I don't like when my Step Children are home...

[Amanda87]

Sorry, but I really feel so much better and happier when it's just DH and me!
I miss the quiet, I miss the adult time and most of all, I hate hearing all the time: Mom did this... Mom said that... Mom bought this...
Uuuuuuuuuuugh!

I know I'll be thrown many rocks at in here, but just wanted to vent and I know many people feel like me.
I would do anything when they're here, from cooking to entertainment, but I like it better when I'm disengaged and leave their dad with them.
I even rather come to work when they're home because I feel better outside.
Now, I'm not horrible or a monster like I know I'll be labeled as. I just feel like nobody will every be ready and 10000% ok with being a step parent to children that aren't theirs...
Well...

How is being a step parent in any way comparable to adoption? OP I don’t blame you, sounds pretty human to me, as long as you don’t let him/them know I don’t see the harm.

@LunaLula83

Poor kids. Suck it up like parents do.

Except that stepparenting isn't the same thing at all.

@Finelinehere

"I cannot possibly feel that way about any other child. I am just fundamentally not programmed that way"

But then how do Adoptive parents do it? Do you not believe that they can? So many say this happened, and also so many SM...

Regarding how, I cannot be sure, I have not been in that situation. However i can relate to this question from my own experience in this way: Dont know about you guys, but when I first delivered by DC, I wasnt immediately head over heels madly in love with my DC. I became gradually (fast though) admiring of her features, her innocence and vulnerability, what she does, how she grows etc etc which grew to unconditional love. And then, even if she makes me mad sometimes, love stays on...So perhaps a process like this is going on though i am neither a psychologist nor a sociologist.

Adoption is very different.

And I did love my DD instantly, it wasn't a gradual process.

So no, I'm not going to feel that way about any other child, and I'm OK with that.

@Finelinehere

Adoptive parents are also (presumably since they are adopting) unlikely to have had the experience of their own biological child. They have no comparative benchmark. They will feel whatever love they feel for their adopted child - but by and large, they won't be able to categorically say "this is the exact same as I would feel about my own". So how would they know it feels the same?

A step mum is a much easier target for a child who is unhappy.

Agree with this - I hated mine simply because she wanted to be "my mum". She hadn't done anything wrong as such, but she was an easy person to project it all onto because she wasn't my parent. I think, sadly, SMs are seen as an "easy target" to many, actually - even when they're genuinely just doing their best.

"Adoptive parents are also (presumably since they are adopting) unlikely to have had the experience of their own biological child. They have no comparative benchmark."

Not all AP are those who have no other DC.

@Finelinehere

"Adoptive parents are also (presumably since they are adopting) unlikely to have had the experience of their own biological child. They have no comparative benchmark."

Not all AP are those who have no other DC.

That's why I said unlikely and not always.

In any case, when you adopt a child you do so with the intentions becoming at least one of their legal parents. That doesn't apply to SC who already have two parent. Different dynamic entirely.

Dreadful typos in that last post, but you get the gist.

@luciestar my cumulative typos are far worse, glad people can decipher what I'm writing!

Found this lovely bit in the adoption thread (from an old post but can find the link)

"As someone else has said the love grows differently with an adopted and bio child. You don't have the pregnancy to get ready and get excited and start to love - instead one day a child comes into your life that already has a history. A really common term in adoption is fake it till you make it - meaning just act like you love them and one day you will realise you're not faking it anymore. I can honestly say I love all of my children equally, all in different ways becaus each one is so different but there is no question as to whether we love bio child more than the others."

Ps, just to be balanced, there seem to be also lots of AP asking when love will grow with an AC, so it's not an easy task with AP either...

This thread has taken a bit of an odd direction hasn’t it.
I loved both my sons before they were born and when they were placed on my chest for the first time I knew they were who I’d been waiting for my entire life - the two most beautiful, perfect, amazing little souls who I will love eternally with everything I’ve got.
How could I ever feel like that about another woman’s child? Baffling notion.

I care about my DPs kids but I maintain an appropriate distance. I am disadvantaged by the fact their mother who has never met me has told them not to speak about me, makes faces when my name is mentioned, and generally uses loyalty bonds to ensure her children probably have pretty complicated and negative feelings about me. Which only damages them, because I am an adult and it has very little effect on me. It’s a shame she doesn’t get to know me, she’d realise I’m so thoroughly unmaternal that parenting my own children saps all my nurturing energy and I have no interest at all in muscling in on hers 😂

@Youseethethingis

This thread has taken a bit of an odd direction hasn’t it. I loved both my sons before they were born and when they were placed on my chest for the first time I knew they were who I’d been waiting for my entire life - the two most beautiful, perfect, amazing little souls who I will love eternally with everything I’ve got. How could I ever feel like that about another woman’s child? Baffling notion.

One thousand percent, this.

[quote Finelinehere]@luciestar my cumulative typos are far worse, glad people can decipher what I'm writing!

Found this lovely bit in the adoption thread (from an old post but can find the link)

"As someone else has said the love grows differently with an adopted and bio child. You don't have the pregnancy to get ready and get excited and start to love - instead one day a child comes into your life that already has a history. A really common term in adoption is fake it till you make it - meaning just act like you love them and one day you will realise you're not faking it anymore. I can honestly say I love all of my children equally, all in different ways becaus each one is so different but there is no question as to whether we love bio child more than the others."[/quote]

Well that's really lovely and all, but... I haven't adopted my DP's kids as my own. They already have two parents to love them unconditionally. So this isn't applicable to my situation.

I love my DP and him alone - that's why I'm with him. It's enough for us both - I'm fully open with him about how I feel and don't feel about his kids, and he's very understanding and doesn't expect anything other than what I can give. Equally, he doesn't love my DD as his own, because she has a Dad already. We will both soon be experiencing, however, the same level of unconditional love for the same child when our baby is born. So we have all scenarios at play. It works for us - we get along as a family just fine.

Sadly, comparison and competition seem to be really frequent occurrences for many in step life. The "I will never be first in his life, " "he makes his children more of a priority than me", " I will never love his children the way that I love mine" ," "his first family takes up too much oh his time" , " I hate that he had a pregnancy experience with someone before me" ," I do not get as much alone time with him as his children get.

If thoughts lIke these occupy real estate and space in your head, you are making yourself miserable. These are not thoughts that occur very much with confident and secure people. I think that secure people realize that love is elastic and there is time and space enough for everyone in a healthy relationship.

I think that secure people realize that love is elastic and there is time and space enough for everyone in a healthy relationship.

What exactly does "love is elastic" mean?

Love is organic - it's either there from the start of your relationship with a person, or it's not. Or, it either grows over time, or it doesn't. If neither of these things happens for you with respect to another person, it doesn't make you "insecure" for goodness sake. It makes you - well, human!

@Tiredoftattler

Sadly, comparison and competition seem to be really frequent occurrences for many in step life. The "I will never be first in his life, " "he makes his children more of a priority than me", " I will never love his children the way that I love mine" ," "his first family takes up too much oh his time" , " I hate that he had a pregnancy experience with someone before me" ," I do not get as much alone time with him as his children get.

If thoughts lIke these occupy real estate and space in your head, you are making yourself miserable. These are not thoughts that occur very much with confident and secure people. I think that secure people realize that love is elastic and there is time and space enough for everyone in a healthy relationship.

What about "his existing children should always be the priority over his new ones", "you have to accept being second in his life" (said to posters who said nothing about expecting to be "first"), "he will always have a first family", "the SC are the only people who suffer in a blended family", or just good old fashioned "the child should always come first"?

The interest in comparisons and competition very much goes both ways.

@aSofaNearYou
I agree that both sets of statements are not the thoughts of genuinely healthy and secure people. Love has the capacity to stretch and encompass all of the people in your life that you love. My neighbors brought home their 4th child yesterday, and I have no doubt that they love this child as much as they love the first child that they brought home from the hospital.

People who look for slights will always find them. Secure people who are confident of their place and position do not need validation. They know well who they are and what they bring to the relationship table. Most people's lives seem to have both highs and lows ,and the compatibility and maturity that people bring to the relationships seem to determine their ability to celebrate the highs and work through the lows.

Self confidence and an awareness of your own self worth are not attributes that your partner or spouse can't grant or give to you. These are attributes that should exist within you and that you as a healthy person bring into your relationship.

But no matter how comfortable and secure you are, in a step family there are always elements you can’t control and other people might not have the same level of comfort as you. Often a new relationship triggers a change in your DPs co parenting relationship which means that his ex might start to behave in a way that impacts you. When I started dating DP, his ex suddenly began calling at 10/ 11 at night and saying one of his children missed him and needed to talk. The first time we went away together with our respective children, to a UK holiday park, we arrived to find she’d called ahead and pre booked some of the activities for their children only. Because there is rarely any direct interaction with the ex, the children become representative of these challenges and issues and this is exacerbated when they are primed to turn up at your house and say things like mummy said your house isn’t clean because I come home dirty. I would never allow this to affect the way I feel about or treat DPs children but it’s completely understandable how these situations build up, it’s not as simple as comparability or maturity.

@Tiredoftattler

Sadly, comparison and competition seem to be really frequent occurrences for many in step life. The "I will never be first in his life, " "he makes his children more of a priority than me", " I will never love his children the way that I love mine" ," "his first family takes up too much oh his time" , " I hate that he had a pregnancy experience with someone before me" ," I do not get as much alone time with him as his children get.

If thoughts lIke these occupy real estate and space in your head, you are making yourself miserable. These are not thoughts that occur very much with confident and secure people. I think that secure people realize that love is elastic and there is time and space enough for everyone in a healthy relationship.

I think you're forgetting that a lot of women are actively reminded of these things, told them my their partner. You're making out like it comes solely from the step parent and it's all in their head.

Love has the capacity to stretch and encompass all of the people in your life that you love.

This is an odd, nonsensical statement.

Look at your last 3 words.

Love has the capacity to stretch and encompass all of the people in your life that you love. You have to love them first, for your love to be able to do this! My love stretches abundantly around all those in my life who I love, of course it does - with a particular intensity for my own child, of course, as with any mother. But that still doesn't mean I can force an emotion for children who aren't mine!

Secure people who are confident of their place and position do not need validation.

Exactly.

I'm secure and confident in my position as someone who is surplus to requirements in my SCs life - just an added extra - who isn't needed by them emotionally in any sense; and vice versa. I'm just a kind person who greets them and welcomes them, and leaves them to time with their Dad.

I'm fine with that.They're fine with DP is fine with that. All secure and confident.

Yet previously you implied that security equals loving everyone.

You're confusing two issues. I agree with your above statement - that's security. Being confident that you know your own mind and (on the whole, because we all need external validation at some points), not needing others to validate that. However, not feeling a natural human emotion for a person because it's just not there, does not equal insecurity.

I care about my DPs kids but I maintain an appropriate distance. I am disadvantaged by the fact their mother who has never met me has told them not to speak about me, makes faces when my name is mentioned, and generally uses loyalty bonds to ensure her children probably have pretty complicated and negative feelings about me.

Now this is a clear example of insecurity.
On the part of the mother, not the SM.

@Tiredoftattler

Sadly, comparison and competition seem to be really frequent occurrences for many in step life. The "I will never be first in his life, " "he makes his children more of a priority than me", " I will never love his children the way that I love mine" ," "his first family takes up too much oh his time" , " I hate that he had a pregnancy experience with someone before me" ," I do not get as much alone time with him as his children get.

If thoughts lIke these occupy real estate and space in your head, you are making yourself miserable. These are not thoughts that occur very much with confident and secure people. I think that secure people realize that love is elastic and there is time and space enough for everyone in a healthy relationship.

Completely my thoughts to the previous comments along the lines of "no i cant love another child", "but he's not my biological child therefore cannot happen", "but she/he's is loved by her parents already" etc etc...

But much better worded. you should write a book @Tiredoftattler

More parental love doesnot hurt anyone!