To ask about your relationship with your step-siblings?

[CornishGem1975]

Just that really - as a stepmother (brave move, outing myself as one, I know) with SDC and my own DC I'm just curious about how step-sibling relationships develop throughout life?

Ie if you became step-siblings as young children or teens, were you close? And if so, did you remain close as adults?

Dont have a relationship at all with my step brother or half sister. Times were different and the only time I saw my dad is if i went to visit. Never invited on holidays with them or anything family related at all. So that didnt help.

So it really depends how involved they are in each others lives as to whether the relationship will continue

I have 2 step siblings from when my dad remarried for the 3rd time when I was 6, im in my 30's now. I never lived with them but visited regularly and we have always and still do have a really good relationship. Obviously we are all adults now and dont see each other more than 2-3 times a year but I see them as my "full" siblings. We all have oir own children now and they all love each other as well.
Luckily there has never been any drama, my mum will comment on their Facebook posts congratulating them for things etc and we could all definitely be in the same room or at a celebration together, including my half siblings parents aswell (dads 1st marriage)

I always forget that I technically have 2 stepsisters. I was 16 and pregnant when my mum met their dad. His girls were 17/19 and the eldest was also pregnant with her 2nd child when they started dating. By the time they moved in together I had long moved out to my own house. So there was none of that EOW thing. His daughters were also independently living away from home too. So we just saw each other on special occasions. As time has passed the sisters fell out, and have remained that way. They fell out about 8 years ago after their partners had a physical fight at my mums house. It was on my due date with my middle child. I have never experienced anything like it. It was all over how their mother had treated the two girls differently. She had given the eldest a house to live in rent free I believe, and nothing to the youngest.
I've no idea why we aren't "close" now I think about it. I really hadn't considered it before now given I really feel sad that I'm an only child and wish I had siblings. I think both sisters are very different from each other, and I'm also different again from them. The younger one I have on fb, and we have much more in common. Her children are a similar age to my younger 2 as well. But we still don't really make effort, either of us. My mum is the one who makes the effort to get us all together once or twice a year.

My own children have a stepsister. I suspect they won't be close when older because the time together is severely limited by her mother's behaviour, and her mother's influence on how she feels towards them. Her mother is unfortunately poisonous. It is looking like she will live with us one day though, as it is heading that way through court (again due to mother's behaviour). So that could change how their relationship develops. There is only 18 months between her and my youngest son. They really enjoy playing together and have more in common. We will just have to see as they get older how that works out.

I have some (much younger) half-sisters. We have no relationship and I don’t think they know that they have any half-siblings. I’m totally fine with this and don’t really consider them to be any relation to me.

We moved in with my two step sisters when I was aged 14. Me and the eldest shared a room until we went to uni, although she was there half the week only and I was there full time. We're all (2 step sisters a half brother and my sister) close, and interact nearly daily in a family WhatsApp group, and separate chats as well. I'm Auntie and God Mother to their kids. I do see my biological siblings more, but that's because we're all child free and can go to the pub together frequently, whereas my two step sisters have families and more commitments. We all call each other 'my brother and sisters though'. So it really varies by family and individuals!

I have a step sibling. We lived at opposite ends of the country so only saw each other during summer/Christmas etc. I haven't seen or spoken to them in years but that's more on their part than mine. They just stopped talking to the whole family once they turned 21 and weren't getting a monthly maintenance on my step parent.

I have 2 step sisters who I’ve known since I was about 9/10, one a couple of years older and the other 5 years younger than me. We get on really well and I count them both as my sisters. We had the usual childhood squabbles that all siblings have. I saw them every other weekend for the first couple of years then I moved away, with my mum, and it was generally school holidays.

I think the younger the kids are when the family is blended the more chance of them all getting on.

I had 3 step siblings DSS about 3 years older, DSB about 2 years younger and DSB about 4 years younger. I also have a brother and sister respectively 2 and 4 years younger than me.

We spent every third weekend at my dads and half the holidays. Until I was about 14 I'd say I was quite close to them especially my step sister. After that, my step mother got weird(er) and for no apparent reason banned all three of us from the house. I've never seen them since and feel some sense of loss. My dad and SM divorced when I was about 19.

I tried sending step sister a friend request on facebook about 5 years ago and got a reply saying her mum wouldn't like it and that was the last I heard from any of them

It was hard to go from sharing a good chunk of our lives with them and even sharing bedrooms to suddenly not seeing them ever again and I think it affected me quite negatively in a lot of ways.

Try to be supportive of any relationship they may form OP even if for any reason your relationship does not work out with your DP. Its not down to the children.

PS also had step siblings who were children of my step dad but they were all adult when he met my mum and we hardly knew them