Interrupted time-sharing required to be made up?

[AbbaDabba730]

OP is not married to Dad, therefore not even StepMom.

so true. I was mislead by the screen name

 

[LdiJ]

So, OP... WHO is the one with the problem here? Is DAD the one wondering if he gets make-up time for the fictitious time loss, or is it you who has a bug up it? (I can guess.)

I commend Dad for agreeing to take his kids to this concert so that they can perform pieces that they have likely been practicing for a period of time. That's what a GOOD parent does. Even if the concert had NOT been on his time, as a good parent - he WOULD make a point of being there to support his kids.

What a lousy parent does is use such activities/events to stick it to the other parent of their children. This is not an activity that occupies regular amounts of his time - which is what I expect the order was intended to prevent.

What a truly lousy STEPparent/SO does is use such activities/events to drive a wedge between a parent and his/her children - which is what you are trying to do by trying to create a "situation" between your husband/bf and his ex. That's something you should be deeply ashamed of.

Your husband/bf's kids are lucky that they have a Mom who (apparently - although I am sure you will now dig up a ton of examples to the contrary) goes out of her way not to interfere with Dad's time with their children. They are also lucky to have a Dad who supports their activities.

Being a parent includes sometimes giving up the time you'd like to spend with your kids allowing them to do stuff with friends, with a group, on their own, and often being little more than a chauffeur. I cannot tell you how many hundreds (if not thousands) of hours I have spent driving one kid or another or both to rehearsals, practices, games, concerts, performances, competitions, auditions, interviews, tours, tests, classes... you name it. We make the most of the time we have together - it would never occur to me to limit their interests or abilities by refusing to do so or demanding some sort of make-up time. (Though I'm not sure who I'd demand it from!)

What will Dad (aka you) do when the kids are older and they have to take the PSATs (for example, and only given on one date, with very limited exceptions) on HIS time? Will he demand make-up time from Mom? Or will he be pleased that he gets to be the one to make sure they have a good dinner the night before, a good night's sleep, a good breakfast... have all their pencils, registration info, etc.?

Being a parent requires much more than just "fun" time for Mom/Dad. It tends to require a lot more work than that. And if you're not willing to allow Dad to do that work - and reap the pleasure from it? You should walk away now.

Not only do I agree with this, but I will add that this children's concert is a quintessential amount of "quality time" that a parent should spend with their children...should be thrilled to spend with their children.

The children will be thrilled to death to have their daddy there to hear them sing. This will be a special time that they will remember.

If dad made the foolish choice to leave them with mom until after the concert, instead of participating with them, then dad might have grounds to ask for makeup time. Instead dad is making the very wise choice to participate in his children's lives...in a very quality way.

If dad actually had the nerve to take mom to court for contempt because she denied him makeup time in a situation like this one, dad would get his butt chewed out by the judge.

Dad is not losing one iota of time with his children. He is getting to experience something with them that is important to them. Its really sad that dad's fiancee doesn't grasp that.

 

[stealth2]

O/T Just want to share some "quintessential time" I'm sharing over the next two weeks!

Saturday? Homecoming/Family Day at my son's college. #2 & I can't wait! We're spending the day with #1 and his friends - feeding them, cheering on their team, feeding them some more!

10-20? Grandma & I are going down to hear one of #1's compositions performed LIVE in concert for the first time EVER! I can tell you now that I will be a puddle, because I know how hard he's worked for this.

10-27? I'm heading down again to listen to him perform with his University Chorale. I already know he will be handsome as anything in his new tux.

Yep, it involves over an hour of travel time each way, but I wouldn't miss any of it for the *world*!

 

[CJane]

O/T Just want to share some "quintessential time" I'm sharing over the next two weeks!

Saturday? Homecoming/Family Day at my son's college. #2 & I can't wait! We're spending the day with #1 and his friends - feeding them, cheering on their team, feeding them some more!

10-20? Grandma & I are going down to hear one of #1's compositions performed LIVE in concert for the first time EVER! I can tell you now that I will be a puddle, because I know how hard he's worked for this.

10-27? I'm heading down again to listen to him perform with his University Chorale. I already know he will be handsome as anything in his new tux.

Yep, it involves over an hour of travel time each way, but I wouldn't miss any of it for the *world*!

Last weekend - not even "my" weekend - I went to the home football game so I could see Wild march at half time, then Saturday I got up early and drove 40 minutes to watch her march in a parade competition, and then went to the awards ceremony (and I didn't get to "see" her at all, didn't talk to her, nothing. But I was THERE).

I "lose" a little over an hour every one of "my" Saturdays to Unruly's Aikido, and until Christmas, I lose almost two hours on "my" Sundays because she's involved in a dance thing w/her Dad's church.

I've "lost" tons of evenings since school started because Wild is on the volleyball team and has practice every night/games a couple of times a week.

She has early band/marching practice a couple of times a week and I get to "lose" the time because she's @ school.

Thankfully, she's not playing basketball this year, but she will be on the academic bowl team, and she'll be in track. And of course, we'll have band concerts and youth group.

She's got to take the ACT in December because she's being nominated for the young scholar's academy @ Truman State this year (SO excited! If accepted, I'll "lose" 10 days this summer because she'll be living in a dorm, taking college level classes and earning college credits - the summer after 8th grade!).

I'm sure there's tons of other time I'll "lose" too. And time her Dad will "lose" with her as well. And as Unruly gets older, we'll "lose" more and more time with her too.

But I'm not thinking either of us will be looking at it as "lost" time.

 

[LdiJ]

Last weekend - not even "my" weekend - I went to the home football game so I could see Wild march at half time, then Saturday I got up early and drove 40 minutes to watch her march in a parade competition, and then went to the awards ceremony (and I didn't get to "see" her at all, didn't talk to her, nothing. But I was THERE).

I "lose" a little over an hour every one of "my" Saturdays to Unruly's Aikido, and until Christmas, I lose almost two hours on "my" Sundays because she's involved in a dance thing w/her Dad's church.

I've "lost" tons of evenings since school started because Wild is on the volleyball team and has practice every night/games a couple of times a week.

She has early band/marching practice a couple of times a week and I get to "lose" the time because she's @ school.

Thankfully, she's not playing basketball this year, but she will be on the academic bowl team, and she'll be in track. And of course, we'll have band concerts and youth group.

She's got to take the ACT in December because she's being nominated for the young scholar's academy @ Truman State this year (SO excited! If accepted, I'll "lose" 10 days this summer because she'll be living in a dorm, taking college level classes and earning college credits - the summer after 8th grade!).

I'm sure there's tons of other time I'll "lose" too. And time her Dad will "lose" with her as well. And as Unruly gets older, we'll "lose" more and more time with her too.

But I'm not thinking either of us will be looking at it as "lost" time.

Re the bolded...dang CJane you have to be SOOOO proud!

I got to be in a lot of programs like that when I was an adolescent/teen. Between those and the ACTs I already had 33 college credit hours when I started college for "real". That gave me an enormous amount of freedom and choices in college that other kids didn't get...as well as some scholarship dollars.

This is the sort of thing that parents have to understand and realize. They have to realize that sometimes those "extra curriculars" mean a great deal to their children's futures.

 

[Nevergrowup]

Ooh, ooh, I want to play too.

Kid 1:
Friday, cheering soccer game
Saturday, cheering day football game, evening soccer, AND it is her 16th birthday


Kid 2:
Friday: tumbling
Sunday, cheer practice

Kid 3: award thing for football on Saturday

Kid 4: Nothing this weekend, thank goodness. By the way, this weekend is kind of tame.

No CP gets all quality time either...less and less as they grow. Turn the event into quality time! If I didn't do that I'd barely see mine, especially the teen between choir and cheer.

Not a hill for your boyfriend to die on, OP...in fact, it is really, really petty, and he is not interpreting the order correctly if it reads as you state it does. If he is with the kids, then no makeup, even if they have an event. His choice is to take them and enjoy it, or give up that time and request makeup time. By the way, choice number two is the WRONG choice.

Oh, and another thing...if there is a special event, like a concert, that is not in the mother's power to control. Should the kids do NOTHING, ever, because they might have a special event that is the culmination of their hard work in the activity? They should just sit around and be dormant, just in case a special activity that mom gave your boyfriend TWO MONTHS NOTICE for comes up? Please. I hope you aren't like this in "real" life, or you are probably a joy to your coworkers.

 

[haiku]

I think it is hard, though you get used to it, when you can't even be ships that pass in the night with your kids...

But the OP is just so bizarre to me..

We planned a whole weekend, with all our children, around driving to see our girl and her boyfriend, all dressed up for Prom, The pictures of a proud Poppa and his beautiful daughter were priceless to both and well worth the drive!

People forget the big picture griping about all this petty stuff...

 

[mistoffolees]

Ooh, ooh, I want to play too.

Kid 1:
Friday, cheering soccer game
Saturday, cheering day football game, evening soccer, AND it is her 16th birthday


Kid 2:
Friday: tumbling
Sunday, cheer practice

Kid 3: award thing for football on Saturday

Kid 4: Nothing this weekend, thank goodness. By the way, this weekend is kind of tame.

No CP gets all quality time either...less and less as they grow. Turn the event into quality time! If I didn't do that I'd barely see mine, especially the teen between choir and cheer.

Not a hill for your boyfriend to die on, OP...in fact, it is really, really petty, and he is not interpreting the order correctly if it reads as you state it does. If he is with the kids, then no makeup, even if they have an event. His choice is to take them and enjoy it, or give up that time and request makeup time. By the way, choice number two is the WRONG choice.

Oh, and another thing...if there is a special event, like a concert, that is not in the mother's power to control. Should the kids do NOTHING, ever, because they might have a special event that is the culmination of their hard work in the activity? They should just sit around and be dormant, just in case a special activity that mom gave your boyfriend TWO MONTHS NOTICE for comes up? Please. I hope you aren't like this in "real" life, or you are probably a joy to your coworkers.

Darn - I have it the other way. My ex works early mornings some weekends and works late some weekdays - so I get EXTRA time with my daughter. Maybe I should stop taking that extra time?

 

[CJane]

Re the bolded...dang CJane you have to be SOOOO proud!

I got to be in a lot of programs like that when I was an adolescent/teen. Between those and the ACTs I already had 33 college credit hours when I started college for "real". That gave me an enormous amount of freedom and choices in college that other kids didn't get...as well as some scholarship dollars.

This is the sort of thing that parents have to understand and realize. They have to realize that sometimes those "extra curriculars" mean a great deal to their children's futures.

I am. You can only be nominated if you achieve 90th percentile or higher on the standardized testing. She was 98th percentile in Math. No idea on earth where she got THAT gene! She's so proud she can barely stand it, nervous about the ACT, excited at the idea of going to college. It's really awesome.

Our school participates in something called the A+ program too. If a student meets certain academic, attendance and community service criteria, the state of Missouri will pay for them to attend a 2 year college in state. Full ride, tuition and books, and a stipend towards housing if necessary. She's excited about getting enrolled in that next year too.

/proud momma hijack.

 

[Isis1]

Now i'm just plain jealous. I can admit that. Pea green with envy....

 

[milspecgirl]

now check this out- daughter was diagnosed with Mono and had an extremely swollen spleen. Due to the fact that dad's house is fairly chaotic with 3 small children, dad and I (dad's idea) decided that it would be best if daughter stayed with me to prevent anyone accidentally hitting her and risking rupture and because my work schedule is more flexible. He lost 7 DAYS over that 2 week period (we are on a 2/5/5/2). He missed her ( and so did her siblings ) but he didnt even ask for makeup time because the girls are content in their schedule and it was best for her at the time.

I guess he could demand that she rework her schedule for the next month so that he gets the extra week, but it is only going to make things more chaotic and mess with the schedule. It isn't about dad, mom, stepmom, etc- it's about what is best for the kids.

 

[CJane]

now check this out- daughter was diagnosed with Mono and had an extremely swollen spleen. Due to the fact that dad's house is fairly chaotic with 3 small children, dad and I (dad's idea) decided that it would be best if daughter stayed with me to prevent anyone accidentally hitting her and risking rupture and because my work schedule is more flexible. He lost 7 DAYS over that 2 week period (we are on a 2/5/5/2). He missed her ( and so did her siblings ) but he didnt even ask for makeup time because the girls are content in their schedule and it was best for her at the time.

I guess he could demand that she rework her schedule for the next month so that he gets the extra week, but it is only going to make things more chaotic and mess with the schedule. It isn't about dad, mom, stepmom, etc- it's about what is best for the kids.

And that was actual missed time. Not just time he'd rather spend doing something else.

I'm pretty sure my dad would rather have spent his weekends with me, when I was a kid, doing something besides standing out in the summer heat watching me compete in horse shows. But he sure never would have missed a show, and he never would have thought he was owed "make up" time because he wasn't receiving my undivided attention.

 

[milspecgirl]

exactly. I cant tell you how many hours I have spent (on my time and his) sitting in the cold or heat (it cant ever be pretty weather!) watching 1 cheer or the other one dance. And dang- I had to travel and PAY to get in the games and everything. I didnt even get to talk to them during that time. but- they knew I was there. They know that I will always be there. Or what about the time they wanted to go on vacation with their dad and church group on MY time. I didnt ask to rework the schedule- I sent them off with a kiss and bags packed and told them to have fun and called them every day.

OP- you need to get over yourself. It's not like mom is the one who scheduled the event. She put them in an activity that is on her time. Wow- 1 time dad has to be inconvenienced and participate. poor daddy.