Being with my BF will mean being financially challenged. His divorce and CS and other expenses related to SD have currently made it nearly impossible to live in his own place...he lives with his mother now and will for the forseeable future or until SD decides she wants to live full-time with BM. He cannot contribute 1/2 to household finances now, maybe in the future, barring some unforseen crisis, which will eventually occur.

Add to the financial stress, his post-divorce situation with BM and SD is less than perfect, fraught with many difficult issues and dynamics...

My BF and I talked a lot yesterday. I feel like a relationship should be adult focused and not child focused...in other words I feel our relationship should be the primary relationship that supports the family, that dictates what goes on, that it should be the focus, but if I was hearing him correctly, he said he was working toward that but didn't think he could give that to me. I also told him that I wanted us to make the rules together, for us to decide together what is best for the people who live under our roof. They have 50/50 custody.

You know, I was thinking...I have TWO kids that I have FULL physical custody of...why is it that everything is seen and life is lived on my BF's side through the filter of SD? I'm just not comfortable with that and cannot live my life that way.

Is it because she is an only child? I guess other men must act that way even if they have more than one child.

I just don't get it. My kids are my top priority and I adore them but my life isn't lived in relation to them, am I making sense? I don't even know how to explain it. I don't have a preoccupation with my children.