I hate my step kids!

[Tappergirl]

They live with us full time, are parasites, and have ruined my relationship with my husband. Now though, I blame it on him for being spineless and taking every spat as my fault. I dont want to walk away but I can not see another option :-(

Well I suppose Autism was just made up before 1980, as Aspergers was just made up before 1994.

Many conditions have taken years or even decades to be recognised.

Nothing to do with incestuous thoughts, absolutely not, you are totally on the wrong side of the track. Nor jealousy for that matter, or excessive cuddles. There are deeper observations of her behaviour that I can't be bothered to explain on here. Clearly it's not made up if there is a book written on the subject and somebody has identified a trait that rears it head in some step family scenarios.

I have fantasy issues now do I? What an absolutely preposterous comment! Yes, I may fantasise about Colin Firth but I think that is far as it goes

No fantasising that your SD is trying to steal your husband.

Sistermckenzie those conditions are about communication and thought processes not a sexist fear that little girls can't be close to their dads!

Oh yes of course, I forgot about that, you are so right. That's what it must be [hmmm]

Awesome betterthan

The Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory is so alive on this thread.

Did you really just compare the unfortunately late awareness of complex, life long affective conditions such as autism and Aspergers (proven medical conditions by the way), to situations where some grown women feel jealous because their step daughters are close to their fathers? I've read some nonsense on here in my time but that just takes the cake. Do you have any idea how ridiculous and utterly ignorant you sound?

I can't find any explanation of the 'mini wife' thing online except some odd blogs and forums. So it's just made up.
You are completely, completely wrong on this count, better, and really out of your depth. The concept of spousification is widely accepted within the fields of psychiatry and counseling and has existed at least since the late 1940s. If you would like to educate yourself, one of the major authors on the topic is Salvador Minuchin, a highly regarded child psychiatrist who developed the idea of Structural Family Therapy.
At the other end of the spectrum, there is popular, 'reader-friendly', research on the topic. I found Motherless Daughters by Hope Edelman very helpful; it has a section devoted to the topic. (Stepcoupling is another text I often recommend, which isn't wholly devoted to the topic, but touches on it in very practical ways for stepfamilies.)

Whatever is happening in this particular situation, you are simply uninformed on this point. You may find the idea of children placed into a "wifely" role unpleasant and uncomfortable - most people do - but please don't spout off about it not existing.

If others are reading this and wondering if they might be dealing with a 'spousification' problem, I would encourage them to read up and to get professional help as it made an incredible difference to our family and saved my DSD, who is a much happier, healthier young woman today as a direct result of intervention.

situations where some grown women feel jealous because their step daughters are close to their fathers?

This is not at all what it is. Of course there may be some women who are simply "jealous", but you are displaying a profound ignorance with this statement. And why not? It isn't something most people have any reason to know much about it, if they aren't professionally or personally affected by it.

I think a better comparison would be to such things as Munchhausen syndrome, perhaps, or even to PTSD. There is some validity in comparing the public ignorance displayed here to ignorance about ASD, however, as your statement shows: reducing the issue to merely jealousy is akin to the way that people once tried in their ignorance to explain ASD as a problem of parenting, and I think that is the point sister was making.

There is nothing you can say to make that comparison in any tiny way reasonable or sensible. There is no possible way that can be justified.

Perhaps you could educate me brdgrl. I too have been unable to find anything remotely professional looking on the subject. Could you give me some general examples of mini-wife behaviours?

Hi tapper I've been lurking with interest ...
I moved in with my Dad and SM when I was 17. Previously I was there ( with DBro ) every week end and all holidays. I met my SM when I was 7 and DB was 5.
So she's been in our lives a long time - I'm now 39.
I had to move in as my DM has bipolar and is a functioning alcoholic, my lovely StepDad did his best but I couldn't take much more and moved in with Dad and SM.
My DM took another overdose ( one of many ) and DBro moved in too. We were in effect 4 adults and one child ( my gorgeous half Bro )
I do think SM tried really hard with the new dynamics, but actually when/if there was a problem she took it up with DDad, who wanted to defend us and they bickered between them. My Dad just wanted us to feel safe and secure and 'at home'. My SM just wanted him to support her. It became impossible, until I was kicked out.
She has always loved us I think, but couldn't live with us ( even when we both had week end jobs and paid board, did chores etc ) because she didn't have space.
I don't have a solution, but I recognise how you are feeling and wanted to give the step daughter side of it.
It really is Very hard, but ... There must be a way to live together, Dad wasn't spineless in not supporting SM but just trying to keep the peace and probably understanding we'd been through quite a lot already.
Nothing lasts forever and if you can find a way now, then the future will be brighter I hope

Oh I know about utter ignorance Nicki because after decades of being labelled as an ignorant, unfriendly oddball I was diagnosed with Aspergers in my 40's. The condition was not even recognised until I was in my 20's.
I even baulk at telling people of my diagnosis because of the utter ignorance I have been subjected to for decades.

I have not in real life encountered mini wife syndrome, I have however read many anecdotes about it her. Unlike you and others I remain open minded about it's existence and sympathetic to people who feel they are encountering it.

As for the this thread in its entirety, I am utterly gob-smacked at the abuse the OP has been subjected to, especially given her mental anguish. What type of person puts the boot in on someone's who has recently been suicidal????

I have two children with autism and whether or not you too have the condition, it is beyond ridiculous to compare it to "mini wife" syndrome. I say that in no way to be confrontational towards you, but you are entirely and possible dangerously inaccurate to say that.

Duchess, thank you from the bottom of my heart for your compassionate post. May I PM you later?

The kind of family cooperation you have only works if both adults in the home are enforcing it.

Exactly! And this is OP's problem. It doesn't have to be step children, if my dh didn't work alongside me to enforce the rules, then we would be in the same difficult situation with our own children that OP is with her step family.

This is why most posters have said leave off the kids and take it up with their dad. Properly. Address the problems and make some compromises to find a resolution.

If he won't do that, there is no hope. Nothing will change and OP will continue to be miserable in her own home. The only option then is to leave.

This is what posters have been saying over and over but OP is not willing to do that.

Of course tapper

Does this 'spousification' occur/is recognised in families where the step parent is male, or is it something purely attached to a female dynamic?

Tappergirl from what you have posted recently you say you wanted the children when they were younger, you failed in your bid to get them and when, as you predicted, circumstances changed you had to have them you didn't want them. Your relationship with your dh would never have survived if you had refused to have them at that point.

You seem bitter and resentful for not getting what you wanted initially and bitter and resentful for getting what you didn't want now. In both instances your life and your vision of what it should have been/ should be are polar opposites.

For the sake of everyone in this situation there has to be change and, unfortunately, it nerds to start with you. This isn't what you wanted, it isn't what you imagined, but it is what you've got and you need to stop the blame game and the "why me/poor me" attitude and find a way to make the current situation work, or cut your losses and make a life you will be happy with.

Fixitagain, the terms used by professionals are parentification and spousification (I've never heard mini-wife except on here myself, and I don't think it is a useful term). I am not a professional myself, but as I indicated in my above post, my family has received professional help in dealing with the dynamic (it is not a medical condition, but a family dynamic and a process) - so I don't claim to have a practioner's knowledge, but that of someone who has experienced it and read about it. When it was suggested to us that FST might be a good approach, and that DSD had been 'spousified', that was the first I really knew about it.

The main issue is that the healthy boundaries of parent/child are lost. The child is treated as a peer and partner, rather than as a child. This often means that the daughter (or son because that happens too) takes over the role of the mother in terms of companionship and decision-making. Many times she also takes over adult responsibilities, such as domestic duties and childcare. Obviously there are many teenage girls who do housework and look after siblings, but this is more than that. It is about the role within the larger family structure. Sometimes this happens, for instance, when the mother dies and the daughter tries to fill the gap left behind, especially where the father is not able to adequately maintain boundaries or meet the kids' emotional needs himself because of his grief. It also can happen in divorce or even within intact families.

In other cases (and this is more what happened in my family), the DSD does not take on the adult household responsibilities, but does take on the role of social partner and is given inappropriate decision-making powers.

These children suffer from the dynamic, even though it is superficially very satisfying to them. They generally lack good peer relationships, and may suffer from excessive perfectionism; they often feel a great deal of stress and may blame themselves for things that are outside of their control. Edelman (as one example) writes about the affect on their ability to have healthy adult relationships.

It can be very damaging not just to the child, but to other children in the home. In our case, DSD was very domineering over her brother, and he was really infantalised, in order to allow her to maintain her role as 'mum'. She was not competent to provide for his needs, practical or emotional, and it was a bit like a small child playing with a doll, if that makes sense. He in turn was very resentful and very lonely, as he felt utterly excluded from the 'partner' relationship he saw between his father and sister; as a result, he suffered even more from the loss of his mum.

Does this 'spousification' occur/is recognised in families where the step parent is male, or is it something purely attached to a female dynamic?
From what I have read, it does happen in mother/son relationships as well.

brdgrl there are some valid points in your last post! seemingly this occurs through necessity when the other adult parent is no longer in situation whatever reason. I can see how such a dynamic might occur.

However I cannot and will not ever see how that can be used to describe an insecure four/five/six year old who prefers to sit next to her Dad and likes to cuddle him a lot. I think that perception is totally that of the step mother who could choose to be sympathetic and caring and show the small child that she respects that relationship, or can be jealous and threatened and act accordingly.

It seems to me that the former (sympathetic and respectful handling) would go far further in solidifying the relationship between ALL members of the family rather than the latter, jealousy and anger, which creates tension and makes an already insecure child frightened and therefore even more likely to cling to the familiar.

Do you not think that is the emotionally healthy way forward rather than feeling jealous of a small child?

I have a 7 year old who had always preferred me, she likes to sit next to me all the time, she would get in the way if her brother cuddled me etc. is she my "mini wife"? It is normal behaviour for that age group. Can you really justify a grown woman getting jealous of a small child and reading up on "mini wives" and labelling normal child behaviour in that way? I would say that THAT reaction would go some considerable way to creating an unhealthy, family dynamic.

This is why people take issue with the SP board, these kind of really, very strange ideas and opinions directed towards children.

Oh you're back, Tappergirl. Good morning.

You sound more sober and calm this morning. Good.

It's not so good that you still sound self-pitying and are still on the roundabout that you were claiming you'd get off by means of leaving and/or divorce in almost fortnightly posts over the past 3 or 4 months.

It's a little hard to take you seriously when you don't mean what you say and say what you mean. A bit like the boy who cried wolf, you know?

For what it's worth, your house - one small living space and a small kitchen with 4 adults in in, including late teens/early 20s and not all of them your own - sounds identical to this home. it's suffocating sometimes, isn't it?

I resolve it by not sweating the small stuff and by making the best of it. If someone wants to play X box, that's fine. It's not my problem. If there's no milk they will have to go get some if they want more. It's all very simple. If I want something doing, if someone's left the bath dirty I tell them to get their ass up the stairs and do it. Sometimes I have to wait until they want something and then I bargain with them. Sure it gets right on me but that's how teens WORK.

Sometimes their behaviour doesn't please me but I don't HATE them. I don't resent them. You marry a man with kids and they WILL be there forever whether you like it or not. They SHOULD come first or he's a pretty shit, immoral lowlife individual and you don't want to be wed to one of those, do you?

DO you?

Did you not think of what would happen with the DC after they grew up? When, say, they needed a hand financially because they had a baby of their own, or had lost their flat and needed to return home? Did it never enter your mind that any decent parent would ALWAYS consider their home to be their children's home?

If it didn't, chalk it up as something you've learned and make one of two choices for everyone's sake. Accept that you don't come first and your DH would be an utter shit to put anyone above his own children - and you don't want to be with an utter shit, do you - or that you're not cut out for being married to a family man and leave them to live their lives without hatred.

Otherwise, buy a ticket Alton Towers and we'll see you back on the roundabout in a couple of weeks time.

I'm so sad that in Duchess situation she was kicked out. A father chose his wife over his child who had been through so much. The adults needed to find a way to make themselves happier not get rid of child. I hope this isn't what happens with you op?
No one has actually given any examples of mini wife behaviour excerpt for wanting to spend time with their father. Can anyone do that? And also explain why there aren't mini husbands?