Mom Doesn't Want Her Boyfriend To Move In Because Their Daughters Would Have To Share A Room

Sharing a room would hurt her daughter more than it would help her.

By Alexandra Blogier — Written on Jun 10, 2023

Photo: Cottonbro Studio / Pexels

A mom asked for advice on letting her boyfriend move into the home she owns. She wrote to Mumsnet, an English parenting forum, seeking guidance around the possibility of cohabiting with her partner, because the two don’t see eye-to-eye on a very specific issue — having their daughters share a bedroom.

The mom has one 8-year-old daughter who lives with her full-time and visits her dad for one night every other weekend. Her boyfriend also has an 8-year-old daughter and a 4-year-old son, who he has shared custody of.

The conflicted mom doesn’t want her boyfriend to move in because he insists their daughters share a room.

She explained that she owns her 3-bedroom house; one room is hers, one is her office, and the third room is her daughter’s bedroom. Her boyfriend lives in a 2-bedroom rental where his kids share a room.

Their current plan is for him to move into her home when his lease is up, but they disagree on which of their kids should share a room.

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She believes that his kids could “share the spare room and we can decorate it, it’s big enough for a double bed so they could easily have a side each, although it’s not big enough for a physical divider due to where the window is.” But her boyfriend thinks that the two girls should share the larger of the two bedrooms, and his son should have the smaller room to himself.

The mom gave further context as to why she doesn’t want her daughter to share a room, saying that her daughter has special needs and a medical condition; her bedroom is “her sanctuary to get away from it.”

“She always says it’s the only space that is totally hers and she can do what she wants in it... decorated exactly how she wants it and with her things where she wants them. It’s also where she goes if she’s having a meltdown.”

‘I do not under any circumstances want her to have to share that space,’ the mom stated.

She told her boyfriend that even if her daughter didn’t have special needs, she wouldn’t ask her to share her room: “This is her only home and room, she shares a room at her dads/grandparents with her cousin and it's my house I've paid for.”

But her boyfriend thinks that because his kids have to share a room when they’re with their mom, they shouldn’t have to do so when they’re with him.

“I have said no, they either share bedroom 2 or [he] doesn’t move in,” the mom explained. “I am happy in [the] future to move to a 4 bed so they can all have their own rooms, but it's a while away yet.”

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She further explained that if her boyfriend were to move into her home, he wouldn’t be on the mortgage, nor would he be paying towards it. They would split their bills equally.

She wondered if she was being unreasonable for not wanting her daughter to share a room with his daughter, yet the overwhelming response from other people on the forum agreed that he was the one who was being unreasonable.

“You're putting your [daughter’s] needs front and center ahead of your partner's wants, and [have] given your partner options up front,” said one person. “You having a relationship shouldn’t make your [daughter’s] life worse, which sharing a room really would,” said someone else.

Photo: Mumsnet