Stepmom doesn't like my children

[Onegoodreasonforthis]

I've changed my username for this as it could be outing and I don't want it linked to my other comments.

exH has remarried recently. His new wife is not a mother and I have two children with my ex (19 and 16). My DD didn't like her at the start but seems to have warmed to her now my DS has done the opposite.

They come home after visits to there dad and say that she's avoiding them. They go out with their dad for the evening and she stays at home or is out with friends.

She's not being unkind in a direct manner but they don't like going round as theirs an atmosphere. They haven't seen her since Christmas Day and they see there dad twice a week.

Do I tell her she needs to include them in her life now she's a stepmom? When she married there dad she signed up for this didn't she? I don't like to see my DD and DS unhappy like this and she seems to be causing it.

As a stepmother myself, I can tell you she's avoiding them, to avoid them or you causing shit.

Mother's of the stepchildren make life hell for stepmother's most of the time and hold unnecessary resent.

Stepmother's are "evil" if they get involved because the mother thinks she is trying to take over.

You've demonstrated the reverse.

Resentment

Sounds like she let's their Dad have quity time with them and gets on with her own life whilst he is doing so

You would be very unreasonable to contact her and tell her she has to be involved in your (adult!) DC's lives.

My father remarried when I was about 16yo, I don’t consider her my (step)mother. She is perfectly nice, much much nicer than my arsehole father so I have no clue why she married him but at 16yo I didn’t need a stepmom.

Your DCs are old enough to deal with this by themselves, leave them to it.

For a start it is Mum not Mom. Doesnt your 19 year old have a tongue in their head. The woman is doing the right thing but no doubt if she was there everytime your Ex saw his children you would moan about that too

@lowlandlucky
in some parts of the UK 'mom' is the usual term, as is 'mam' in others

For a start it is Mum not Mom. Doesnt your 19 year old have a tongue in their head. The woman is doing the right thing but no doubt if she was there everytime your Ex saw his children you would moan about that too

No, it’s been mom here for decades.
‘Mom’ has been used in various parts for decades. It’s not just ‘mum’

It’s not unknown for stepmums to create an atmosphere to try to put off visiting DCs

Maybe the “atmosphere” is that the stepmum is just getting on with her day because her life doesn’t actually revolve around the stepchildren and the stepchildren are being too sensitive. There may be no ulterior motive like you seem to want to make there out to be, to try am put the dcs off coming. It may just simply be that she has other other things going on her life and the stepchildren aren’t at the top of her priorities. They have a mum for that!

Maybe if your kids didn’t like her to begin with then over time she’s thought it’s best for your DC to spend good quality time with their DF rather than her being there and the situation being tense. Your DC are basically adults, you need to get over it.

Step parents cannot win on MN. They are either over involved or don't get involved enough. Just leave the poor woman alone OP.

For a start it is Mum not Mom

That's like saying "For a start it is Robert, not Bob" to someone called Bob.

Mum, Mom, Mam, Mummy, Mommy, Mammy, Ma, Mamma, Momma - all diminutive forms of 'Mother'.

You don’t have to do any parenting to be a step mother/father, that’s what you become when you marry someone with offspring- it’s just a title.

A “partner” is to me a non-term, it’s a little bit up itself and right on, and it doesn’t describe someone who is actually married.

I call my mother’s husband my mother’s husband but that’s because he’s a wanker and I loathe him, but he is - whether I like it or not - the man who my mother has married and therefore is my step parent

His kids are also steps to me, because they’re now part of the family tree

Step parents cannot win on MN. They are either over involved or don't get involved enough.
This is quite true. The golden rule seems to be "stepmother must be psychic and instinctively know what the children's mum wants at any given time; failure to this means she is simultaneously a heartless bitch and trying to replace their mum".

With younger children this often materialises as:

• step mum must go out of her way to ensure absolute identical financial input and if she earns more than the child's father then she should be topping up the step children financially as it's not fair if she has more money than their mother.

• step mothers should have zero say or input in any area of the child's life and she shouldn't so much as tell them to put their dirty plates in the dishwasher because they already have a mum and don't need dad's new woman playing mum. If the kids are rude then she shouldn't challenge it because they already have a mum and don't you know they're still clearly suffering from lasting trauma from an amicable split 8 years ago and the subsequent positive co-parenting relationship. Step mum needs to back off.

For a start it is mum not mom

Did you mean to be so rude, hun?

My ex was raised to call his mother mom. It was a thing in the area of the west-midlands they lived. This was 50 years ago, so by no means a result of American tv.

I also hear a lot of mam. Especially the closer people get to Liverpool.

@lowlandLucky in the West Midlands it's Mom. Just as in a lot of the north, it's Mam.

I have no idea why you felt it necessary to begin your post with that, even if you'd been correct. But as it turns out you made yourself look stupid.

100% @LolaSmiles! 100%!

where's the dad in all this?
what's his take on it?
Or were you thinking of bypassing him and going straight into 'getting step-mum told' mode?

If they were 6 and 9 I would be concerned.

One is 19 and therefore an adult. The other is less than 2 years from adulthood.

I would assume they think that they need adult time alone with their dad.

She's doing fine. Her husband has two children, one is an adult, one is nearly. She lets them enjoy time together and goes off to do her own thing. She's not their mother, they already have one. They need to stop imagining an atmosphere and resenting her and start enjoying time with their dad. Maybe they could cook a meal for all of them one evening?