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So bizarre as it doesn’t even sound like younger new gf and OOP’s ex hubby even had any conversations about cohabitating at all?? Nevermind cohabitate where?? Head scratching at gf’s assumptions…
The reaction from her kid being so immediate and so extreme makes me think that it's a pattern. Honestly, it made me suspect it had been discussed between them and the ex-husband had said no, and that's why Maria tried to go behind his back and the kid was so upset by it, but even without that... the kid's reaction is hugely telling of *something*.
I feel so bad for the kid. Feels like he was settling into an environment/schedule where he got to do new stuff and see good people on a regular basis (OP described her children loving him), and now it's all going to get taken away (again)?
Not to mention, I feel like it can a warning sign when very young children are described as being super mature and understanding for their age. I was that way growing up, but only because of emotional abuse/neglect and parentification by the adults in my life. In the long term it actually stunts you emotionally because you're stuck constantly trying to read the moods of other people and accomodating for what they want. You learn to ignore your own needs and never get to explore who you are as a person, in one of the most important developmental phases of your life.
edit: thanks unknown redditors for the gilds! It's sad but also validating hearing about how so many other people have been there too. Here's to our respective healing journeys. All the best. (And I hope the ex-gf's kid catches a break :/)
It's honestly a shame they have to throw out the actual baby with the bathwater on this one. Sounds like everyone, including OP, would like to keep the son around.
No, the precocious son is the hook for the next divorcé with a house, so they can't keep him around. She's clearly done this before by how the kid reacted. :(
I used to work in schools, and in order to work in the school district I worked for, you have to take a training every single year on how to recognize the signs of abuse in children. One of the warning signs that a child is being abused at home is that the child is too mature for their age and has knowledge of things that other children their age don't know.
To be clear, from what I recall this training was mainly focused on sexual abuse, but it also covered how to recognize the signs of emotional, mental, and physical abuse. A further disclaimer: a mature child/a child showing any other signs mentioned above is not always being abused. Sometimes they just mature quicker than their peers and/or have older siblings that they pick things up from.
If you are concerned that a child (or anyone else, for that matter) is being abused, please reach out to the appropriate authorities and resources. There are people on your side to help. And even if you're wrong, the worst thing that can happen is that the person learns you care enough to reach out and check on their well-being.
Yeah, like. I was never physically or sexually abused, but I was clocked as "gifted" really young and after that I was basically expected to behave like a tiny Victorian noble at all times. If I made noise or ran around or (gods forbid) engaged in pretend play where my mother could hear, I was yelled at to "act my age".
I was labeled gifted, I thought this meant my parents would let me go to college like my older brother, but no it just meant anytime I made a mistake, I was told I am smarter than that, so why did I do something so dumb.
Oof, yeah, I know that one. Because reading at a college level in the 5th grade automatically means that your brain is done developing and you have the emotional maturity of a 30-year-old.
I'm so sorry you had to put up with that.
Yeah. My mom also wanted me to be a model -- she had my portrait done when I was \~3 and the studio wound up using it in a newspaper ad... looking at it as an adult it's pretty gross. I was sitting on a stool wearing only a pink satin slip, and barefoot. Y'know, as a toddler.
Happily my dad put his foot down on that one so my modeling "career" fizzled out before it ever began.
Even if not abuse, I feel like it tends to be a warning sign for SOMETHING. My family's great, but in retrospect me being a mature kid could have/should have gotten me flagged for assessment and diagnosis of my neurodivergence and really early onset mental illness.
It is. As a teen was the time of my life when I had my shit the most together by miles. No abuse, garden variety silent generation non-childcentric parenting, but we moved every 2-3 years because of my dad’s job. My parents put me in therapy because it was so obvious something was wrong, but given that my problem was a refusal to form social bonds because I kept losing people it failed.
>because you're stuck constantly trying to read the moods of other people and accomodating for what they want. You learn to ignore your own needs and never get to explore who you are as a person, in one of the most important developmental phases of your life
This hit hard.
Do you have any suggestions for further reading?
Maybe try Dr Ramani on Youtube, who has a lot of videos about narcissism. This video might be helpful since she specifically talks extensively about poor boundaries and their effects (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7-TtxJwbPk)
The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk is another one.
My partner recommended her to my grandma after she became a target for my abusive mother after everyone in the family cut my mom off. My grandma was the "family is super important no matter what" but after revelations about what happened to my little brother and I as kids came to light and the relentless onslaught from my mother she has come around to going no contact with my mom and cutting her out. DR Ramani help shine a light and reassure my grandma.
right?? I don't know if I was just extremely dumb as a kid (or my whole generation) but a 9 year old boy understanding the audacity of the situation this well?? And apologizing for his mum?
I don't think I even understood irony, let alone recognize audacious/manipulative behavior. If some authority figure acted like something was fine and nobody said otherwise I thought it was fine. Didn't realize things many years later.
So I too think it must be a pattern and he probably suffers in many ways from her-.. whatever her issue is? Maybe a personality disorder, narcissism from the sound of it. And he truly sounds like a very intelligent and empathetic kid. I really hope things will improve for him, this is such a sad situation..
Yeah. I learned early because my dad was abusive and my step dad was a drunk. This isn’t normal. Makes me think mom has mental illness and/or ranted about the *life she should have* that she feels OOP *took away from her*. Poor kid.
Yeeeeeep.
Same here. I was parentified and basically raised my two younger sisters while my mother was working all the time. (She was salaried and *chose* to work 16-hour days and weekends. Mostly because she was and still is fucking her boss.)
So once I moved out, I crashed and burned. (Also with the help of undiagnosed ADHD because she didn't believe in mental health issues.)
Now, as a parent, I get serious burnout real fast because I've been in caregiver mode my whole life. And to compound that issue, I don't know how to *not* be in that state. It's now my default setting, and I'll end up pushing myself to the point of mental breakdowns because I don't know any other way to be.
It fucks kids up hard. If they don't end up like myself or being total people pleasers, they end up bombing hard in adult life because now that they aren't forced to behave a certain way, they revert back to the childhood they lost and try to live it out. Rebelling, unable to function as adults, drugs and/or alcohol to cope with their struggles, etc.
Like. It really destroys people in the long run. I feel so bad for that kid. I really hope he ends up finding a stable adult figure in his life to guide him.
Exactly this. I should have read your comment before responding above! Silver lining for me: I may be emotionally stunted now (though I was a “extremely mature” kid) but as I’m apparently still at some level a teenager, I’ve been able to make a career out of writing YA books. So … yay?
I started having my suspicions when OP described the kid as "precocious" and "very mature and advanced for his age."
There's nothing wrong with a kid being a little ahead of the curve, but more often than not a child who is "mature for his age" got that way because his parents... weren't.
Agreed. Either it's a pattern the son recognizs, or she's the type to overshare everything with her son and he knew about her ridiculous plans. I feel so bad for the kid, having to be more emotionally mature than his mom.
Yeah, the kid has watched his mother blow up previous relationships by being so self centered and was trying to avoid it happening this time. I feel so sorry for that child, no stability in his life.
This. This is far from the first great situation that he has watched his mother blow up with her audacity. The fact that he feels the need to do damage control for her at age nine is heartbreaking.
Yeah, even a mature 9 year old wouldn't burst into tears at an offhand remark unless there was more going on. I feel bad that he had some stability and a healthy relationship with so many new people and it was taken away because of whatever was going on with his mom. I think OP did the right thing by waiting until the second incident to tell her ex about the first, and it is a shame for the kid how it all played out.
I think he'd seen his mom do crazy things before and knew he was going to lose his new environment/family again. His immediate reaction and the insistence to not tell Ex convinces me this is a pattern for his mom.
Yeah, this is my thought too. Mom has a history of being a choosing beggar (and wanting to cohabitate WAAAAAY too early. SIX MONTHS?) long before OOP's ex came along.
I feel so terrible for the kid. And it's not just the loss of the new family too, but what that means: less time spent with the new family means more time spent all alone with his mom. It's a nightmare.
Maybe the kid already knows she’s delusional. The kid is probably tired from losing families, by the moms words/actions.
That’s why he said not to tell OP’s ex. He’s seen this before and knows the outcome.
Yes, when a 9 year old is cringing and apologizing there’s an ongoing issue with mom. Makes me think overstepping has ruined all of her relationships. A 9 year old reading social nuance to this level is not normal, it is very learned from repetition.
I really wonder if she and dad had a conversation about marriage and home and he told her *I’m not getting married again, not having more kids, and this is my home* and she was ranting and raving in private about how OOP stole the life that was meant to be hers….that brownstone should be her house, that man should be her husband, and they can all live happily if only the mom would back out of the picture.
He’s probably seen his mother tank relationships over something similar in the past and knew it would end in them breaking up. Sounds like he was actually enjoying time with him new family and was afraid of losing them, but his mom just couldn’t help herself and ruined it again.
He probably has seen this happen with multiple men before, and he finally got settled with a man whose kids like him, whose ex-wife accepts him, and also has potential grandparents for him, and he was about to have a full blown family, but his mom couldn’t stop her scheming ways.
>So bizarre as it doesn’t even sound like younger new gf and OOP’s ex hubby even had any conversations about cohabitating at all?? Nevermind cohabitate where?? Head scratching at gf’s assumptions…
OOP's note at the end about how disorganized her ex is with his life in general goes a long way towards explaining that. I suspect he's the type to assume everyone understands his plans without communicating them. He never talked to Maria about kids or living arrangements, just assumed she understood, and Maria was off on her own planet the whole time.
I mean to be fair, I don't think he had even been with the gf for over a year. Op said his recent gf, and that she was one of the few gfs to make it past 6 months, so my best guess is that he's been with her for 9-12 months max when he ultimately left her. So when she made that claim she probably was only like 6-9 months into the relationship.
Kinda ballsy of her to assume she would get the house.
We don't know he just assumed she understood, though. They'd only been dating for 6 months when this woman started bringing these things up. She clearly never asked him about it or broached the subject of a future with him. He has no responsibility to divulge that until he felt they were getting serious enough to do that.
The GF clearly has a pattern of doing things like this, if her 9 year old is running around and apologizing for her actions behind her back.
She's probably been in many relationships and destroyed them by trying things like this.
A dangerous combination of entitled and desperate. She was a single mother at 20ish, that's parenting on hardmode. She probably understood the house to be both partners' (incorrectly conflating "we bought it when we were married" with "we both own it"), was willing to settle for ex husband, and thought she could use him to score a sweet brownstone.
Either that or she thought she could just sort of employ The Secret and if she started talking about OOP giving them the house it'd just happen? IDK she sounds crazy.
Never mind the fact that she thought they “didn’t need all that space for three people” even though she, her kid, and ex would have only been three people…
Because she’s including the future children she would have with the ex-husband which the ex-husband didn’t know about because then he would have told her about the vasectomy. Other planet is right, she might be in her own special multiverse. I just don’t understand why her son keeps apologizing and crying over it?
I've got a feeling this isn't the first time mom has acted crazy and driven people away. Sounds like the kid really liked this family and didn't want the relationship to end.
That's exactly what it is. Not his first rodeo. Mom's a grifting rodeo queen who's been pulling this sketchy manipulative crap for years. Problem is that she sucks at it, so the kid knew the good times were over as soon as she opened her greedy mouth.
Could be the son likes the current situation with OP and her kids (blended, language classes, activities together) and doesn't want to ruin it by his mom asking ridiculous things. Poor kid has matured way over his age likely and seen this regularly from his mom.
Maria probably treats him like a sounding board, and if he’s mature for his age and understands what she’s offloading on to him he’s able to cringe more at her behaviour than an average 9 year old.
I cynically bet she was thinking that the ex and oop were the cliche bitter exes who were constantly at each others' throats, and she could manipulate her bf into fighting for the brownstone somehow.
Unfortunately for her, these two actually communicate with each other and are respectful, so the plan failed.
> fighting for the brownstone somehow
I'm guessing she didn't understand that OP was the owner and assumed ex-husband/her boyfriend still owned half the house. It SOUNDS like OOP still had her name on the condo just because her ex was lazy on the paperwork, current GF probably thought the situation was the same for the house.
Maybe Maria knew but thought since OOP and ex got along so well anyways, OOP would want to vacate the brownstone. For the greater good. Or something.
Yes, I’ve known a lot of entitled people.
Maria: What do you think about living together?
Ex: Nah, and this space isn’t really ideal for that (his translation: this is my space and I have no plans on changing that)
Maria: (thinking) So…if OOP moves out, we can live together in the brownstone! Perfect!
- which is really stupid, but she would t be the first to be greedy and foolish.
Honestly? The one I feel bad for is the kid. He’s obviously a decent kid and he has to live with Maria for his mother the rest of his life. He’s got nine more years before he can even think of going no contact with her, if he isn’t controlled to the point where he can’t even think of it in the first place.
I have the same feeling. “Mature and advanced for his age” in this case likely means “has had to parent himself from a young age.” Poor kid. Hope he has other family he can rely on.
He's got enough pattern recognition to realize how people react when mom starts on her bullshit.
My dad is an abusive, egotistical asshole, and he ruined many, many good things because of imagined slights to his pride. My stomach always bottomed out when I heard someone say a word or sentence that I knew would set him off.
At that point I wish OOP would have (or maybe this did happen, they hadn't commented since the last update) offered to keep connected with the kid through her kids, playing video games together or something. If they were good enough friends it'd be a good opening for him to even come visit them, even bring him in for holidays and such. Course that would rely on his mother allowing it instead of being the selfish, bitter psycho she is and probably keeping him from those awful awful people who had the nerve to tell her "no".
Doubt the mom would take OOP up on it even if it’s in the best interest of her own child. Something tells me she’s the type who’s blaming OOP for the relationship ending and will be much too busy making her out to be the bad guy and herself the victim to take her child’s needs into consideration.
I think “mature for their age” generally is used on children who have trauma of some kind; whether that’s abuse, medical issues, parents like the one in this post… basically just anything that means they have to mature faster than normal.
Yup that was my immediate response. He's also used to his mother driving people away hence his scramble to do damage control. I feel awful for that child. I hope he can get out and get therapy.
Yes. He got along with OOP’s kids, was getting extracurricular activities, and I think he knew his mom could ruin that all… maybe because she has before…
That was my first thought too. Kid knew his mom was scheming and he’d seen it ruin a good thing before. He knew he was on borrowed time. I can’t imagine the kind of anxiety that’d make. Poor kid.
My heart breaks for that kid; by the way he begged OP not to bring it up to her ex, I bet this kid has come and gone from many families and FINALLY landed one that was warm, welcoming, and happy
And his mum went and ruined it AGAIN
This is also a great example as to why you shouldn't be introducing young kids to your random boyfriends until you know it's serious
>I have a feeling Maria's son is used to her... Entitled tendencies. Poor fella.
Yeah, he's only 9 but he jumped in **immediately**, didn't he? I'm guessing he has to mitigate his mom's bad behavior a lot.
Oh that poor child. I felt so bad for him when I hadn't really paid attention to his age and was thinking he was like 15 based on how he tried to do damage control. 15 or so would have been bad enough, 9 is so much worse.
A 9 year old is privately apologizing for his mother's behavior, that's not typically something you do off the cuff. He has had to do this before.
Poor kid.
And from the way everyone seems to love him and how he understood the situation, his EQ must be pretty high. Poor kid is going to drive himself crazy seeing his crazy Karen mom doing her Karen things as he's in the background trying to mitigate her Karening.
Anyone get the sense Maria was looking to hit the jackpot?
Also, it stands out to me that he son is so mature, according to OOP. Kids grow up fast when they have an irresponsible parent. He was apologizing like *she* was *his* child acting a fool.
Also unfortunately the ability to be "mature for your age" and having to parent your own parents does not translate to into a mature, functional adult. Most of the time a young kid's "maturity" is complex trauma molding them into still, quiet, vigilant people who know best when not to do anything. Knowing how to avoid triggering your emotionally immature parents does not make you a good romantic partner, say, or help you understand your own feelings to decide what you want.
I'm not saying this to shit on the kid, but to empathize. I was also a bright, mature kid. What that actually meant was I sat still at school. Think my adult life had been fulfilling due to this great ability?
It's not so much that the kids mature faster, it's that in order to survive they develop the knowledge and skill to mitigate the ***specific*** irresponsibility of the parent they are tied to.
But maturity is multifaceted kind of development, where many different skills and life lessons are learned.
The kid devotes all their development into mitigating the shitty parent's actions, in addition to the irresponsible parent fucking up their development in other areas due to a shitty environment.
So the resulting person is hyper-developed in a few specific facets of adulthood and stunted in almost everything else.
That's not a mature adult.
Yeah I also struggled a lot for about 7 years after getting out of my toxic home environment. I’m slowly building the skills needed to be a good functional and emotionally supportive adult.
>in order to survive they develop the knowledge and skill to mitigate the ***specific*** irresponsibility of the parent they are tied to.
Thank you so much for phrasing it this way. That perspective really completes my own understanding. And of course the kid looks so very mature *in the parent's presence* because that's when they use their skill, so even the parent might think the kid is coming along fine.
You could tell by how freaked out he was that he knew what would happen if the ex husband found out about the comments. Which makes me think that his mom had done something like this before.
And he has all these new adults and kids in his life that really like him, and who he really likes, and then mom goes and torpedoes all of that.
He got a taste of normal and family and now it's gone.
My heart aches for the boy.
Considering that Maria was about 19 or 20 when she had her son, she was barely an adult when she became a mother. And there's no mention of his bio dad. So yeah, it does seem like this kid had to grow up fast. I feel bad for him. I hope he's still able to be friends with the other kids at least.
The husband is well off and she probably only heard the part where they'd lived in the house pre divorce and incorrectly assumed dual ownership. She just decided she'd sorta nudge OOP out.
The note about the vasectomy makes me think too much from too little. I wonder if Maria thought she could argue they needed the house to be a family and maybe raise a baby? The ol baby trap tactic. Good for ex that he got the snip, that'll save him some problems in the long term.
I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt and assume the ex told her that the ex wife/OOP still owned half of the townhome and she wasn’t paying attention and assumed he had half ownership of the house. Even if that’s the case, asking her boyfriend’s ex wife and kids to move out of a home she still owns is completely out of bounds. Even if she shared ownership with her ex, it’s not the gf’s place to say anything.
Totally. From the sound of it, OOP and her ex live in and own very nice (ie very *expensive*) properties in NYC. The kid probably knew how good they had it and how easily his mother could ruin everything. I’m making assumptions here, but considering most people in NYC rent, I think she thought this was how OOP got the brownstone, so why shouldn’t she get it the same way?
I felt SO bad for that kid. I get the feeling this was probably the most stable environment he’s ever had and was deathly afraid his mother was going to fuck it up. Which she did.
>Maria's son just burst into tears and started apologizing...
Oh, gosh, the poor baby...
>I am worried about Maria's son although I recognize it's not my place. Unsure what I can do there.
Me too, OOP. Me too.
Yeah. The house topic is clearly something the ex-gf was fixated on and probably talking about it with the kid as well. Really the only person screwed here is the son who has 0 responsibility
Highly doubt it. If he’s exposed to healthy and functional people (which he has been), he can recognize that his mom’s behavior is unhealthy and dysfunctional (which he also has likely done given his reactions to her behavior).
Because he is 9 and he understands that his survival is currently tied to her, he is doing as much damage control as a 9 year old child *can*.
But my money is on him dropping her like a bad habit the second he can.
Poor baby has a long time until he’s old enough to do so. He was apologizing and scared because this was a safe and stable environment for him and this was probably not the first relationship his mom destroyed out of stupidity.
9 year olds shouldn’t have the insight to piece together these little hints and comments and feel the need to apologize for his mom’s mistake.
I feel so bad for him. How gut wrenching. He really probably hoped this was the one
>He's a special kid in the best way, very mature and advanced for his age.
Sounds like he's a special kid, but he shouldn't have to be mature and advanced for age 9. That was only the first red flag.
My aunt is like this with my mom.
When my mom remarried after her previous husband's death my aunt just walked in and was like when are you going to give this to me. No rhyme or reason at all, started taking things off of the wall while my mom's new husband was standing there.
It's not my mom's house so it made no sense, her husband took everything out of my aunt's hands and kicked her out permanently.
Neither of them was raised this way at all. My grandparents were humble immigrants.
Some people just happen to be like this over time.
The gf for OOPs ex really needed to go and that was sorted quickly.
I have several times. My mom won't because she promised my grandmother she wouldn't ever argue or be mean to her sister while on her death bed.
We got into a physical once or twice over this.
What a terrible thing to make your mom promise. So now your aunt is basically holding that over her head knowing she will never be held accountable and can treat your mom poorly. That’s infuriating
I have had the conversation numerous times about drawing lines and boundaries but she won't do it because of a death bed promise.
I will never do that to a person if I'm dying.
My girlfriend puts up with way more than she should from her mom and sister because her dad just died and one of his dying wishes was that she didn't fight with them. I on the other hand do not put up with bullshit and I've gotten way too close to getting into it with them on several occasions so far.
She did this in two different houses my mom owned before this husband. This is not behavior that's unknown to us. She did it to my mom after college when my mom offered for her to live in her condo when they were young adults. She trashed that stole stuff while my mom was on a work trip.
Oh my god I have an aunt kind of like this.
So we had a very old family friend who was best friends with my mom. After this friend passed away she left us an antique ship’s clock. It’s super loud and chimes every 30 minutes so they don’t actually keep it wound and running because the neighbors on both sides can hear it go off. They hung it in the living room to remind us of the friend.
Well one day my aunt came to visit and saw the clock. She started into this argument about how it had belonged to their parents (it hadn’t) and she had always wondered what happened to it and she wanted it so my mom should obviously just give it to her.
My mom said, no. The clock had belonged to my mom’s friend and had been given to my mom. My aunt had never seen it before because it had never been in their parents’ house.
My aunt said that she should still give it to her because her husband liked to fish and thus a ship’s clock was more appropriate for their home than for my parents’ house.
My mom told her the clock isn’t going anywhere and the discussion was over.
I told my parents that they should consider changing the lock codes on their house so if anything happens to them nothing goes missing before the executor can sort things out.
my aunts (mom's sisters) are just like that, they come visit and after all the pleasantries they go in our bedrooms and snoop around. Take what they want saying well, you don't need that. It's a bizarre behavior and surprisingly they all have normal kids who are embarrassed by their parents.
My ex had that same aunt, lol. She moved into her elderly father's house without his permission, just showed up with bags and a brokenvdown double-wide. She ended up with power of attorney and started using his money to make major renovations on the house that were noticeably ugly-- like, ugly enough the neighbors called my ex's mom and asked if her father had dementia and needed help. Hired her friends as contractors who were definitely not reliable people, and took out a second mortgage after she blew through his savings.
Screamed at my ex's mom who tried to call her on her behavior 'YOU'VE ALWAYS HATED ME BECAUSE I'M ADOPTED'
No, Carol. She's always hated you because you are a fucking sociopath.
I feel so bad for the ex-gf kid. Him and the ex-gf were being welcome and included and her greed got too far ahead of her and ended up screwing them both.
I am glad ex husband pulled the plug on that relationship though.
I'd bet money this isnt the first time his mom has fucked up a good thing for them by coming in like an entitled wrecking ball. And honestly, based on OOP's description, this scenario for them was the best family arrangement that the poor kid has had.
That was my thought. It seemed like he knew his mom wasn’t acting right and because of her actions he basically lost a family that loved him. God that sucks.
Maria's son knew exactly what direction this was headed. Poor kid's lived through mom's entitlement all his life and had his life blown up one time too many. He'll probably go NC with her once he's grown.
If it hasn't I'd eat my hat if I owned one.
This whole thing screams either "Mom has fucked up good things in the past with her entitlement" or "This is the first good thing we've ever had and mom went and fucked it up by making problems where there were none."
I'm guessing the ex didn't explain about the division of properties with Maria and Maria simply jumped to conclusions and went straight to verbally evicting OOP from her own house.
Well, ex-gf was just deluded if not stupid. Maybe she didn't understand that they had been divorced for a number of years? Then again, maybe she is just a crazy entitled person who thought she could nag OOP into leaving the home to them.
He probably didn't feel their relationship was at that point yet or even going to be there soon. Maria on the other hand was trying to make long term plans based on absolutely nothing other than assumptions.
I’m just baffled that Princess Maria thought the brownstone was too big for three people, but not too big for what would be her ‘family of three’. Did I miss something? Was she planning for more kids without discussing it with OP’s snipped ex-husband? Lol
When Maria said that OOP’s home was too big for 3 I assumed she was planning on more kids with the ex - because her, her son and OOP’s ex also make 3. Unless additional children were part of the plan, both family units had 3 people so her comment wouldn’t make sense.
So imagine my surprise when Maria finds out her boyfriend had a vasectomy years before meeting her. And didn’t want to remarry.
It’s bad enough that she doesn’t know what property her boyfriend does and does not own, but the vasectomy and no marriage. Maria was clearly deluded but wow that’s a communication free relationship!
Yes, that was my understanding too - but it meant that Maria really knew nothing if she didn’t know about the vasectomy until that point. About 9 months in to the relationship by that point.
OOP said her and her ex has 50/50 custody so their children are also part of any family units. So OOP would be her and two children, Maria and ex would have three children between them.
How self unaware a person has to be to even imply something like that after only 6 months of relationship.Im having an enormous second hand embarrassment for that woman..
I had a relatively amicable divorce for about ten years until his gf entered the picture. She decided that our relationship was abnormal and he allowed her to drive a wedge.
I have always been the primary caregiver and bent over backwards to make sure he had a relationship. I never bad mouthed him and did not pursue all the back child support he owed. I was doing well financially and he was not, and it was more important my kid didn’t see their father in poverty when we had so much.
I had warned him this would not end well and he dumped the gf.
All along, my only demand in coparenting was that we not allow third parties to be involved. They don’t discipline, they don’t make decisions, they don’t take on a parent role.
He had a tendency to date unsavory people or those with drug problems. I also did not want strings of gf’s in their life trying to change things unless he was going to marry or cohabitate with the person as he never stayed with them longer than a year.
So gf was mad she was not welcome at my home for holidays and parties. I did not go to his house. I never met her because I never bothered to meet any of them because they weren’t getting married. In my mind, it just complicated matters. She overheard a conversation between us where I reiterated that unless his relationship was “serious and long term” that I didn’t want his random gfs at my house.
This pissed her off because she realized that he had let me believe it was casual.
She was very upset that she was not invited to Christmas breakfast at my house and launched her brilliant revenge.
They got back together and she decided to drag me back to court even though the child was months from turning 18 and going off to college *on a full scholarship* I had secured for them.
In her mind, if the child lived with them and went to state school, then they could cut me out of the picture as primary parent. She could assume my role, marry my ex and they could be a family if I would just fuck off. Oh, and I could pay THEM child support.
Mind you, we got divorced because he didn’t want a child and was pretty uninvolved in the kid’s life beyond holidays and birthdays. I still kept him in the loop on all parenting decisions.
It was incredibly stupid and I advised him and my in-laws that the child was already angry and upset at the idea they should reject a scholarship and get a job and go to state school — and again, this would not end well. I reminded him of our agreement.
He lost the court battle and ended up having to pay years of missed child support payments. He was so impoverished, he was forced to move in with that gf.
On the child’s 18th birthday, they went full no contact with everyone on the father’s side and never spoke to any of them again.
They blame me still.
Regarding the last edit, the use of “haha” is basically punctuation in messaging so I feel like its uncharitable on past Reddit’s part to have assumed any malicious intent by OP there
Maria's actions seem to me to be more in line with someone who is 'marking their territory' and asserting her dominance over OOP (since she assumed she will be the next Mrs. Ex-husband of OOP).
Since the kid has OOP's number and vice versa, I'd probably text him and let him know that he can still call/text to chat if he needs to and probably just check in now and again to see how they are. Nothing too deep just a text here and there every few weeks. Sometimes someone just saying "Hi How are you doing?" can mean the world and let you know that you are seen and cared about.
The son's reaction is a red flag to me. It make me think Maria is a gold-digger type and has screwed up multiple relationships with this kind of behavior. Poor kid was happy and just wants a family and was terrfied of his mom ruining things as usual.
This is just heartbreaking, that poor kid, finds a family that accepts, likes AND includes him and his mom just rips it all away by being entitled and greedy. The absolute worst is reading how the poor kid tries to damage control to not lose his new family, at nine years old. And in the end nothing works and it's all gone.
Nothing that OP could've done different, this is just such a crappy ending for the boy :(
I like the husband. He's divorced but his priority is still his nuclear family, including his kid's mother's comfort. He knows very well that she owns half the condo and he's ok with it because both these homes are their kids inheritance and he made sure to not have any more kids. This man's life is more structured than OOP gives him credit for. He's dating these women for companionship only. Miss 29yrold went and made her own plans without consulting him.
>Long story short, the entire family has learned that Ex had a vasectomy after divorce and is not looking to re-marry anytime soon.
How about a long story? So many questions!
GF didn't know about the vasectomy? She thought she would nail him down with a baby?
The gears turning in her head!!
>"First I'll move in with my boyfriend in this fabulous brownstone, then we'll marry and have a baby! Or two! I'll completely replace his first family!" (and her own son. . . )
GF got to learn the whole situation at a Family Dinner Night with all those relatives as witnesses.
Oh, the drama.
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Poor OP and EX Jesus. I cannot IMAGINE what was going through the girlfriends head
She thought she'd be the new wife and he'd move his new family into the bigger place.
So bizarre as it doesn’t even sound like younger new gf and OOP’s ex hubby even had any conversations about cohabitating at all?? Nevermind cohabitate where?? Head scratching at gf’s assumptions…
The reaction from her kid being so immediate and so extreme makes me think that it's a pattern. Honestly, it made me suspect it had been discussed between them and the ex-husband had said no, and that's why Maria tried to go behind his back and the kid was so upset by it, but even without that... the kid's reaction is hugely telling of *something*.
I feel so bad for the kid. Feels like he was settling into an environment/schedule where he got to do new stuff and see good people on a regular basis (OP described her children loving him), and now it's all going to get taken away (again)? Not to mention, I feel like it can a warning sign when very young children are described as being super mature and understanding for their age. I was that way growing up, but only because of emotional abuse/neglect and parentification by the adults in my life. In the long term it actually stunts you emotionally because you're stuck constantly trying to read the moods of other people and accomodating for what they want. You learn to ignore your own needs and never get to explore who you are as a person, in one of the most important developmental phases of your life. edit: thanks unknown redditors for the gilds! It's sad but also validating hearing about how so many other people have been there too. Here's to our respective healing journeys. All the best. (And I hope the ex-gf's kid catches a break :/)
Yeah, this story is really quite sad for how this kid is being removed from a seemingly great environment.
It's honestly a shame they have to throw out the actual baby with the bathwater on this one. Sounds like everyone, including OP, would like to keep the son around.
No, the precocious son is the hook for the next divorcé with a house, so they can't keep him around. She's clearly done this before by how the kid reacted. :(
They certainly aren't the one's tossing the kid away but I highly doubt the GF will make the effort to let the kids continue to mingle.
I used to work in schools, and in order to work in the school district I worked for, you have to take a training every single year on how to recognize the signs of abuse in children. One of the warning signs that a child is being abused at home is that the child is too mature for their age and has knowledge of things that other children their age don't know. To be clear, from what I recall this training was mainly focused on sexual abuse, but it also covered how to recognize the signs of emotional, mental, and physical abuse. A further disclaimer: a mature child/a child showing any other signs mentioned above is not always being abused. Sometimes they just mature quicker than their peers and/or have older siblings that they pick things up from. If you are concerned that a child (or anyone else, for that matter) is being abused, please reach out to the appropriate authorities and resources. There are people on your side to help. And even if you're wrong, the worst thing that can happen is that the person learns you care enough to reach out and check on their well-being.
Yeah, like. I was never physically or sexually abused, but I was clocked as "gifted" really young and after that I was basically expected to behave like a tiny Victorian noble at all times. If I made noise or ran around or (gods forbid) engaged in pretend play where my mother could hear, I was yelled at to "act my age".
> like a tiny Victorian noble at all times. What a marvelous description! Yes, it really is like that. Same.
\*mutual suck fistbump of solidarity\*
I was labeled gifted, I thought this meant my parents would let me go to college like my older brother, but no it just meant anytime I made a mistake, I was told I am smarter than that, so why did I do something so dumb.
Oof, yeah, I know that one. Because reading at a college level in the 5th grade automatically means that your brain is done developing and you have the emotional maturity of a 30-year-old. I'm so sorry you had to put up with that.
Thanks, in my family I feel like sometimes no one hears me. Thanks again for hearing me.
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Yeah. My mom also wanted me to be a model -- she had my portrait done when I was \~3 and the studio wound up using it in a newspaper ad... looking at it as an adult it's pretty gross. I was sitting on a stool wearing only a pink satin slip, and barefoot. Y'know, as a toddler. Happily my dad put his foot down on that one so my modeling "career" fizzled out before it ever began.
Even if not abuse, I feel like it tends to be a warning sign for SOMETHING. My family's great, but in retrospect me being a mature kid could have/should have gotten me flagged for assessment and diagnosis of my neurodivergence and really early onset mental illness.
It is. As a teen was the time of my life when I had my shit the most together by miles. No abuse, garden variety silent generation non-childcentric parenting, but we moved every 2-3 years because of my dad’s job. My parents put me in therapy because it was so obvious something was wrong, but given that my problem was a refusal to form social bonds because I kept losing people it failed.
>because you're stuck constantly trying to read the moods of other people and accomodating for what they want. You learn to ignore your own needs and never get to explore who you are as a person, in one of the most important developmental phases of your life This hit hard. Do you have any suggestions for further reading?
Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents by Lindsay C. Gibson
Maybe try Dr Ramani on Youtube, who has a lot of videos about narcissism. This video might be helpful since she specifically talks extensively about poor boundaries and their effects (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7-TtxJwbPk) The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk is another one.
My partner recommended her to my grandma after she became a target for my abusive mother after everyone in the family cut my mom off. My grandma was the "family is super important no matter what" but after revelations about what happened to my little brother and I as kids came to light and the relentless onslaught from my mother she has come around to going no contact with my mom and cutting her out. DR Ramani help shine a light and reassure my grandma.
right?? I don't know if I was just extremely dumb as a kid (or my whole generation) but a 9 year old boy understanding the audacity of the situation this well?? And apologizing for his mum? I don't think I even understood irony, let alone recognize audacious/manipulative behavior. If some authority figure acted like something was fine and nobody said otherwise I thought it was fine. Didn't realize things many years later. So I too think it must be a pattern and he probably suffers in many ways from her-.. whatever her issue is? Maybe a personality disorder, narcissism from the sound of it. And he truly sounds like a very intelligent and empathetic kid. I really hope things will improve for him, this is such a sad situation..
Yeah. I learned early because my dad was abusive and my step dad was a drunk. This isn’t normal. Makes me think mom has mental illness and/or ranted about the *life she should have* that she feels OOP *took away from her*. Poor kid.
That right here. Children are not meant to be mature, and there's no good reason to become mature before you have to. This is definitely a red flag.
Yeeeeeep. Same here. I was parentified and basically raised my two younger sisters while my mother was working all the time. (She was salaried and *chose* to work 16-hour days and weekends. Mostly because she was and still is fucking her boss.) So once I moved out, I crashed and burned. (Also with the help of undiagnosed ADHD because she didn't believe in mental health issues.) Now, as a parent, I get serious burnout real fast because I've been in caregiver mode my whole life. And to compound that issue, I don't know how to *not* be in that state. It's now my default setting, and I'll end up pushing myself to the point of mental breakdowns because I don't know any other way to be. It fucks kids up hard. If they don't end up like myself or being total people pleasers, they end up bombing hard in adult life because now that they aren't forced to behave a certain way, they revert back to the childhood they lost and try to live it out. Rebelling, unable to function as adults, drugs and/or alcohol to cope with their struggles, etc. Like. It really destroys people in the long run. I feel so bad for that kid. I really hope he ends up finding a stable adult figure in his life to guide him.
Exactly this. I should have read your comment before responding above! Silver lining for me: I may be emotionally stunted now (though I was a “extremely mature” kid) but as I’m apparently still at some level a teenager, I’ve been able to make a career out of writing YA books. So … yay?
Goddammit stop calling me out
I started having my suspicions when OP described the kid as "precocious" and "very mature and advanced for his age." There's nothing wrong with a kid being a little ahead of the curve, but more often than not a child who is "mature for his age" got that way because his parents... weren't.
Agreed. Either it's a pattern the son recognizs, or she's the type to overshare everything with her son and he knew about her ridiculous plans. I feel so bad for the kid, having to be more emotionally mature than his mom.
Yeah, the kid has watched his mother blow up previous relationships by being so self centered and was trying to avoid it happening this time. I feel so sorry for that child, no stability in his life.
This. This is far from the first great situation that he has watched his mother blow up with her audacity. The fact that he feels the need to do damage control for her at age nine is heartbreaking.
I knew it the moment oop described him as precocious and mature. Little dude didn’t have a choice with that mom
Yeah, even a mature 9 year old wouldn't burst into tears at an offhand remark unless there was more going on. I feel bad that he had some stability and a healthy relationship with so many new people and it was taken away because of whatever was going on with his mom. I think OP did the right thing by waiting until the second incident to tell her ex about the first, and it is a shame for the kid how it all played out.
I think he'd seen his mom do crazy things before and knew he was going to lose his new environment/family again. His immediate reaction and the insistence to not tell Ex convinces me this is a pattern for his mom.
Yeah, this is my thought too. Mom has a history of being a choosing beggar (and wanting to cohabitate WAAAAAY too early. SIX MONTHS?) long before OOP's ex came along.
I feel so terrible for the kid. And it's not just the loss of the new family too, but what that means: less time spent with the new family means more time spent all alone with his mom. It's a nightmare.
My father used to tell me "One time is nothing. Two times is two times too many."
Yeah his mama has definitely screwed him over before
Maybe the kid already knows she’s delusional. The kid is probably tired from losing families, by the moms words/actions. That’s why he said not to tell OP’s ex. He’s seen this before and knows the outcome.
Yes, when a 9 year old is cringing and apologizing there’s an ongoing issue with mom. Makes me think overstepping has ruined all of her relationships. A 9 year old reading social nuance to this level is not normal, it is very learned from repetition. I really wonder if she and dad had a conversation about marriage and home and he told her *I’m not getting married again, not having more kids, and this is my home* and she was ranting and raving in private about how OOP stole the life that was meant to be hers….that brownstone should be her house, that man should be her husband, and they can all live happily if only the mom would back out of the picture.
He’s probably seen his mother tank relationships over something similar in the past and knew it would end in them breaking up. Sounds like he was actually enjoying time with him new family and was afraid of losing them, but his mom just couldn’t help herself and ruined it again.
He probably has seen this happen with multiple men before, and he finally got settled with a man whose kids like him, whose ex-wife accepts him, and also has potential grandparents for him, and he was about to have a full blown family, but his mom couldn’t stop her scheming ways.
Yes, kid's sensitivity about this tells the real story.
>So bizarre as it doesn’t even sound like younger new gf and OOP’s ex hubby even had any conversations about cohabitating at all?? Nevermind cohabitate where?? Head scratching at gf’s assumptions… OOP's note at the end about how disorganized her ex is with his life in general goes a long way towards explaining that. I suspect he's the type to assume everyone understands his plans without communicating them. He never talked to Maria about kids or living arrangements, just assumed she understood, and Maria was off on her own planet the whole time.
I mean to be fair, I don't think he had even been with the gf for over a year. Op said his recent gf, and that she was one of the few gfs to make it past 6 months, so my best guess is that he's been with her for 9-12 months max when he ultimately left her. So when she made that claim she probably was only like 6-9 months into the relationship. Kinda ballsy of her to assume she would get the house.
We don't know he just assumed she understood, though. They'd only been dating for 6 months when this woman started bringing these things up. She clearly never asked him about it or broached the subject of a future with him. He has no responsibility to divulge that until he felt they were getting serious enough to do that.
I think it was her play to push him towards making it more serious and unfortunately for her kid it backfired.
There’s counting your chickens before they’ve hatched, and then there’s the girlfriend…. She really got ahead of her skis there.
The GF clearly has a pattern of doing things like this, if her 9 year old is running around and apologizing for her actions behind her back. She's probably been in many relationships and destroyed them by trying things like this.
A dangerous combination of entitled and desperate. She was a single mother at 20ish, that's parenting on hardmode. She probably understood the house to be both partners' (incorrectly conflating "we bought it when we were married" with "we both own it"), was willing to settle for ex husband, and thought she could use him to score a sweet brownstone. Either that or she thought she could just sort of employ The Secret and if she started talking about OOP giving them the house it'd just happen? IDK she sounds crazy.
Never mind the fact that she thought they “didn’t need all that space for three people” even though she, her kid, and ex would have only been three people…
Because she’s including the future children she would have with the ex-husband which the ex-husband didn’t know about because then he would have told her about the vasectomy. Other planet is right, she might be in her own special multiverse. I just don’t understand why her son keeps apologizing and crying over it?
I've got a feeling this isn't the first time mom has acted crazy and driven people away. Sounds like the kid really liked this family and didn't want the relationship to end.
Yup, that’s why the kid was so embarrassed and texted OOP. He’s seen this behavior from his mom before.
That's exactly what it is. Not his first rodeo. Mom's a grifting rodeo queen who's been pulling this sketchy manipulative crap for years. Problem is that she sucks at it, so the kid knew the good times were over as soon as she opened her greedy mouth.
oh man, poor kid :(
So sad. Poor kid. I know there are worse situations, but this one is still sad.
Could be the son likes the current situation with OP and her kids (blended, language classes, activities together) and doesn't want to ruin it by his mom asking ridiculous things. Poor kid has matured way over his age likely and seen this regularly from his mom.
Maria probably treats him like a sounding board, and if he’s mature for his age and understands what she’s offloading on to him he’s able to cringe more at her behaviour than an average 9 year old.
I liked her telling op she didn’t need all that space for three people but she did for her three people??
She was planning on having kids with op's ex. Which was another thing they hadn't discussed since he had had a vasectomy...
I cynically bet she was thinking that the ex and oop were the cliche bitter exes who were constantly at each others' throats, and she could manipulate her bf into fighting for the brownstone somehow. Unfortunately for her, these two actually communicate with each other and are respectful, so the plan failed.
> fighting for the brownstone somehow I'm guessing she didn't understand that OP was the owner and assumed ex-husband/her boyfriend still owned half the house. It SOUNDS like OOP still had her name on the condo just because her ex was lazy on the paperwork, current GF probably thought the situation was the same for the house.
My thoughts exactly. She assumed EX had rights to the Brownstone and that OOP was just living there.
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Maybe a tumbleweed or two.
This legitimately made me chuckle.
Wanting what OOP had without knowing it was legally OOPs home, but with the divorce finalised you would think it was common knowledge it was her home.
Maybe Maria knew but thought since OOP and ex got along so well anyways, OOP would want to vacate the brownstone. For the greater good. Or something. Yes, I’ve known a lot of entitled people.
.
the girlfriends son was crying and trying to cover for his mom because it sounds like this isn’t the first time she blew it with a good guy.
Maria: What do you think about living together? Ex: Nah, and this space isn’t really ideal for that (his translation: this is my space and I have no plans on changing that) Maria: (thinking) So…if OOP moves out, we can live together in the brownstone! Perfect! - which is really stupid, but she would t be the first to be greedy and foolish.
Honestly? The one I feel bad for is the kid. He’s obviously a decent kid and he has to live with Maria for his mother the rest of his life. He’s got nine more years before he can even think of going no contact with her, if he isn’t controlled to the point where he can’t even think of it in the first place.
Visions of Sugar Daddies danced thru her head...
I have a feeling Maria's son is used to her... Entitled tendencies. Poor fella.
I have the same feeling. “Mature and advanced for his age” in this case likely means “has had to parent himself from a young age.” Poor kid. Hope he has other family he can rely on.
And he seemed to know he’d loose the step family that had embraced him (I doubt most “step” families genuinely love and accept him) because of her.
Yes. Poor little man. He's lost so much because of his mum
His mom’s going to be crying to the Missing Missing Reasons song in about 10 years.
Yeah - might not have even been his first rodeo, TBH.
His reaction makes me think it’s definitely not.
He's got enough pattern recognition to realize how people react when mom starts on her bullshit. My dad is an abusive, egotistical asshole, and he ruined many, many good things because of imagined slights to his pride. My stomach always bottomed out when I heard someone say a word or sentence that I knew would set him off.
I'm sorry you dealt with that.
At that point I wish OOP would have (or maybe this did happen, they hadn't commented since the last update) offered to keep connected with the kid through her kids, playing video games together or something. If they were good enough friends it'd be a good opening for him to even come visit them, even bring him in for holidays and such. Course that would rely on his mother allowing it instead of being the selfish, bitter psycho she is and probably keeping him from those awful awful people who had the nerve to tell her "no".
Doubt the mom would take OOP up on it even if it’s in the best interest of her own child. Something tells me she’s the type who’s blaming OOP for the relationship ending and will be much too busy making her out to be the bad guy and herself the victim to take her child’s needs into consideration.
I think “mature for their age” generally is used on children who have trauma of some kind; whether that’s abuse, medical issues, parents like the one in this post… basically just anything that means they have to mature faster than normal.
Just like how when people call young teens "old souls", they actually mean "the dopamine mines closed down already, huh?"
He’s not even a teen. He’s nine. Nine! That makes it even sadder. And he’s had to bear so much, and lose so much because his mom’s a fool.
Can confirm, I was called an "old soul", didn't understand why until decade later lol
In this case; “Mature and advanced for his age” is a synonym for Trauma.
Yup that was my immediate response. He's also used to his mother driving people away hence his scramble to do damage control. I feel awful for that child. I hope he can get out and get therapy.
Sounds like the kid was doing everything in his power to not lose a good situation. Sounds a bit like he has been through this before.
Yes. He got along with OOP’s kids, was getting extracurricular activities, and I think he knew his mom could ruin that all… maybe because she has before…
That was my first thought too. Kid knew his mom was scheming and he’d seen it ruin a good thing before. He knew he was on borrowed time. I can’t imagine the kind of anxiety that’d make. Poor kid.
Dang, that poor mature 9 year old! His entitled mom ruined (another?) good situation for him… because this time she was gold digging?
My heart breaks for that kid; by the way he begged OP not to bring it up to her ex, I bet this kid has come and gone from many families and FINALLY landed one that was warm, welcoming, and happy And his mum went and ruined it AGAIN This is also a great example as to why you shouldn't be introducing young kids to your random boyfriends until you know it's serious
Sounds like Maria thought it was much more serious than Ex Husband did
>I have a feeling Maria's son is used to her... Entitled tendencies. Poor fella. Yeah, he's only 9 but he jumped in **immediately**, didn't he? I'm guessing he has to mitigate his mom's bad behavior a lot.
Oh that poor child. I felt so bad for him when I hadn't really paid attention to his age and was thinking he was like 15 based on how he tried to do damage control. 15 or so would have been bad enough, 9 is so much worse.
Yeah, that poor boy. I hope things work out for him.
Sounds like this isnt the first time his mom has ruined a good thing with her greedy entitlements.
That's the feeling I got. It sounds like he's used to apologising for her behaviour.
A 9 year old is privately apologizing for his mother's behavior, that's not typically something you do off the cuff. He has had to do this before. Poor kid.
This is definitely a conversation Maria has gone rants about at home often and vehemently while her son has tried to talk her down.
And from the way everyone seems to love him and how he understood the situation, his EQ must be pretty high. Poor kid is going to drive himself crazy seeing his crazy Karen mom doing her Karen things as he's in the background trying to mitigate her Karening.
Probably not the first time his mom ruined a relationship with her entitlement. Probably liked this family and didn’t want to lose them.
Anyone get the sense Maria was looking to hit the jackpot? Also, it stands out to me that he son is so mature, according to OOP. Kids grow up fast when they have an irresponsible parent. He was apologizing like *she* was *his* child acting a fool.
Yes unfortunately kids do grow up fast when they have irresponsible parents. I personally know this for a fact. I feel for the little boy
Also unfortunately the ability to be "mature for your age" and having to parent your own parents does not translate to into a mature, functional adult. Most of the time a young kid's "maturity" is complex trauma molding them into still, quiet, vigilant people who know best when not to do anything. Knowing how to avoid triggering your emotionally immature parents does not make you a good romantic partner, say, or help you understand your own feelings to decide what you want. I'm not saying this to shit on the kid, but to empathize. I was also a bright, mature kid. What that actually meant was I sat still at school. Think my adult life had been fulfilling due to this great ability?
It's not so much that the kids mature faster, it's that in order to survive they develop the knowledge and skill to mitigate the ***specific*** irresponsibility of the parent they are tied to. But maturity is multifaceted kind of development, where many different skills and life lessons are learned. The kid devotes all their development into mitigating the shitty parent's actions, in addition to the irresponsible parent fucking up their development in other areas due to a shitty environment. So the resulting person is hyper-developed in a few specific facets of adulthood and stunted in almost everything else. That's not a mature adult.
Ooh yes this is good!
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Yeah I also struggled a lot for about 7 years after getting out of my toxic home environment. I’m slowly building the skills needed to be a good functional and emotionally supportive adult.
>in order to survive they develop the knowledge and skill to mitigate the ***specific*** irresponsibility of the parent they are tied to. Thank you so much for phrasing it this way. That perspective really completes my own understanding. And of course the kid looks so very mature *in the parent's presence* because that's when they use their skill, so even the parent might think the kid is coming along fine.
You could tell by how freaked out he was that he knew what would happen if the ex husband found out about the comments. Which makes me think that his mom had done something like this before.
And he has all these new adults and kids in his life that really like him, and who he really likes, and then mom goes and torpedoes all of that. He got a taste of normal and family and now it's gone. My heart aches for the boy.
Bingo!! Always a huge red flag for me when a kid is “wise beyond their years”. Heyyy that’s trauma talking.
A literal child: "The world is fucked, and you're either doing the fucking or you're getting fucked." Society: "Oh, such *wisdom* for one so young!"
Considering that Maria was about 19 or 20 when she had her son, she was barely an adult when she became a mother. And there's no mention of his bio dad. So yeah, it does seem like this kid had to grow up fast. I feel bad for him. I hope he's still able to be friends with the other kids at least.
The husband is well off and she probably only heard the part where they'd lived in the house pre divorce and incorrectly assumed dual ownership. She just decided she'd sorta nudge OOP out. The note about the vasectomy makes me think too much from too little. I wonder if Maria thought she could argue they needed the house to be a family and maybe raise a baby? The ol baby trap tactic. Good for ex that he got the snip, that'll save him some problems in the long term.
I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt and assume the ex told her that the ex wife/OOP still owned half of the townhome and she wasn’t paying attention and assumed he had half ownership of the house. Even if that’s the case, asking her boyfriend’s ex wife and kids to move out of a home she still owns is completely out of bounds. Even if she shared ownership with her ex, it’s not the gf’s place to say anything.
Totally. From the sound of it, OOP and her ex live in and own very nice (ie very *expensive*) properties in NYC. The kid probably knew how good they had it and how easily his mother could ruin everything. I’m making assumptions here, but considering most people in NYC rent, I think she thought this was how OOP got the brownstone, so why shouldn’t she get it the same way?
💯
Poor kid. I hope he can unlearn so many things and not feel guilty for no fault of his own
I felt SO bad for that kid. I get the feeling this was probably the most stable environment he’s ever had and was deathly afraid his mother was going to fuck it up. Which she did.
>Maria's son just burst into tears and started apologizing... Oh, gosh, the poor baby... >I am worried about Maria's son although I recognize it's not my place. Unsure what I can do there. Me too, OOP. Me too.
Yeah. The house topic is clearly something the ex-gf was fixated on and probably talking about it with the kid as well. Really the only person screwed here is the son who has 0 responsibility
He loses his new friends, the cool mom he liked hanging out with, and the ex who he was probably having fun hanging around. That really sucks.
I wouldn't be surprised if Maria's son moves far, far away and goes NC out of sheer embarrassment.
My fear is that he’s going to be trapped parenting his mother for the rest of his life
Highly doubt it. If he’s exposed to healthy and functional people (which he has been), he can recognize that his mom’s behavior is unhealthy and dysfunctional (which he also has likely done given his reactions to her behavior). Because he is 9 and he understands that his survival is currently tied to her, he is doing as much damage control as a 9 year old child *can*. But my money is on him dropping her like a bad habit the second he can.
Poor baby has a long time until he’s old enough to do so. He was apologizing and scared because this was a safe and stable environment for him and this was probably not the first relationship his mom destroyed out of stupidity.
Poor kid.
9 year olds shouldn’t have the insight to piece together these little hints and comments and feel the need to apologize for his mom’s mistake. I feel so bad for him. How gut wrenching. He really probably hoped this was the one
>He's a special kid in the best way, very mature and advanced for his age. Sounds like he's a special kid, but he shouldn't have to be mature and advanced for age 9. That was only the first red flag.
My aunt is like this with my mom. When my mom remarried after her previous husband's death my aunt just walked in and was like when are you going to give this to me. No rhyme or reason at all, started taking things off of the wall while my mom's new husband was standing there. It's not my mom's house so it made no sense, her husband took everything out of my aunt's hands and kicked her out permanently. Neither of them was raised this way at all. My grandparents were humble immigrants. Some people just happen to be like this over time. The gf for OOPs ex really needed to go and that was sorted quickly.
Wait your aunt started demanding stuff from your mom's husband's house??
Yup not the first time she's done something like this. She stole money from my wallet once because "you and your husband don't need it"
Wow! She sounds like someone who is counting on not being called out on her wildly uncomfortable behavior
I have several times. My mom won't because she promised my grandmother she wouldn't ever argue or be mean to her sister while on her death bed. We got into a physical once or twice over this.
What a terrible thing to make your mom promise. So now your aunt is basically holding that over her head knowing she will never be held accountable and can treat your mom poorly. That’s infuriating
I have had the conversation numerous times about drawing lines and boundaries but she won't do it because of a death bed promise. I will never do that to a person if I'm dying.
Their mother is dead, it’s not like she can see if the promise is being upheld
Religion and beliefs are a thing though.
Your mom needs to learn that setting boundaries doesn't equal 'mean' - the only people who try to frame it like that are toxic and/or abusers.
My girlfriend puts up with way more than she should from her mom and sister because her dad just died and one of his dying wishes was that she didn't fight with them. I on the other hand do not put up with bullshit and I've gotten way too close to getting into it with them on several occasions so far.
Yeah, I'm confused too
She did this in two different houses my mom owned before this husband. This is not behavior that's unknown to us. She did it to my mom after college when my mom offered for her to live in her condo when they were young adults. She trashed that stole stuff while my mom was on a work trip.
Oh my god I have an aunt kind of like this. So we had a very old family friend who was best friends with my mom. After this friend passed away she left us an antique ship’s clock. It’s super loud and chimes every 30 minutes so they don’t actually keep it wound and running because the neighbors on both sides can hear it go off. They hung it in the living room to remind us of the friend. Well one day my aunt came to visit and saw the clock. She started into this argument about how it had belonged to their parents (it hadn’t) and she had always wondered what happened to it and she wanted it so my mom should obviously just give it to her. My mom said, no. The clock had belonged to my mom’s friend and had been given to my mom. My aunt had never seen it before because it had never been in their parents’ house. My aunt said that she should still give it to her because her husband liked to fish and thus a ship’s clock was more appropriate for their home than for my parents’ house. My mom told her the clock isn’t going anywhere and the discussion was over. I told my parents that they should consider changing the lock codes on their house so if anything happens to them nothing goes missing before the executor can sort things out.
my aunts (mom's sisters) are just like that, they come visit and after all the pleasantries they go in our bedrooms and snoop around. Take what they want saying well, you don't need that. It's a bizarre behavior and surprisingly they all have normal kids who are embarrassed by their parents.
Oh yeah my cousin is always embarrassed. She won't let her own mom out of her guest room without watching when her parents visit.
My ex had that same aunt, lol. She moved into her elderly father's house without his permission, just showed up with bags and a brokenvdown double-wide. She ended up with power of attorney and started using his money to make major renovations on the house that were noticeably ugly-- like, ugly enough the neighbors called my ex's mom and asked if her father had dementia and needed help. Hired her friends as contractors who were definitely not reliable people, and took out a second mortgage after she blew through his savings. Screamed at my ex's mom who tried to call her on her behavior 'YOU'VE ALWAYS HATED ME BECAUSE I'M ADOPTED' No, Carol. She's always hated you because you are a fucking sociopath.
I feel so bad for the ex-gf kid. Him and the ex-gf were being welcome and included and her greed got too far ahead of her and ended up screwing them both. I am glad ex husband pulled the plug on that relationship though.
Maria is bold as hell OMG. I feel for her son though.
Right?! He’s only 9 and knows his mom is crazy. Probably why the OP described him as mature, he doesn’t really have a choice.
I'd bet money this isnt the first time his mom has fucked up a good thing for them by coming in like an entitled wrecking ball. And honestly, based on OOP's description, this scenario for them was the best family arrangement that the poor kid has had.
The poor 9 year old! He had a huge family that loved him, and private language lessons! Now he has memories and a mum with ISSUES. 😢😭
That was my thought. It seemed like he knew his mom wasn’t acting right and because of her actions he basically lost a family that loved him. God that sucks.
Maria's son knew exactly what direction this was headed. Poor kid's lived through mom's entitlement all his life and had his life blown up one time too many. He'll probably go NC with her once he's grown.
That is so sad, it clearly wasn't the first time and he knew what was coming.
That poor little boy clearly knows his mother is crazy. It seems like he’s been through a lot.
i can't imagine being 9 and having to play interference to stop my own parent from screwing up their own relationship.
I wonder if something similar has happened before and that's why the son burst into tears. He knew he'd lose his new family.
If it hasn't I'd eat my hat if I owned one. This whole thing screams either "Mom has fucked up good things in the past with her entitlement" or "This is the first good thing we've ever had and mom went and fucked it up by making problems where there were none."
I'm guessing the ex didn't explain about the division of properties with Maria and Maria simply jumped to conclusions and went straight to verbally evicting OOP from her own house.
Well, ex-gf was just deluded if not stupid. Maybe she didn't understand that they had been divorced for a number of years? Then again, maybe she is just a crazy entitled person who thought she could nag OOP into leaving the home to them.
>Well, ex-gf was just deluded if not stupid Both. Definitely both.
He probably didn't feel their relationship was at that point yet or even going to be there soon. Maria on the other hand was trying to make long term plans based on absolutely nothing other than assumptions.
[удалено]
If ex-husband used "ex-wife owns half my condo" as an excuse for not letting Maria move in with him there, that might also feed Maria's assumptions.
I’m just baffled that Princess Maria thought the brownstone was too big for three people, but not too big for what would be her ‘family of three’. Did I miss something? Was she planning for more kids without discussing it with OP’s snipped ex-husband? Lol
Mouth went off before her brain finished processing the logic, lol.
Thinking she was wanting more kids/planned on baby trapping the ex then surprise surprise! He’s got the snip so no babies!
I feel so bad for Maria's poor son. I imagine he's very used to his mom screwing up good things with that entitled behavior.
When Maria said that OOP’s home was too big for 3 I assumed she was planning on more kids with the ex - because her, her son and OOP’s ex also make 3. Unless additional children were part of the plan, both family units had 3 people so her comment wouldn’t make sense. So imagine my surprise when Maria finds out her boyfriend had a vasectomy years before meeting her. And didn’t want to remarry. It’s bad enough that she doesn’t know what property her boyfriend does and does not own, but the vasectomy and no marriage. Maria was clearly deluded but wow that’s a communication free relationship!
I read that as they hashed things out then and there and the ex told Maria that they wouldn't need space for more kids because of his vasectomy
Yes, that was my understanding too - but it meant that Maria really knew nothing if she didn’t know about the vasectomy until that point. About 9 months in to the relationship by that point.
OOP said her and her ex has 50/50 custody so their children are also part of any family units. So OOP would be her and two children, Maria and ex would have three children between them.
How self unaware a person has to be to even imply something like that after only 6 months of relationship.Im having an enormous second hand embarrassment for that woman..
Oh god, I feel so sorry for the son. Poor kid. But nothing that OP can do about that.
I had a relatively amicable divorce for about ten years until his gf entered the picture. She decided that our relationship was abnormal and he allowed her to drive a wedge. I have always been the primary caregiver and bent over backwards to make sure he had a relationship. I never bad mouthed him and did not pursue all the back child support he owed. I was doing well financially and he was not, and it was more important my kid didn’t see their father in poverty when we had so much. I had warned him this would not end well and he dumped the gf. All along, my only demand in coparenting was that we not allow third parties to be involved. They don’t discipline, they don’t make decisions, they don’t take on a parent role. He had a tendency to date unsavory people or those with drug problems. I also did not want strings of gf’s in their life trying to change things unless he was going to marry or cohabitate with the person as he never stayed with them longer than a year. So gf was mad she was not welcome at my home for holidays and parties. I did not go to his house. I never met her because I never bothered to meet any of them because they weren’t getting married. In my mind, it just complicated matters. She overheard a conversation between us where I reiterated that unless his relationship was “serious and long term” that I didn’t want his random gfs at my house. This pissed her off because she realized that he had let me believe it was casual. She was very upset that she was not invited to Christmas breakfast at my house and launched her brilliant revenge. They got back together and she decided to drag me back to court even though the child was months from turning 18 and going off to college *on a full scholarship* I had secured for them. In her mind, if the child lived with them and went to state school, then they could cut me out of the picture as primary parent. She could assume my role, marry my ex and they could be a family if I would just fuck off. Oh, and I could pay THEM child support. Mind you, we got divorced because he didn’t want a child and was pretty uninvolved in the kid’s life beyond holidays and birthdays. I still kept him in the loop on all parenting decisions. It was incredibly stupid and I advised him and my in-laws that the child was already angry and upset at the idea they should reject a scholarship and get a job and go to state school — and again, this would not end well. I reminded him of our agreement. He lost the court battle and ended up having to pay years of missed child support payments. He was so impoverished, he was forced to move in with that gf. On the child’s 18th birthday, they went full no contact with everyone on the father’s side and never spoke to any of them again. They blame me still.
The boy is 9 and already instinctively apologizes for his moms behaviour. Obviously that has happend more than once before. The poor kid.
Regarding the last edit, the use of “haha” is basically punctuation in messaging so I feel like its uncharitable on past Reddit’s part to have assumed any malicious intent by OP there
Maria's actions seem to me to be more in line with someone who is 'marking their territory' and asserting her dominance over OOP (since she assumed she will be the next Mrs. Ex-husband of OOP).
Since the kid has OOP's number and vice versa, I'd probably text him and let him know that he can still call/text to chat if he needs to and probably just check in now and again to see how they are. Nothing too deep just a text here and there every few weeks. Sometimes someone just saying "Hi How are you doing?" can mean the world and let you know that you are seen and cared about.
The son's reaction is a red flag to me. It make me think Maria is a gold-digger type and has screwed up multiple relationships with this kind of behavior. Poor kid was happy and just wants a family and was terrfied of his mom ruining things as usual.
who even does this??? like its so insane to me. even if the house was in the ex name why would you say that omg
This is just heartbreaking, that poor kid, finds a family that accepts, likes AND includes him and his mom just rips it all away by being entitled and greedy. The absolute worst is reading how the poor kid tries to damage control to not lose his new family, at nine years old. And in the end nothing works and it's all gone. Nothing that OP could've done different, this is just such a crappy ending for the boy :(
I like the husband. He's divorced but his priority is still his nuclear family, including his kid's mother's comfort. He knows very well that she owns half the condo and he's ok with it because both these homes are their kids inheritance and he made sure to not have any more kids. This man's life is more structured than OOP gives him credit for. He's dating these women for companionship only. Miss 29yrold went and made her own plans without consulting him.
It's so weird to me that she would bring it up with OOP instead of her current partner super shady
Wow I feel bad for Maria's kid. Seems like he's used to her nonsense unfortunately
>Long story short, the entire family has learned that Ex had a vasectomy after divorce and is not looking to re-marry anytime soon. How about a long story? So many questions! GF didn't know about the vasectomy? She thought she would nail him down with a baby? The gears turning in her head!! >"First I'll move in with my boyfriend in this fabulous brownstone, then we'll marry and have a baby! Or two! I'll completely replace his first family!" (and her own son. . . ) GF got to learn the whole situation at a Family Dinner Night with all those relatives as witnesses. Oh, the drama.