This is what google came up with on Second Wife Syndrome:
April please tell me how this is pertinent?
No First Wife expects to be an heiress when her ex-huband dies. Those who don't remarry have already accepted that they will never have the luxury of two incomes unless they work two or more jobs outside the home. First Wives do, however, expect their ex-husband to play fair when he writes a will and leaves everything to his Second Wife.
In many documented cases where a First Husband dies, the first thing the Second Wife does is run to the county clerk's office and probate her husband's will. Some do this in less than a month after his death. The minute all of the legalities are out of the way, these Second Wives run to a lawyer and use their survivor's rights to their husband's estate to get even with the First Wife and her children. Second Wife has a will written of her own. The only heirs are her children from her first marriage if any and the children of the second marriage. Slam dunk!
Cheated in Life of a Father and Cheated After His Death
When the Second Wife Syndrome is finalized, only she and any children of the second marriage are recognized as being her husband's "family." This has happened countless times when a combined will leaves an entire estate to the Second Wife. In many of these wills, the husband intended to leave equal shares "after" his Second Wife dies, not realizing his Second Wife has no intention of even recognizing his children of his first marriage as equal heirs.
In one case, the Second Wife had only two children from her first marriage. After probating the combined will and taking control of her newly acquired "estate," her two children became the only heirs even though the combined will indicated that upon her death the estate of their marriage was to be shared equally.
Tossing the Baggage
In the simple act of writing a combined will that included her deceased husband's personal intention to leave specific items to the children of his first marriage, all the Second Wife had to do was probate the combined will and write her own, dismissing completely her husband's intention. The husband she once wished didn't have a past. The husband she tried desperately to distance from the children of his first marriage. In effect, her great romance and marriage were really all about her.
Ironically, in one case, a fifth wife of a man who had only three children of his wife and two from her second marriage to another man, was left his $9 million estate. She probated his will in less than two months, wrote her own will and left "her" newly acquired estate to her two daughters. His two sons and daughter of his first marriage were effectively denied their rights to inheritance he specifically stated in the combined will with his fifth wife. Money and marriage make strange bedfellows.
An interesting anecdote in these Second Wives (or Fifth Wife) is how they suddenly maintained contact with their step children to discover whether or not the children planned to contest her will upon her death.