Source: Reddit
I am a widow who from my previous marriage has two daughters, a 15 year old and a 9 year old. I remarried two years ago to a divorcee who has a 10 year old daughter after dating him for four years. We met through our younger girls both doing swimming. This isn’t a case of me splitting him up from his ex-wife as I know some will likely ask that.
Things with his ex-wife have been cordial though not particularly warm. He moved into my house and I converted my office into a bedroom for her for when she visited so she’d have her own room and set up an office space in our bedroom instead. My daughters love their step sister and treat her just like another sister. My youngest and her especially get on as they are already friends.
I recently got offered a promotion which would mean we’d need to move to the city, which is more expensive. We’ll be selling the current home to fund this but based on our current savings and the money we’d get from the sale the only houses in our price range are 3 bedrooms. Not ideal but we can make it work. The plan was for me and my husband to share one room, my oldest daughter to have her own room and my youngest daughter to share a room with her stepsister, they’d also get one of the larger rooms.
When his ex-wife was dropping her off we filled her in on the plans and properties we’d been looking at to keep her up to date after all her kid will be staying with us sometimes she has a right to be kept informed of this matter but she did not like the fact that her daughter would have to share a room as she’d never done that before. I tried to assure her it’d be fine that the girls get on well and they’d have a larger room to prevent squabbling over space.
She was still not happy about this and told me if anything my daughters should share and leave a room free for her daughter. I told her my teenage daughter wasn’t going to share a room with her little sister and leave a room free for whenever my stepdaughter came to stay, that my daughters will be the one living in the house full time so they need their own space. My husband added here that, that really wasn’t a fair request and at least the two younger are friends.
She insists we should get a mortgage to pay for a bigger place if our savings and the sale can’t give us enough money to buy somewhere big enough. Now this could be an option but neither of us are keen on starting out with debt and I personally feel that it’s none of her business.
We fought more until finally I told her to get over herself, that it wasn’t like I was making her daughter sleep on the couch or putting her in with a much older kid or one that her daughter couldn’t stand. That to the younger kids it’d just be like a sleepover, hell even with their own rooms they sometimes do this
Maybe I’m the a**h**e for snapping but I just reacted at her continual pushing. My husband understands why I did this but says maybe I went too hard too fast, I hate that I may make things more awkward in the future through this. What are your opinions? Did I over react?
Here are a few comments on the story where it was originally posted: