Aloha, Franny&Zooey - other intelligent, sensitive types...

[boysontoast]

hiya.

having read a bit on other threads in stepparenting from Aloha, im hoping she might be able to shed some light for me here

and also having a fair dollop of respect for Franny, i hope she can maybe put in a bit...

(ooo, get me, being specific in my calls for help!)

all comments welcome obv

ANYWAY, to cut to the chase;

i find my relationship with my stepson (do i call him dss? makes me think of 'Bread'...)
he is only 7, so i know he needs good strong caring dependable adult influences... i am just struggling really hard to be that for him and it breaks my heart.
his behaviour is, um ,challenging. he has been overindulged materially but, i believe, starved emotionally his whole life (that is to say; his mother is a poisonous cow who both dotes on him and emotionaly blackmails him and is seemingly impossible to predict)...

oh this is so difficult to explain. am re-reding each sentence as i type and dont think i am being v eloqent about it...

i guess, for me, i want to know how i can seperate my distaste for her (and i have truly never known anyone quite so vile) from my relationship with him. when he is rude or brattish, i see her and her influence in him and that is so not fair on him. i want to be a better stepmother. i want him to love and depend on me, to know he is allowed/able to anyway. and i want to love him. i tell him i do, but it feels like i am carrying the great weight of this guilty sectret that i just dont like him. in fact, there is much i do love about him, i just find his bahving like a little prince who the world was born to serve, frustrating to say the least.
i have even gone as far as trying to get a hypnotherapist to make me love him! (tho i felt silly and asked her to get me to stop biting my nails instead. which i havnt so im glad i didnt bother with the stuff that mattered afterall)

i should say that we are not having a crisis. there is no great emergency... but for his sake i want to find a way to be more peaceful with him, less judgmental of his behaviour and able to LOVINGLY guide him when his behaviour is unnacceptable.

should i just find a better hypnotherapist? or study Buddhism? help me get some perspective please.

Aloha, I have been reading this thread out of curiosity but had nothing to say; now I have to say that your post has brought tears to my eyes, what a wonderful stepmother you are, your DSD is a very lucky girl (and your DS and DD are very lucky too of course!)

I am very, very lucky. Three amazing children in my immediate family. How fab is that? My stepdaughter was helping my two year old 'walk' up the wall in the manner of The Wrong Trousers (the Wallace and Grommit film) and they were giggling away and it was such a beautiful thing. Feel she is the biggest bonus in my life. My bonus child, my children's bonus sibling. I wish she was all mine, tbh!

I have a lovely SD (8 yrs) who has no Mum to be poisonous or otherwise because she died very sadly 2 years ago (before I knew DP). She is a saint in the eyes of my SD and I am never going to live up to that. We talked about it last night and we agreed that it's not about replacing people, and that we could only all be the best people we could be, and try and love each other and then things work out. I do find it hard to love her sometimes when she is being a pain or I am tired or whatever, and I do still feel very guilty about it, because she desperately wants my love and would spend every minute with me if she could. But I came to the conclusion a while back that, like someone said, it's the long game that's important, and I cannot expect to have the same bond with her as her father does at present, and that if I do my best, and try and love her as much as I can I will build that up. I really notice a difference in my feelings towards her when we have spent time just the two of us - although sometimes it is hard to keep being enthusiastic it pays dividends, and I find I get out as much as I put in. She is a very loving little girl, and when I consistently make efforts to spend special time just her and me I find I love her much more too.

Aloha, thats beautiful. thank you

you know what? this thread has been really really positive... and im now v much looking forward to dss coming for the w/end on friday... will post back about that then! (well, probably after the w/end as its hectic when hes here) so lets see if im so brimming w love then!!
lol, no really, i have the perspective i was looking for on this thread.... and will refer to it again and again.

thank you all, and thank you MN!

boysontoast

How did the week end go? my dsd has come over twice to look after her 2 sisters and brother. Our relationship is now back on track after the nightmare of 2005 but thats another story.