Page 2 | To think the first child always comes last in broken families?

birdsinging · 2023-12-19T12:28:18+00:00

My mum and dad split when I was 4 so I barely remember them being together but my dad met someone pretty soon after and she was really lovely to me, I had a room at my mums and at my dads and it was meant to be 50/50 type arrangement until my dad and step mum had another dd and I was asked to stay at my mums full time because they needed my room but I still visited and could stay on the sofa sometimes. I'm still close to my step mum but it's nothing like the instinctive bond she has with her own daughter and since they've had their own dd it's like they are a real family and I'm not really part of that. My mum remarried and had 2 daughters with my stepdad who I get on with but now he has daughters with him, his daughters are everything to him and it's obvious they are the real family and then there's me too. I just feel a jealous that all my sisters live in a family home with both biological parents who will always put their own first. I don't live at home now but my younger sisters all do but in each family home I'm the only person that isn't fully related to most of the family. I don't think my parents or sisters will ever see how it feels to be the other child, my nan always said I was so lucky to have two families to love me but it's just two families where I've never been anyone's priority. I've left home and I'm happy in life, I just feel my childhood was ruined because my parents had me first. Sorry to rant but it's Christmas and I am thinking about family and it's just upsetting.

NauseousNancy · 19/12/2023 14:39

I am so sorry you feel this way, it must be very difficult.

You absolutely deserve to be a priority and I am so sorry you haven’t been.

I have a step daughter and I would hate for her to feel this way. What things would have helped you not to feel this way?

LaurieStrode · 19/12/2023 14:43

LolaSmiles · 19/12/2023 14:37

Way too many people have multiple children with zero thought about how their stupid selfish actions negatively affect those children.
The longer I'm on here, the more I have found myself agreeing with this.

There's so much moving in and having new babies to blend the family, men playing dad of the year to their partner's children whilst doing very little for their actual children, and children having to slot into what's convenient for adult relationships.

Exactly.

LaurieStrode · 19/12/2023 14:44

@AmazingDayz

Yes, that is what I am saying. There is zero reason to be having kids with multiple partners.

mathanxiety · 19/12/2023 14:46

Your dad and stepmother shafted you.

But mostly your dad.

SilenceIsComplicity · 19/12/2023 14:48

I'm the odd one out and the forgotten one, but I'm also the youngest with a massive age difference between me and the older siblings. My parents divorce only really affected me as I was still a child whilst the others were adults and had moved out of the family home by that point. They managed to have a relatively normal loving childhood whilst I suffered alone the horror and hatred and angst that came with the break up and shunted between two homes with 2 parents who were damaged in their own ways from the fallout. So I get what you're saying, but this being ' othered ' is more circumstantial than a pure age related thing. It also helps if your parents are emotionally healthy and put their child's needs above their own; not so in my case unfortunately.

SleepingStandingUp · 19/12/2023 14:49

LaurieStrode · 19/12/2023 14:44

@AmazingDayz

Yes, that is what I am saying. There is zero reason to be having kids with multiple partners.

Well arguably there's zero reason to ever have a child, let alone a second one with anyone. No one has more than one cold because they are required to.

My sister got divorced and eventually got a new partner who had no kids. Expecting her to get sterilised or have abortions because she'd met someone new is ridiculous. Not even cold in a blended family is pushed out

OhmygodDont · 19/12/2023 14:49

Yup the child who never belongs.

But you know these grown adults can’t not procreate and actually put the existing children before a future thought of children. Because they deserve to be happy. Unlike their children obviously because they are silly little children.

SoIRejoined · 19/12/2023 14:50

That's awful OP. Your Dad treated you v v badly . I think all you can do is recognise the huge sadness you feel, and then in time move on from it. I'm excluded from a family Xmas event this year but I honestly don't mind, I will enjoy my own quiet Christmas this year and have a lovely time. I hope you have a lovely Christmas with people who care about you, even if it isn't your own parents.

Reugny · 19/12/2023 14:52

The issue is mainly your parents.

Your dad should have ensured you had a bedroom with a bed to sleep in, and not slept on the sofa. (I actually grew up thinking it was normal to have a spare bed in a single room for various reasons.)

Your mum should have chosen someone who wasn't so obviously selfish.

I'm saying this as someone who has step and half sibling. In my case there is a lot of us and some of my siblings are closer to half-siblings than full siblings. I am also a step-mother.

Dacadactyl · 19/12/2023 14:53

I'm sorry to hear you feel like this. I hope you have a lovely Christmas x

Nonplusultra · 19/12/2023 14:53

AmazingDayz · 19/12/2023 14:35

Really? So if someone has one child and the relationship doesn’t work out they shouldn’t have another child with someone else? They should just stick to one child? This isn’t my situation btw so just asking out of curiosity

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I wouldn’t have put it as emphatically as @LaurieStrode but once you have a child, subsequent decisions have to be taken with their welfare and well being in mind, and that includes having more dc. That’s true in all family arrangements.

It’s not ok to have more dc that you can provide beds for.

Christabelladaisy · 19/12/2023 14:54

The Mother I Could Have Been (I can’t remember the author) deals with this - YANBU.

Reugny · 19/12/2023 14:55

Nonplusultra · 19/12/2023 14:53

I wouldn’t have put it as emphatically as @LaurieStrode but once you have a child, subsequent decisions have to be taken with their welfare and well being in mind, and that includes having more dc. That’s true in all family arrangements.

It’s not ok to have more dc that you can provide beds for.

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They could have provided her with a bed plus some room to store belongings.

They just chose not to.

Bunk beds have existed for decades.

herewegoroundthebastardbush · 19/12/2023 14:58

Granthams · 19/12/2023 12:30

It’s not ideal for you, but what would have been? Your parents staying together unhappily, or them both remaining single forever?

Yes, them both remaining single (or at least, subsequent-child-free) forever would have been better for the OP. How would it not have been better for her to be her parents' priority?

NonPlayerCharacter · 19/12/2023 15:01

I think that's why it's so, so important not to do anything that makes the first child feel cast aside in any way. There was a thread about it the other day, OP wanting her husband's children from his first marriage not to have their usual contact time right after she'd had a baby. That's how it starts.

herewegoroundthebastardbush · 19/12/2023 15:03

helplesshopeless · 19/12/2023 14:27

I really hope my daughter doesn't feel like this. She is absolutely my priority and my ex husband's priority as well.

Well as long as neither of you haul off and have new kids with new partners, thereby creating a family unit your daughter is only partly a member of, then hopefully she won't.

herewegoroundthebastardbush · 19/12/2023 15:05

AmazingDayz · 19/12/2023 14:35

Really? So if someone has one child and the relationship doesn’t work out they shouldn’t have another child with someone else? They should just stick to one child? This isn’t my situation btw so just asking out of curiosity

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Yes, I think they should. Obviously, as adults you get multiple chances at true love/a happy marriage. But a child only gets one shot at a family. If you have kids and the family fails, you owe it to be fully in that failure with them, not just wander off and have another go at a happy family with someone else, and they can be sort of 50% a part of that, always on the fringes.

WorriedMum231 · 19/12/2023 15:07

Some people threads from the Step Parenting need to read this post…

Reugny · 19/12/2023 15:07

herewegoroundthebastardbush · 19/12/2023 15:03

Well as long as neither of you haul off and have new kids with new partners, thereby creating a family unit your daughter is only partly a member of, then hopefully she won't.

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It is not what you do but the way that you do it.

herewegoroundthebastardbush · 19/12/2023 15:08

NauseousNancy · 19/12/2023 14:39

I am so sorry you feel this way, it must be very difficult.

You absolutely deserve to be a priority and I am so sorry you haven’t been.

I have a step daughter and I would hate for her to feel this way. What things would have helped you not to feel this way?

Answering for the OP but I'd guess not having half siblings. It automatically creates a two tier system. So if you really want your StepD to feel like a part of your family, don't have kids with her dad who get to live with both their parents all the time. It sucks.

Somehow I think you'll feel maybe that's too much to ask though.

Reugny · 19/12/2023 15:10

NonPlayerCharacter · 19/12/2023 15:01

I think that's why it's so, so important not to do anything that makes the first child feel cast aside in any way. There was a thread about it the other day, OP wanting her husband's children from his first marriage not to have their usual contact time right after she'd had a baby. That's how it starts.

To be fair it sounded like she was looking after the toddlers.

Until my dad proved he was completely shit, my SM was not involved in looking after me as a child. Likewise I've only looked after my SDC alone when no-one else was available.

housethatbuiltme · 19/12/2023 15:11

I'm from a 'broken' family and don't feel like that.

My bio dad disowned me and frankly I'm better off without him, he was absusive and awful.

My mam gave me an amazing childhood, I was utterly doted on as the only child of a single parent who would have gone to the ends of the earth for me.

Things where awkward when sibling was born and step dad became aggressive. Mam kicked him out and spiraled becoming clinically depressed (she already had to raise me alone and sacrificed so much to put me first asking her to do it alone again wasn't fair) so I left home so he could move back... discovered I LOVE my freedom and independence, honestly wouldn't have it any other way.

Got on fine with Step dad ever since who has helped me loads in life (we just don't cope well in the same nest).

By comparison my best friends (who grew up with married parents) was sexually abused for years by her father and watched her young siblings get taken and lost in the care system (spent years desperately trying to find them again).

Another (with 'happily married' 'pillar of the community' parents) watched her father beat her mother for years until he nearly killed her then ditched them. She also found out as an adult she had dozens of siblings she never met and the fear that any guy she dated could turn out to be a sibling really fucked with her mental health.

I don't think I have had it worse than many other people I know to be honest.

herewegoroundthebastardbush · 19/12/2023 15:11

SleepingStandingUp · 19/12/2023 14:49

Well arguably there's zero reason to ever have a child, let alone a second one with anyone. No one has more than one cold because they are required to.

My sister got divorced and eventually got a new partner who had no kids. Expecting her to get sterilised or have abortions because she'd met someone new is ridiculous. Not even cold in a blended family is pushed out

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Errr... she could use birth control??? It doesn't have to be sterilised or abortions? Why be so melodramatic?

Alright there's no reason to have even one child. But once you have, and if your relationship with the child's other parent doesn't work out, there's a good reason NOT to have more - it will make the original child feel less than and pushed out. Why is that so ridiculous?

You say not every child in a blended family is pushed out - but they all have to see their siblings living an objectively better, more stable life than they have; to know their siblings get to be with their mum/dad 24/7 instead of 50% or less of the time. How can that ever NOT be detrimental?

housethatbuiltme · 19/12/2023 15:15

herewegoroundthebastardbush · 19/12/2023 15:11

Errr... she could use birth control??? It doesn't have to be sterilised or abortions? Why be so melodramatic?

Alright there's no reason to have even one child. But once you have, and if your relationship with the child's other parent doesn't work out, there's a good reason NOT to have more - it will make the original child feel less than and pushed out. Why is that so ridiculous?

You say not every child in a blended family is pushed out - but they all have to see their siblings living an objectively better, more stable life than they have; to know their siblings get to be with their mum/dad 24/7 instead of 50% or less of the time. How can that ever NOT be detrimental?

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I'm VERY glad I have siblings thank you very much.

They are my only family left and no one knows your origins better than a sibling who grew up in a similar shared experience (even a half one).

I didn't need a father but I begged my mam for years for a sibling.

I also think my brother had a shitter time than me, my mam was older and got sicker during his lifetime becoming unable to do many things. My step dad suffered a painful 'lack of whimsy' but got equal say so they didn't get a lot of the fun I did because he didn't see the point.

ModestMoon · 19/12/2023 15:15

I actually agree. I would have absolutedly loved more children. But DS's dad didn't take well to fatherhood and I couldn't go through it again with him. I personally would love to find someone else and "try again" at the lovely happy family with two children that I have always wanted, and that I know I have in me to care for. But I know that it isn't in the interest of my existing child, so I won't ever enter him into a blended family.