Things that us step mums have to "suck up."

[malificent7]

Sorry bout the turn of phrase " suck up" but i think it sums up what we have to put up with as step mothers. Fwiw, dp is a wonderful man in many ways and is an excellent df to ddsd who I do love but i need to get this off my chest. So here follows a bit of a rant.
We have been together 7 years and due to be married.

When I 1st got with dp his ex wife ( who had cheated on him and set up home with her lover pushing dp out) got jealous and started reminiscing with dp about the good times...trying to reel him in.

Every other weekend I can't spend with dp due to daddy dd time. In some ways it's good but it also means I get less time with dp.

I've met with their mutual friends and most are great but some are off with me.

His dm ( late mil) found me and my dd hard to accept me at 1st and even after e years , showed me his wedding cake from ex wife that was kept frozen and pointedly placed a wedding photo of them when i came to visit.

Once , starting a new job in healthcare, the only annual leave i could get was in the middle of the holidays. Dp relayed a message from ex wife " in the future could i please take AL either at the beginning or end of the summer hols.

I had to really fight for his ex not to come to our wedding ceremony as for once I wanted something just for us. She threw a massive strop and ignored me for a few months as apparently she was " confused as she thought we were all one happy family."

Dsdd is lovely. I genuinely love her but sometimes i feel like I am not cut out to be a step mum.

Being a stepparent is pretty thankless, I’ve been doing it for a looong time(23 yrs) and I’m well practised at the keeping quiet yet doing all the work.
I particularly enjoyed being screamed at this morning that nobody likes me and I’m horrible because I want to go somewhere alone tomorrow on my day off by 16 yr old SD. I just laughed 🤣

It sounds like you step mother is a bit of a cow who seems to think you're getting in the way of her son getting back with his wife.

I don't understand why you're excluded when your partner is with his daughter. You've as much right to be there as anyone and if your partner doesn't support you on that then they've got a problem.

No way I'd have allowed my husband's ex at our wedding and I don't understand why she would want to be there, nor why you had to fight for that to be the case.

It sounds a bit like everyone wants the pair of them back together. I think you need to be sure that doesn't include your husband. His ex should be his past. She is this daughter's mum, but that's it.

Being a step parent is not easy. I'm one.

I hear you. I'm the higher earner in the relationship, so the house, school, cars etc are through my hard work, but they can me by my first name and ignore me and go to their real parent of they don't get the response they want from me and my partner all to often takes their side.

I feel a bit like I've been cuckoo's.

Mil is sadly departed and apparently she grew to love me. Ex wife has 2 kids and now married with lover ...no chance of reconciliation.

Im not always excluded when dp has his dd. I have allowed that time as i can see it benefits her and i get a bit more peace!

Okay, you said you can't spend time with him when he has his daughter which is a bit different. Why don't you spend time with her?

I'm a bit confused as to what's going wrong in your relationship if most of the crap stuff is in the past and you aren't there when his daughter comes over. I don't understand why you're not if you think she's lovely. Sorry I'm a bit tired, so maybe missing something (like a brain).

Shall I write about what I had to ‘suck up’ as a step child ?

No thanks this is a step parenting board

We live together. I do spend time with her but I know she loves 1:1 time with dad so i leave them to ot. I still go on days out without them. I am trying to be a good step mum but feel guilty when my own needs come last.
My dd ( 14) lives with us ft so i try to spend time with her.

That sounds hard, you could start a separate thread?

Ah I understand a bit better now. I can certainly relate to the feeling of being last. Sometimes I feel like I'm a stranger in my own house and I'm only here to do the chores and pay the bills.

It sounds a little like you're trying too hard to be a step mum and maybe your partner isn't v aware that you're feeling left out and forgotten and he could do with being told. I have had that conversation myself and it helped for a while, but I think I'll always be the sixth least important person in the house to my partner (after the kids and the cats).

You could start your own thread. This one ain’t about you.

We also are expected to treat them as our own, but only when it comes to our time and money, anything else and we are not their parent so shouldn't act like we are, apparently.

On the contrary the stepmum part sounds fine, it’s more the ‘new partner’ stuff which sounds hard. They sound utterly nuts (the wedding cake?!) just ignore and do your own thing.

I'm confused about the 23 year vs 16 year old?

Sorry that was to HashBrownandBeans

After 7 years together I would have thought you'd got your head around his eow arrangements. It's not like he's spending a huge amount of time with her. Why are you marrying him if this annoys you?

Are you reading the same post ?

Op had said she actively leaves DSD alone with her dad so they have one on one time.

I think most step parents get that the kids are a priority. However many would say the ex isn't. Bar being civil and polite just because she was once married to dad. Doesn't mean she automatically gets a invite to their wedding 😵‍💫 bizarre I wouldn't expect a invite to my exDH wedding and I like both my Dd sm and (to lesser extent ex - but that's because we clash hen the ex)

Absolutely if you need support. You start your own thread and I'm sure you can appreciate this isn't about you.

As most things in life.

I'm wondering if step-parents really have to 'suck up' anything, this is the choice they made.

I don’t understand what a shitty ex-wife and shitty MIL keeping wedding stuff has to do with you being a step mum? Your DH chooses the 121 arrangement. None of this is the fault of the step-child.

Oh good the people who aren't step parents coming to tell people that they are doing it wrong and their feelings are invalid.

It's kinda this stuff that gripes on people tbh.

but sometimes i feel like I am not cut out to be a step mum

It really would be better if people who suspected this just didn’t choose to do it.

I know categorically I am not cut out to be a step-parent. Honestly? It sounds utterly thankless. I don’t know why anyone does it.

You don’t have to choose it, you know. You don’t have to be a step-parent.

@hourbyhour101 I have lot of sympathy for step-parents, particularly step-mothers because of all the paths and shapes my life might take or has taken one thing I know without so much as a grain of doubt is that I am not made of the stuff it takes to weather the storms that come with being in that role.

Yes, aspects of it definitely.

Because it's choosing the table d'hote, not a la carte