My boyfriend and I have been together about a year. I love him very much. He is divorced and a single parent of a 5 year old boy that is quite the handful (that is another story entirely). Recently, he went through a custody hearing with his nutty ex wife. He has custody of his son throughout the school year and alternate weekends and holidays. The mother, when she bothers to take her custody time, has him on the summers and alternate weekends. His parents bought him a house to help him out. Yes, bought him a house. He pays his parents rent, without a rental agreement, and in exchange, apparently they get to have a fully furnished guest room done in their taste for them to stay in, and they have full say in how clean the house is and what can hang on the walls. (NO JOKE!!!) My boyfriend is a programming engineer and he makes a decent living, but not good enough to afford property in the area in which he needs to live in order to keep his son. (Their are restrictions that the child has to stay within a certain school district where his speech therapist and social worker are.) For the last 4 months I have been living with my boyfriend. A lot of the furniture and decorations in the home are mine. However, I have been keeping a seperate apartment on the opposite end of town. I am in Grad School full time and work full time for a less than stellar wage. Keeping this apartment has been costly, especially since I don’t even stay there. Why do I have this apartment you ask? I have it because his mother won’t let me move in with him unless they charge me a seperate rent. Yes, another rent apart from my boyfriends! She also told him that if something happens she wants to make sure I have no legal rights to any of his stuff and that he should get a pre-nup. A PRE-NUP for what?? HE doesn’t even own the house he is in and the essential furniture is MINE!!!! His mother and father have met me exactly twice. Both times she wanted all the information she could get on the grad school I was attending and what my plans were, to make sure I will end up being successful enough for her son, no doubt. His mother is a peice of work. She always has to be right, she is very cold, and overbearing. This is making me reconsider even marrying my boyfriend. I spoke to my boyfriend and I insisted that if I move in I wanted a rental agreement.
My feelings are, If I am renting a room there, then I want A ROOM. That means the stuff in their guest room has to be moved to make way for the room I am renting. That room is the only available one in that house, therefore I feel it should be mine. If this is her way of making me feel welcome I hate to see how she is with their enemies. Gosh, my moms only requirement of my boyfriend is that he doesn’t abuse me or treat me unkind. Apparently to get in with this woman you have to go through a credit check first!!

This post was submitted by Joni.