You’re pretty young, aren’t you? Not married, no children?
Because it’s really, really easy to judge from that position, and much, much harder to judge when you’ve actually lived a little. I’m not casting stones at you in particular, but you sound very like that relative we all have, who has no children but knows exactly what s/he’d do in every situation…
The original poster vented - crummy situation, but it sounds like she has learned a bit and is re-grouping. Sometimes, you just need to vent, without someone judging you. We’ve all been young and stupid before - most of us get over it these days.
OP: It will get better. You’ve learned a difficult lesson, and you won’t be very quick to trust in the future. Maybe you’ll be a single mom for a long time, or maybe you’ll find the right partner very soon. Either way, you’ve learned something important here.
Honestly, that was the wisest move in the chain of events. Just in case things turned out…well, like they turned out. The kid, if he remembers anything of this at all, will probably remember the pigeons in New York.
He’s three years old! I didn’t keep anything hidden from him, he knew we were going to NYC and had fun while we were there. And he was there for two weeks. I agree that you probably don’t have kids and don’t get that everything in the world doesn’t revolve around the kid. I didn’t do anything to hurt him in anyway! Of all the comments on this thread yours is the most judgmental and ridiculous. I could care less whether or not you think I’m a bad parent. I’m not the one in the relationship that was doing everything for sex–I did it for love. As far as economics go…it’s just money and I happen to have a large savings account for his education already set aside and growing. Obviously education is important to me since I have a Master’s degree and worked very hard, as a single mother to earn it. As far as your comment “heal thyself”: it’s important to teach your children to do things for themselves, to give them a good example of putting yourself first as long as it doesn’t hurt someone else. I’m not going to stop living my life because I have a child and I didn’t do anything to hurt him or impact his life in a negative way. He got to ride on a plane, ride in a taxi, ride the subway, see the Statue of Liberty, Broadway shows, see NYC from the top of the Empire State Building, ride the ferris wheel in ToysRus, ride rides at Coney Island, play in the ocean and hear the NY Philharmonic in Central Park.
You did nothing wrong. You took a chance and it didn’t work out. Sad, but not your fault in the least.
The douchbag is a douchbag, and that’s also not your fault, only his.
and I love the posters here who make up a whole scenario out of nothing, bitch at you for what they’ve invented, and then complain when you correct their assumptions.
There’s one positive in your whole adventure; you found out he was a massive douchbag sooner rather than after years and years and a massive investment of time and self.
Don’t let him ruin it for you in future relationships. There are good people out there.
(and yes, you can find them on the internets, and yes, you can trust (some of) them)
-happily looking forward to my seventh anniversary with the man I met on-line, married (and moved across an ocean to be with) after a year of LDR, and wouldn’t trade for all the tea in China.
I’m childless so most of my exposure to children is through living my niece, but when her mother and I had exciting plans with her they were giggled about with lots of “one more sleeps!” So consider the source, but I think that if your three-year-old can understand the concept of a vacation, he can probably understand having a new home. Your son knew he was going to New York to see Douchebag, but apparently didn’t know he was moving to New York to live with Douchebag and was therefore none the wiser when things fell apart a short time later. For me, that means a conscious absence of what I’d consider everyday remarks like “here we are at our new house!” upon arrival or “this is your room” while unpacking his stuff. (Or, to put it another way, hiding it from him.)
As WhyNot points out being left out of the loop turned out to be a good thing for your son but that struck me as an odd choice for someone who thought she was embarking on a romantic new future. It sounds more like someone hedging her bets, as though some small part of you saw the implosion coming before you left for New York.
Okay, my son was there exactly 10 days…so I should have said that, but I was just estimating, so my apologies for not being exact with everyone on this thread.
More details: our apartment was ONE room. We were planning on moving to a bigger place (his lease was almost up) once I got a job, so there was no “this is your new room”. We did call it “our apartment” but again he’s only three years old so while he understood we were going to New York, because we were going to move again (to the new apartment) in a couple of months, I never said specifically “this is your new house”.
As I stated in another post, I left everything in storage (expecting to come and get it all with a truck when we moved into the permanent apartment). I took luggage when I went with mainly my clothes (I’m not a “things” person) and then when I came back and got my son from his father we brought more luggage and a few of my son’s toys. He didn’t need a lot of stuff, we were in NYC and spent hardly any time in the apartment.
I honestly had no clue it was going to fall apart or I wouldn’t have gone.
I’m not trying to be all over the place but people keep making up their own stories about what happened so I try to explain what REALLY happened in response to their false assumptions.
Whoa; settle down there sparky. This might surprise you, but a lot of people not absolutely rolling in money can pay for their child’s education and still have money to do other things. And (Gasp!) some people choose not to pay for their child’s education, teaching them fiscal responsibility and financial independence earlier than most people learn it, if they ever learn it.
Some people will nitpick everything you say. It’s hardly worth arguing.
You could post “I drove to the store and bought some bread” and you’d get a dozen people saying “Why didn’t you walk? Isn’t that more healthy? Bread is full of bad carbs, really you ought to be eating Egyptian red barley. If you really have to eat bread, you should bake it yourself. It’s almost cents cheaper that way. Why are you throwing away money? You could be spending that money on your kids education. Except, of course, that will spoil them”
Women with small children do not cease to be human, and do not give up their right to self-determination. People try out moves and fail all the time, it’s no crime. “I moved to NYC, couldn’t get a job, and had to go home” is a pretty common story. It sounds to me like the OP had the idea that it might fail (hence putting stuff in storage, etc.) and planned pretty well for that. The kid is three years old and probably had no idea what was going on. Three year olds pretty much live in their own little world. With a six year old in school with friends it might be different, but it wasn’t that way.
Very true. And if all those details had been in the OP, my first response, at least, would have been very different. I don’t see anything particularly rash or bad parenting here after all. Will it teach me to not make assumptions from an OP? Well, honestly, probably not. I respond to people based on their words, not having anything else to go on in a message board format.
I don’t think “nitpicking” is the right word here, when the tone and content of the first post is so at odds with later ones.
Of course she did nothing wrong. She doesn’t have to take resposibility for anything that happens in her life. She can just blame everything that goes wrong in her life on douchbags.
Many successfull arranged marriages involve far, far less contact between the parties involved. However, the original poster’s potential partner wasn’t offering her that, so I would say her plan was a bad idea. In other circumstances, both partners are committed to the relationship working, not an “as long as our love shall last” thing, it may be the best decision either person can make.
The OP was pitting a person for inviting her to New York and then dumping her. How is that not his fault? I haven’t seen her blame anyone but herself for the decision to move or the actual move.
The OP reprinted for reference (as it seems it’s been misread or forgotten):
[QUOTE=thegirlwholived]
I pit guys who ask you to move 1500 miles for them and then dump you
Moved to NYC for a douchebag with my child only to have him, after a month, tell me he didn’t want to be a dad. Nice. Then comes back home for a visit and has the nerve to ask me to be his FWB while he’s in town. Grrrr.
[/QUOTE]
The OP is simple and terse. She showed slight anger with a guy who dumped her; that is all. She didn’t rue that she blew her child’s college fund or in any other way somehow damaged him. That is pretty hefty presumption on part of many of the readers and I really don’t understand where it is coming from. Must all moves necessarily damage a child emotionally, socially, psychologically, and financially? Where is this crap coming from? Certainly not the OP.
I agree 100% with even sven’s post, and I have 0 kids. I sense that it may have absolutely nothing to do with the number of kids a person has, but I’m going to reserve judgment until the 1-kid, 2-kid, and 4±kid vote is in.
on behalf of men who actually have a pair, I would like to offer my sincerest apologies to you. you obviously received a defective model. Unfortunately there is a limited safety risk, which the management feels is acceptable, so there will be no recall. Should you have any further problems with your specific unit, please refer the problem to us and we will attempt to slap the shit out of him.