To think you're not a "step parent" when...

[ThistleDoMeNicely]

You don't live with your partner?

Have never met the child you are apparently a step parent too?

You're never going to meet the child you are apparently a step parent too?

You've been with the childs father 5 minutes?

If all of the above are true and they still refer to the child as their step child is it just me that thinks they are delusional?

[FlossyMoo]

I would maybe speak to your ex.

I am not sure I would want my child around somebody who would swear and carry on in public especially with a virtual stranger.

Maybe start by asking if he knows what happened with GF & friend in the pub the other day. Don't go in all guns blazing but allow him the chance to say what he knows about it.

[CallMeExhausted]

I have seen that, personally. Not only "step" parent, but this woman referred to the DCs as "my sons" and herself as their mother.

It rang every warning bell in the world.

Fortunately for the boys, she is no longer involved with their father.

She is pregnant by some random man from a dating site, instead. And she is 40. And she lives in her parents' basement.

I wondered if this thread would go the other way... my DH has raised my DS as his own for the last 12 years. If others refer to DS as "your son" to DH he doesn't correct them, refers to the DCs as "our kids" - he only identifies DS as his stepson for official purposes, like school and government.

[riverboat1]

Based on your second post, the woman sounds extremely unreasonable. Fine to enquire in general terms, but totally inappropriate to claim a right to personal information on the grounds of being a stepmother. And just incredibly rude to shout at anyonein the street wwhatever, really.

Am assuming there is animosity / complicated situation with your ex and contact, given that you state she is never going to meet the child?

[ThistleDoMeNicely]

The strangest thing of it all (sorry for the dripfeed) my ExH has nothing to do with our daughter and hasn't for 3 years. For those reasons I won't mention it to him as it doesn't make one jot of difference the woman will actually never meet my daughter. I wasn't exaggerating when I said that.

[MuttonCadet]

It's okay call me, stepdads are fine to call the kids "theirs", it's step mums that have to be careful.

(Not that I'd ever refer to my step kids as anything but step kids, they have a mother).

Btw in answer to the AIBU, YADNBU, she sounds like a total loon. Does your exH have contact with the kids?

[Mammuzza]

My parents divorced and my father remarried. She was not my step-mother, she was my father's wife. I already had a mother and therefore had no need of another one. If I was a child at the time and mother had died, then maybe she could have been my step-mum. Maybe, but it would have been up to me to have given her that title, not anyone else.

That ^^

My father's second wife is not much older than I am. I only met her once (under duress).

Hard for me to be her step child when I did not, do not, recognise her as any kind of relation, let alone a "mother" shaped one, to me.

A lot of the premature self-certification as step parent brings to mind cats pissing on their territory. A kind of bolstering of self importance and position. I think anybody who felt fairly secure in their own right and in their relationship ... would not feel the need to "paper over the cracks" with inappropiratly, self assigned labels.

[PhaedraIsMyName]

grockle I disagree with your interpretation.

Your "father's mother" is clearly your grandmother because of the biological connection and that is an indisputable fact.

"Step-parent" has no legal status. It might have been accepted historically or in fairy tales or the novels of Mr Charles Dickens that the spouse of a parent is the child's step-parent but I think it's utterly reasonable to include a qualitative element.

[Ludways]

I'm a step parent but I never call myself that, I'm her dad's wife. I love her to bits and we get on brilliantly BUT I don't parent her other than to feed her and wash a few clothes etc.I would step up if it was needed but as she has her own mother and father it's not needed. Her mum has remarried and I'd say her new husband was a step parent as he lives with her so I assume does do some parenting.

I get annoyed when people who moan and bitch about their step dc's say they're step parents, surely any parenting starts with at least an element of love?

[riverboat1]

This is rubbish really though isnt it. I mean saying "my stepdaughter" is no shorter or quicker than saying "Jimmy's/Jenny's daughter"

Agreed, in real life when you just use everyone's names. But not in generalised discussions online, eg 'Any other stepparents people whose partners have children out there? DSS My DP's son said XYZ about me and I was wondering what you think. DSS DP's son has had a hard time recently so I am trying not to take it personally, but sometimes this stepmother thing thing of having a relationship with your DP's children is hard to get right.'

But anyway, I am being off topic since these aren't the circumstances OP is asking about.

[PhaedraIsMyName]

It annoys me when scum like Peter Connolly's mother's vile boyfriend is referred to as his "stepfather"

Such a terrible misuse of the word.

[DiaDuit]

Ah yes, that's true riverboat. I was thinking of in RL but yes online in text it is quicker.

[wafflyversatile]

She sounds delightful. She was being nosy because she knows fuck all on account of his lack of relationship and when she was called on her nosiness she pulled out the step-parent card to try and justify her nosiness.

Glad it's not bothering you.

[BruthasTortoise]

YANBU - she's not a stepparent; she's delusional. IMO there is a qualitative element to the term "stepparent" I am a stepmum, I was a stepmum before I married DH and continued to be one after we married. My marriage didn't define my role, the relationship I have with my (resident) DSSs defines it.

[ThistleDoMeNicely]

I personally am of the opinion that the step parent vs non step parent argument in general is unique to every situation. I have a friend who saw very little of her Dad and Step Mother growing up but has always through choice referred to her as her Step Mum and latterly (at 28) referred to her as Mum a lot of the time. She has a great relationship with her own Mum too. I have another friend who has a Step Father who lived with her and actually did everything a Dad would do and she does love him but hates the term step dad and does not class him as a parent of any sort, just her Mum's husband.

I guess people are all different where this is concerned.

[ThistleDoMeNicely]

No not bothered other than the fact I find it so odd to even have considered that she plays any sort of role in my daughters life. She is the girlfriend of my daughters absent dad.

Big whoop

[riverboat1]

Also the it's not like the term 'stepmother' has lovely connotations or anything. It's mostly associated with 'wicked stepmother' tbh, I think if you asked people what they associated with the word, mostly nasty things would come up. It's hardly a universally lovely title to be claimed and held with pride.

It's probably because it has the word 'mother' in it that it gets backs up, but I do think the word 'mother' has a TOTALLY different set of connotations to 'stepmother'.

[Sicaq]

I always though 'step-parent' was just a legal term? Not connected to whether you had met the child in question? Sounds like au have that wrong.

Anyway, OP, YANBU. She is not a step-parent in any sense, just a silly gobshite.

[Sicaq]

Like I had that wrong. Not "au" ...

[ThistleDoMeNicely]

Hmmm friend came round, the nature of the questions that were being asked are very odd. I wonder what she's up to!

[MuttonCadet]

Probably been told a load of guff by your ex. I do think your friend is stirring a bit here.

Ultimately only your ex can apply for contact, so she's wasting her time trying to get in loved if he doesn't want to be.

[WonderingHow]

"A lot of the premature self-certification as step parent brings to mind cats pissing on their territory. A kind of bolstering of self importance and position."

Mammuzza good to know I'm not the only one to think that.

It's something I've witnessed recently, and found it horribly inappropriate.

[CallMeExhausted]

Phaedra, in some situations and places, step parents do have legal standing. For example, DH has right of consent for medical and school related needs.

As well, I think if a step parent resides with the RP and is equally involved in parenting, then referring to the child(ren) in question as their kids is not unreasonable (as long as the RP and children feel the same way).

However, in the OP's situation, especially with the clarification in follow up posts, this woman's claim to be a stepmother is so not on as to be more than mildly disturbing.

[MuttonCadet]

Involved, not in loved (I blame the iPad)

[ThistleDoMeNicely]

Mutton she really isn't stirring at all.