Tl;dr My fiancé ended up screaming at me for mentioning archery to his youngest son. The kids got scared and attributed his shouting to being drunk. How do I address this in the morning?
My fiancé has two sons, 9 and 12, from a prior marriage. We have been dating 3 years and recently became engaged.
We also just moved to a new area. For the kids, this means a new school and new friends. The oldest has been set behind a few grades, so all the kids he meets at school are younger than him. I thought we should look into activities for the kids both to help them meet new kids and so the oldest could make friends his own age.
Earlier tonight, I was looking online for different programs. We discussed the local rec centers, YMCA, FFA, and 4-H. We talked about a variety of different things like tennis, swimming, showing livestock, etc. I was trying to get a feel for things the kids would enjoy so we could decide what kind of things to enroll them in.
The local 4-H club had a shooting program that included archery, shotguns, and rifles. I mentioned those programs to my SO while the kids happened to be in another room, and he said he thought the rifle program would be a better fit.
I also ran through the options with the kids, and the youngest mentioned an interest in archery. The oldest was interested in the rifle program. I told them that we need a few months to get settled and then we’d look into programs and see what we could do. No promises were made and it wasn’t a big deal at all. It was one option out of 20 that we discussed, among tennis, swimming, and others. We then sent the kids to bed because it was bedtime.
This is where the argument started. My SO claims he told me expressly not to mention archery to the kids. I firmly believe he said no such thing, and regardless, I didn’t intentionally go behind his back because if he did I didn’t hear it. Though I’m 95% sure that didn’t happen.
My SO got pissed when I told him the youngest was interested in archery. First, he claimed we couldn’t afford it. I told him we could get entry level bows for $150-250 and we could save it for his birthday. I also pointed out that he had literally just been discussing buying livestock for his oldest to show, which is way more expensive. This sparked a tangent about how he wasn’t going to buy a shitty bow and that 4-H would be competitive shooting and how dare I go behind his back and promise things to his kids after he told me not to. I think his overall point was that competitive archery is very expensive, and my attempts to explain that we don’t have to go all gung ho into it went unheard. His second point was that he felt I manipulated the situation and went behind his back, which I feel strongly I didn’t do. He also went on a hurtful tangent about how he has been a parent longer and just understands these things better than I do.
When I told him he never told me not to bring up archery to the kids, he blew up. He had also been drinking a bit. I guess I didn’t realize how much. I couldn’t reason with him and he began yelling at me loud enough for the kids to hear. The fight ended with him storming out of the house and slamming the door.
The oldest came down stairs and hugged me to ask if I was ok. The youngest was in tears upstairs in his room. I sat with them and talked to them. The youngest told me that their dad had scared him. And the part that broke my heart was the oldest reassured him by saying “he’s just drunk.” Their mom has just recently got divorced from their stepdad, so they asked me if we were going to break up. I assured them that I love them and their dad very much and that adults fight sometimes but everything would be fine in the morning.
Here is my question...
Is this enough for me to ask him to quit drinking? I don’t think he has a problem necessarily as in I don’t think he’s addicted. But, he and I do not fight often, but when we do, 99% of the time, he has “had a few beers.” I don’t like that the kids heard their dad screaming at their stepmom and knowing that he was drunk.
How do I address this with their dad in the morning? Should I let it go? Or put my foot down?
Submitted December 27, 2018 at 10:07PM by toolittle-toolate http://bit.ly/2SjAYfm
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