A woman has been branded an ‘evil step-mother’ after she confessed she didn’t want her partner’s four-year-old daughter having her own room in the house they bought together.
The 24-year-old and her boyfriend recently purchased a three-bedroom house, which is a 30-minute drive away from where his little girl, Kate, and her mum live.
“I love Kate with all my heart and she comes to visit us for short stays and sleepovers, more often in the summer time,” the woman explained on Reddit’s Am I The A**hole forum.
However, she went on to say that she and her boyfriend’s new home will consist of three bedrooms; including their bedroom, a bedroom converted into an office, and the third being the ‘guest’ bedroom.
Kate was really nervous about us moving so far away, and my boyfriend has reassured her that she will still get to visit all the time – and she will have her own bedroom waiting for her whenever she wants, she added.
“My issue with this is that I don’t want Kate to treat the only spare bedroom as her personal bedroom. Rather, I want it to be thought of as a ‘guest’ bedroom.”
The woman continued to say that Kate will be welcome to stay in the ‘guest’ room whenever she wants, but she doesn’t want the room filled with her clothes and toys so that no one else feels comfortable to stay in there, adding: “I don’t think it’s fair that a room is reserved for someone who is not there 90 percent of the time.”
Not only that, the woman said she and her boyfriend are planning to have a baby of their own, and she wants to avoid the ‘circus’ of having to tell Kate in a few years time that her room will need to become a nursery.
“My boyfriend thinks I’m being unreasonable, that Kate needs her own room for stability, especially as she feels we are moving away from her. He says we can keep a pull-out sofa in our office for guests to stay on, and call the spare room Kate’s room,” she continued.
“I still don’t think it’s fair to have a room just for Kate when she won’t use it very often. And I think it’s reasonable to be worried at the prospect of eventually giving Kate’s room away to a future child.”
A posting her dilemma, the woman was quickly inundated with comments from fellow Reddit users branding her as the ‘evil step-mother’ and berating her for not providing adequate support for Kate.
“Okay evil step-mother. Tell us more about how your hypothetical future child’s sibling is not part of your family,” one Reddit user wrote, while another added: “You are not ready for this relationship. His daughter is not a guest, she’s a part of his life. And by acting the way you are, you are not making her feel welcome.”
A third added: “She is a child. A four-year-old. And you want to make sure she knows that isn’t her room. Marinate on that. You want to MAKE SURE a four-year-old isn’t too comfortable or at home in her dads home. If I were him I’d leave you.”
Fortunately, though, it seems as though the woman took onboard the advice from fellow Reddit users, as she later shared a follow up post confirming she had performed a complete U-turn on her decision.
“Call me naïve, but I simply didn’t realise the harm I was perpetuating by withholding a room of Kate’s own. By doing so, I was removing a sense of true belonging and welcome,” she wrote.
“The past few weeks, we have been occupied with our move and putting together the rooms. We haven’t moved over Kate’s bed and dresser yet, but we have freshly painted the wall Kate’s favourite light blue, and have bought a brand new Ikea toy chest for her.”
In fact, things have been going so well between the three of them, they recently went out for a walk together to a park, where the woman’s husband proposed to her, with the help of Kate, who asked her in his behalf.
“As many of you have said, I shouldn’t have been concerned with welcoming Kate into my home, rather, I should be concerned with being welcomed into Kate’s home. And I do feel this,” she concluded.
“I want to be a part of Kate’s family, and I feel very lucky to be given the opportunity. And I promise I won’t let it go to waste.”