I don't know why but I just wanted to say that I love my step mum

[travellingwilbury]

and my step dad for that matter .
I read a lot on here of the trials that families go through after a split and I am sure if my step mum had ever had MN "back in the day" she would have had a good old moan , especially about the fact that every single weekend from day one was taken up with me and my brother .
But she is fab and never showed me anything other than love and friendship , I have known her for pretty much 30 yrs and I can honestly say that we have never had a row in all that time .
I did stop visiting when I was a stroppy teenager which probably helped .

I have been really lucky to have 4 parents in my life who are all there for me .
Of course we are not like the blumming Waltons or anything but it has worked .

Lovely post!

I do hope both my DSDs will feel the way you do about the joys of having 4 parents ! I love them to bits and the house doesn't feel right when they are not around.

oh how lovely to hear is that - thanks for sharing!!

I love my step-mother too.

She's brilliant.

Have known her since I was about 17, so 20 years now.

I think it helps, relationship wise, that she was not the woman my father left my mother for, but the one after. She has always been a friend, confidente rather than a mother. I knew her as an adult (or near adult) rather than a child. But then she also has 3 step children from previous marriage that she was involved with from a much younger age.

She's fantastic at thinking of ace things to do and clearly thinks the world of my dad (and he of her). She's exceptionally kind and caring. A top person generally.

Thanks , she really did make it so much easier for us than it could have been .

My dad was determined that every Fri eve to Sun eve was our time together so it can't have always been easy for her but she never let us know that she would rather be doing anything than going to the museum , walk , picnic yet again . I am sure there must have been times when she would rather spend her weekends gaining a hangover or similar(in fact I know there were as I have asked her now as a grown up)

Pooka , my step mum is the woman dad left for and weirdly that has helped me , the fact that I can see just how well suited they are together . You would never set my actual mum and dad up on a blind date . Pregnant and married too young (in that order) I was 9 when I met her and it has been her that at times has kept my relationship going with my dad too .

I'm with you in seeing how wrong in many ways my dad was for my mum.

But I think that the passage of 10 years from them breaking up to getting divorced and him remarried means that I was more mature and able to appreciate my step-mother's loveliness in a way I wouldn't have been with the OW. Was easier for me in some respects because I was younger when it happened and was heavily protected - my older brothers had it worse because they had a greater understanding about what had happened and were in the difficult teen years.

PLus I cannot forget once picking up the phone (aged about 8) and some woman's voice on the other end saying "ask your mother where your father is right now". Basically, from what I understand now is that this was the OW. I don't get the impression she was lovely. Also she never wanted to have any contact with us, to meet us, or form any kind of relationship with us even when my father moved in with her. She left him (incidentally for another married man) a year later.

What a lovely thread! I hope that DSS might say the same about me in 20 years time...