and he does nothing to encourage visits (functioning alcoholic) so it suits him when they want to stay here to be with their friends on w/e and school vacations. When the 12yo does go she is usually at her cousins most of the time. I now let them stay here whenever they want – though it hasn’t always been that easy for me to do that – I had 3 almost teens including 2 lazy boys, who barely squeak through school, did ALL the parenting with no family around, and also work with teens, so at the w/e badly needed a break from kids/teens.  But one has flown the nest and I now have more support/help than I had.  And now they are with friends most of the w/e.  I didn’t even insist dad take them for the CO 2^nd week over summer vacation and they didn’t ask for the first year in 8 yrs. The most they likely did for the first week was go the pool at his place.

I agree with the other poster who said if it affects things at your house, it is worth trying to work out with ex.  Otherwise accept that some things will be different at the other house – that’s just the price we pay for divorce with kids.  My advice - choose your battles wisely, save your breath for the big stuff that you can try and work out by attempting to work out a compromise.  I have found the pick your battles to be a great mantra for me, and since I have needed to use this with my all my kids as they approach adulthood, in particular the difficult one, I am getting more and more practice!!

HTH!

I guess I have a mixture of Liz and UK.  He really doesn't parent anyway, never did, never knew how.  He thought all it involved was coaching soccer, because that's all his father ever did (only it was baseball).  Sigh....

So pretty much everything is left up to me, and that's fine.  That way, when my oldest had his 'breakdown', my ex can point the finger at me, because he can honestly say "I didn't do anything", and he doesn't realize that his doing nothing accounts for some of the issues.

It is what it is.  That's all.  We both had a strong committment to put the best interests of the kids ahead of any negative feelings we had for each other.  They are the innocent victims in any divorce.

Pam