I really don’t think that nachoing helps. I think that people arrive at nachoing because they are a bit desperate and are hoping they can find some way around a problem that they can’t solve.
The premise of nachoing is that you can step back and he will step up. Sounds reasonable. But the problem is that you end up giving up all power and voice in the hope that a man will completely change his approach to his DC and actually consider you in deciding how to parent them. So you end up having to put up with all sorts of things and the approach encourages you to see yourself as the problem because you aren’t happy with things that your husband or partner is allowing to happen in your house.
In theory, it might work for things that don’t affect you (and, particularly, your children). But in a household, there are far fewer things that really fall into that category than the nacho approach assumes. For example, I don’t care whether my stepchildren eat vegetables. They have parents and they can worry about the lack of nutrients in their children’s diets. And that’s all fine, so long as the stepchildren aren’t actually involved in meals.
Because what actually happens is that I cook meals that they sulk through and make a fuss about because they aren’t all beige. This behaviour affects me and it affects my children. My children have to sit there while their half/stepsiblings behave poorly at the table, which makes the whole meal grim for everyone. They have to eat their vegetables while watching other children being allowed to make a big fuss and not do it. My toddler has to sit there listening to his awful the food is, which counteracts my attempts to encourage him to try food and for mealtimes to be nice, stress free events.
So, yeah, I can only nacho that if I give up any control over my own mealtimes and the circumstances in which my children eat. I have to let the SC’s parents choices (which are that their mother doesn’t give a fuck and just hands out cake and sweets instead, and their father is too lazy to do anything about his children’s behaviour) determine things for all the children in the house. Basically, I give up being able to parent my children in any meaningful way.
That same issue comes up again and again because how some members of the household behave and the ways in which they are treated - preferentially, more leniently, etc - do affect everyone else.
It’s not even like I can say to our toddler: daddy lets his other children be really naughty but we expect you to behave better. Because that would being nasty about the stepchildren.
The problems that nachoing cannot solve are: 1. I need my husband to be consider everyone in the household and parent his children accordingly, rather than just doing whatever is easiest for his divorced dad guilt; and 2. The irreconcilable differences in values and family cultures between the stepchildren’s primary parent and this household (and my husband does not share his ex’s values).
Withdrawing and nachoing makes things worse because I end up hugely resentful that the poor parenting and values the stepchildren are explicitly taught by their mother dominate my household - and influence my children - and my husband is unwilling to act in our interests.
Nachoing cannot solve those problems. And if they weren’t problems, I wouldn’t be looking at nachoing as a possible solution. Instead my husband and I would be able to work as a team and treat all the children in the house similarly.