Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 17:12     Subject: When can shared custody end?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:DH says, “Son, Larla and your sister and I are going to be in Maui from the 23rd to the 29th. If you’d like to join us for some or all of that, let me know dates by Thanksgiving and we’ll buy you tickets.” Let DSS figure out his plans with his mom.


When you have a kid who celebrates Christmas, insisting on taking your vacation on those days is an a-hole move.


OP here. That really is the crux of all the conflict. But, even if you don't celebrate Christmas, that's when the break is. This year, we are just spending 10 days at. a beachhouse a few hours from our house. But there's no way to do this during break (which affects both DD and DSS at this point) without crossing Christmas Eve. We offered plane tickets direct from school to beach, from beach to hometown, and from hometown back to school ages ago. But the squabbling over scheduling is still going on. I have to drive back on 12/23 as well to work, so I offered to give him a ride, but DH didn't want to short a day.
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 17:01     Subject: When can shared custody end?
Anonymous wrote:DH says, “Son, Larla and your sister and I are going to be in Maui from the 23rd to the 29th. If you’d like to join us for some or all of that, let me know dates by Thanksgiving and we’ll buy you tickets.” Let DSS figure out his plans with his mom.


When you have a kid who celebrates Christmas, insisting on taking your vacation on those days is an a-hole move.
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 16:50     Subject: When can shared custody end?
DH says, “Son, Larla and your sister and I are going to be in Maui from the 23rd to the 29th. If you’d like to join us for some or all of that, let me know dates by Thanksgiving and we’ll buy you tickets.” Let DSS figure out his plans with his mom.
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 15:55     Subject: When can shared custody end?
OP, you don't have shared custody. You have the inconvenience of being in a stepfamily with a difficult ex, a DH who is passive and happy to inconvenience you, and a stepson who is over it. If you wanted the convenience and simplicity and autonomy of an intact nuclear family, you aren't going to get it from this. It was a mistake to think you ever would.
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 14:45     Subject: When can shared custody end?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:He doesn’t want hurt either parent’s feelings.

Do you need to know in advance? If you buy his plane ticket, wouldn’t you know then? Or even if he just showed up - how does it matter? I don’t understand the issue if he is always welcome.

Tell your husband to stop complaining to you about it.


Yeah I think it’s clearly this. He doesn’t want to have to referee or hear griping. He’s prob over it by age 26. Why is this so hard to understand?


Totally this. He finds it an annoying pain. If he makes the schedule himself, someone's going to be unhappy with it. So he lets his parents choose and OP is unhappy with it. He sees no benefit to engaging in this at all. Frankly you're lucky he comes home at all.
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 14:43     Subject: When can shared custody end?
Anonymous wrote:He doesn’t want hurt either parent’s feelings.

Do you need to know in advance? If you buy his plane ticket, wouldn’t you know then? Or even if he just showed up - how does it matter? I don’t understand the issue if he is always welcome.

Tell your husband to stop complaining to you about it.


Yeah I think it’s clearly this. He doesn’t want to have to referee or hear griping. He’s prob over it by age 26. Why is this so hard to understand?
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 14:33     Subject: When can shared custody end?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:It seems like this is a situation created by the parents. If this young person had so much trauma around shared custody, that he can't handle negotiating this, then that's the parents' fault. So, putting on him to fix isn't fair.

I can't imagine what it would be like being a little kid and not knowing what the holidays would be like. That sounds really terrible, and yet your DH clearly created that situation, since it's not that hard to create a predictable custody schedule. It sounds like both adults put their need to conflict over the need of a young child. Now, when they're dealing with a small fraction of what he went through they're whining?


I tend to +1 this.

I grew up with joint custody, and in thinking back, by the time I was in high school, the holiday plans were solid and the same every year. Thanksgiving with Mom and her family. Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with Dad, Fake Christmas the next day with mom. We'd been doing that for like a decade. I'm sure that at one point it was contentious, but not for years and years and years. So once I went away to school, we just continued on, and eventually, as I got older and moved and had fewer vacation days, it fell to me to talk to my parents and adjust as needed. I stopped traveling for Thanksgiving, for example, and started seeing my mom over easter. Christmas now alternates with my husband's family. But these all became 1:1 conversations between me and the parent I was changing things on.

But it sounds like you guys never got into a groove - you were still fighting (or at least negotiating) holidays when your kid was a teenager, even though the divorce was over a decade ago. So OF COURSE your kid didn't want to step into the fighting!

So my question would be - why on earth haven't you guys long since landed on a standard schedule? If you had that, something long term everyone agreed to, then you'd do that a few years, and any future changes would of course be handled by (and probably driven by!) your stepson as his life and needs change.

But no, it's not fair to have him step in and handle a contentious issue.

So why is it still changing every year??


OP here. That really sounds amazing. Just to be clear, I am the step mom in the situation, so the logistics have never been up to me. Thinking back, I think it evolved this way because both my husband and his ex like to travel during the holidays combined with the fact, ex celebrates Christmas and we don't. So the holidays were a really complex formula based around her getting Christmas every year and the longer period of time that either did or did not include Christmas alternating. This all went out the window during Covid as this was right around the time DSS went to college. And they've never gotton back in a groove, so every year is a crazy negotiation.

I totally understand DSS not wanting to get in the middle of this, but, I also wish my husband would just drop the ball on squabbling with his ex about it too. Seems like we could invite DSS to join us either locally or on a trip (trips are not a huge deal recently and we are willing to fly him in and out separately as he likes) rather than engaging in protracted negotiations
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 14:22     Subject: When can shared custody end?
OP does not have shared custody. She has shared time. This is a DH problem and her DH needs to communicate to her son.

But really, OP, consider whether it's a better deal for you to have no influence over the schedule. It might be even more uncertain and last-minute if your stepson has to plan it himself. Do you want that?
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 13:48     Subject: When can shared custody end?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:You were wrong to expect this would pass. This is why it sucks to have dysfunctional family dynamics . The logistical work never ends. It may never improve. If he has children it may be worse then. I do this with my parents and I loathe trying to coordinate everything. Wish I could just go home and have it be simple.

If you want him to just decide and announce his plans, you will have way less control of the schedule. Do you like that?

Your DH needs to suck it up. He chose to have a child with this person and that is on him. Set boundaries for his complaining to you.


Fixed that for you.

We have conversations about our plans and are considerate so this doesn’t happen. My SS is 32 and married himself. His wife is a nurse. When DIL works Thanksgiving or Christmas, he visits his mom. When DIL doesn’t, they visit us or her mom. They won’t have kids so maybe that’s why it is all less fraught for us.


It's very rude of you to edit my words. And no, it's because of the divorce. My family functions well. Yet, it's still logistical work to plan across two households. No matter how well people get along, it's still a chore. Stop trying to pretend it isn't a burden to your stepson. It is. And maybe that's part of why no kids.
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 13:42     Subject: When can shared custody end?
Anonymous wrote:It seems like this is a situation created by the parents. If this young person had so much trauma around shared custody, that he can't handle negotiating this, then that's the parents' fault. So, putting on him to fix isn't fair.

I can't imagine what it would be like being a little kid and not knowing what the holidays would be like. That sounds really terrible, and yet your DH clearly created that situation, since it's not that hard to create a predictable custody schedule. It sounds like both adults put their need to conflict over the need of a young child. Now, when they're dealing with a small fraction of what he went through they're whining?


I tend to +1 this.

I grew up with joint custody, and in thinking back, by the time I was in high school, the holiday plans were solid and the same every year. Thanksgiving with Mom and her family. Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with Dad, Fake Christmas the next day with mom. We'd been doing that for like a decade. I'm sure that at one point it was contentious, but not for years and years and years. So once I went away to school, we just continued on, and eventually, as I got older and moved and had fewer vacation days, it fell to me to talk to my parents and adjust as needed. I stopped traveling for Thanksgiving, for example, and started seeing my mom over easter. Christmas now alternates with my husband's family. But these all became 1:1 conversations between me and the parent I was changing things on.

But it sounds like you guys never got into a groove - you were still fighting (or at least negotiating) holidays when your kid was a teenager, even though the divorce was over a decade ago. So OF COURSE your kid didn't want to step into the fighting!

So my question would be - why on earth haven't you guys long since landed on a standard schedule? If you had that, something long term everyone agreed to, then you'd do that a few years, and any future changes would of course be handled by (and probably driven by!) your stepson as his life and needs change.

But no, it's not fair to have him step in and handle a contentious issue.

So why is it still changing every year??
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 12:55     Subject: When can shared custody end?
Anonymous wrote:You were wrong to expect this would pass. This is why it sucks to have dysfunctional family dynamics . The logistical work never ends. It may never improve. If he has children it may be worse then. I do this with my parents and I loathe trying to coordinate everything. Wish I could just go home and have it be simple.

If you want him to just decide and announce his plans, you will have way less control of the schedule. Do you like that?

Your DH needs to suck it up. He chose to have a child with this person and that is on him. Set boundaries for his complaining to you.


Fixed that for you.

We have conversations about our plans and are considerate so this doesn’t happen. My SS is 32 and married himself. His wife is a nurse. When DIL works Thanksgiving or Christmas, he visits his mom. When DIL doesn’t, they visit us or her mom. They won’t have kids so maybe that’s why it is all less fraught for us.
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 12:47     Subject: When can shared custody end?
These are adults. There’s no custody. People are making choices. Including you, OP.
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 12:23     Subject: When can shared custody end?
He's 26. I would just let him know that your house is to DSS over the holidays, and let you guys know when he wants to come. It's like a newly married couple - they manage family visits themselves; they don't ask their parents to figure it out between themselves. At 26, he's old enough to be married, and might be soon. It's time.
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 09:41     Subject: When can shared custody end?
Anonymous wrote:Yeah, the 26 year old should be making their own plans, not relying on their parents to coordinate amongst themselves. But that's on your husband. He can say to 26 year old, "We love you and want you here as much as possible, but you are an adult now, its up to you to manage your schedule, let me know your plans"


That's when the "shared custody" ends.


This is the correct answer. You have a husband problem, not a ss problem.
Anonymous
Post 11/25/2025 09:35     Subject: When can shared custody end?
I took on the scheduling when I went to college. Generally, Mom bought my plane tickets, or Dad would fly out and drive home with me (and reverse after the break). Mom would announce her Thanksgiving dinner time, Dad would announce his, and I would plan my day. My parents lived about 10 minutes from each other, and I usually slept at mom’s house.

As a young adult (I moved back to DC after college), I would do the same thing. Once I had kids, everyone came to my house because it was easier than transporting kids around the beltway.

My husband has kids from his first marriage and has an amicable relationship with their mom. Kids are 22 and 24. He still calls their mom to figure out the plan, instead of asking the kids themselves. Which means if I ask the kids directly, they don’t know either because they are waiting for mom and dad to figure it out.

I get a little irritated at him because I never know how many people to plan for until the day before, because my husband waits until the last minute to make this call. This is squarely a husband problem, not a kids problem or an ex wife problem.

I probably need to call her directly and get things in order so we can both plan, but I also want him to carry his own share of the mental load (and frankly, she probably does too), so here we are.