I have two step children with my husband, aged 12 and age 7. I met my husband four years ago and when I met him it had been a year since he left his abusive ex partner who he was with for 10 years. I remember when we started to get to know each other, he told me his whole life story and I just ended up in tears. We both found/met each other when we were going through some serious life changes so you could say the first year we met each other we literally spent that year sorting our own lives out whilst getting to know each other. Towards the ending of the year when everything seemed more settled and life just paused for a second, we realised we really did and continue to click really well!
He then told me he wanted to get to know me more etc and he wouldn't say such a thing if he wasn't certain this is someone he wants to be with long term.
He did not want to make the same mistakes he made in the past and because he had turned 28 when I first met him, he felt he had 10 years worth of life to catch up on - he was not interested in a fling or something short term.
He wanted to grow in every aspect of life; spiritually, emotionally and mentally.
I found that so inspiring! I was only 21 at the time and yes maybe was too young but I felt I had so much more years on him because I would never have even imagined making the life choices that he did make. (That's not to say I was a perfect young adult who had a great upbringing - I grew up in a broken home from a very young age and I had to witness the struggles my mother faced whilst raising her children without any help or support).
So - as we got to know each other more and we started dating etc that time came where he wanted to introduce his two daughters to me. I was so nervous and excited at the same time (all these thoughts running through my head, I wonder what they're like etc, will they like me, first impressions are so important - even when being introduced to children! So I was super nervous)
But it turned out pleasantly enough and as the weeks/months went by and I started seeing them more and noticed that my partner was also constantly being bombarded with texts from his ex etc and the children were just getting passed from one home to another without any consistency and it was affecting them - you could see this through their behaviour.
I decided that he should consider having them for set days during the week, work out his child maintenance payments etc - just because he works 50+ hours and his children don't have any form of consistency which is affecting them and he can make sure the days he has them that he has that time to be with them instead of being dragged everywhere!
Of course, we tried coming up with an arrangement with his ex partner but she was not willing to co operate with us and we ended up having to go to court. Whilst this was all happening, my then boyfriend decided to propose to me and I said yes! - There was a lot going on at that time.
I was so happy to get married to someone who I truly fell in love with regardless of his "baggage" and I was more than willing to support him with his kids etc because I knew what it felt like not to have a father figure in my life and wouldn't dare to wish that on someone else.
However, I'm now at breaking point.
When I met my husband - his youngest was 4 and didn't know how to go to the toilet and wipe herself, any form of manners, she had an Iphone which her mum gave her and was very repetitive (you could answer her question but if she was not happy with your answer she would ask again and again until she got the answer she wanted).
His oldest came across as very grounded and well behaved with decent manners. - You could tell straight away who was going to be more challenging and obviously once I got married to my boyfriend the whole family dynamics were going to change even more.
The good news was that once married, the children understood I was going to be a part of their lives and now that there was a court order on how holidays, birthdays and how many times during the week they would see their dad only led to a stable foundation and some stability.
The bad news is we were hoping for 50% of custody but we received 20% custody. We wanted to be apart of their lives so we can really have an impact on how they grow and how they are raised. Their mother is a drug addict who I know has been around with multiple men whilst my husband was with her and this only heightened even more after he left her. She would dump the girls everywhere, we wouldn't even know where we were picking them up from half of the time!
Even though we strongly voiced our concerns in Court - she still got 80% custody even though she was with someone at the time who had an astonishing police record and was also heavily involved in drugs - which the courts were aware off. But I noticed when we were at court a lot of people informed us the judge nearly always sides with the whole 'single mother - raising kids by herself story' - even though she was not raising them! She was neglecting them! The amount of times the girls would come to our place with ripped shoes and dirty clothes!! We would get so annoyed and frustrated because she even receives child maintenance for them but clearly that money was not going towards them!
Once I got married, I fell pregnant soon after. I was supposed to be happy but all I felt was anxiety! I was completing my Masters at University, working and helping my husband with court proceedings. I just felt so overwhelmed and I felt like there was so much going on all at once. My husband was really supportive and I was always able to open up to him about how I felt etc and he would always try and do what he could to make life just that little bit easier for both.
But things just got worse, I will never forget this because I just felt so depressed about the whole situation - when I was 8 months pregnant and struggling with just daily chores because of how far I was in my pregnancy - his daughters turned up to our apartment with nits.
Nits everywhere! Nits crawling on their clothes and their foreheads, it was absolutely disgusting! My hormones were all over the place, I was so mad that their mother sent them to us in such a state - knowing full well I was expecting! I spent my last month of being pregnant just getting rid of his daughters nits and it took a whole damn month because they are only ever here two nights a week so the five nights when they were back at their mums and their mum should have been combing out their nits (which she wasn't) - they would come back again with their hair covered in them and we would be back to square one.
That was when it all really started to affect me, I was heavily pregnant - disinfecting my house, changing bedding all the time, combing nits, finishing off my Masters whilst working and my husband only lashed out on his ex when I told him I simply had enough.
We were bringing a beautiful baby in to this world and the whole momentum was being destroyed because she was not being a mother to her own kids!
2 years have gone by, I'm raising my own child whilst now being pregnant with another one. His daughters still visit twice a week but I can't seem to do it anymore, I cant seem to be present in their lives anymore. I'm so sick of his once four year old who is now seven not knowing how to wipe her bum, refusing to co operate with us and our routines that we have.
I'm so sick of repeating myself to children who I want the best for but just don't want to listen to me. I work from home 9-5 as everyone else probably is amidst this pandemic, raising my own child (which naturally is going to be raised differently to the way they were raised because me and their mum are two completely different people living on two different worlds) and having to cook clean and support them twice a week.
It's all so draining! I don't know what to do anymore and I know parenting step children is hard, especially when their mother is not only not raising them, but then making your life hard aswell.
Sometimes I think, I'm giving this woman too much control and my step kids too much control in how I feel. But, my anxieties increase 10 fold when they turn up at the door and my husband just cant be bothered to hear what I have to say.
I'm so stuck!