Why are there so few threads about issues with Step Dads

[Talon01]

Just interested. I understand that this is mainly a female site but the statistics I think show approx 90% of kids post separation live with Mom primarily in the UK (or Mom is seen as primary carer ).

Yet there's so few threads talking about issues of step Dad and the kids. It's all about the kids that come to Dad's every other weekend or whatever the arrangement is.

I agree. It’s the classic tactic of ‘just asking questions’ to attack. ‘What about men? It’s only you horrible women complaining about things’.

Yes, this is exactly what I've been trying to explain,

That's my point of the thread. This really is an issue between women. Often seeing a mirror image of themselves and not liking it but refusing to acknowledge it.

The biggest part of the problem is the expectations put on women by men, and the fact that they aren't upfront about those expectations at the start of the relationship and take no responsibility in finding someone that actually wants to take on that role instead of assuming the first woman they fancy will be fine to do it. Let's not pretend it's all about the women!

No one actually wants the role these men are going to assign them though.

it’s like advertising a job admitting that they’re going to pay you half the going rate, expect you to carry the workload of 3 people and your manager is going to bully you and take the credit for everything you do. Those jobs exist. People end up in them. But the employees lied about what they were getting in to.

This.

It’s also not a given that women are looking for a man to provide financially for them and their children. Many women come into these relationships with a house and may be the higher earner.

The there’s the fact that bringing in a salary is not necessarily the hard bit. Other than mat leave, I have always worked FT in demanding roles with significant responsibility. I’m not somehow ignorant of what working is like. I’d imagine it would be significantly easier, in fact, if I got to delegate all the child related and household labour to a partner.

My ex moved in with his partner and her two children. He can’t stand them, told me he has no interest having a relationship with them.

Even our 4 year old has picked up the hatred telling me Dad doesn’t like them which I find is awful 😞

A stepdad wouldn’t really think to aim a post at the ex husband. I think that’s probably because the exh keeps his nose out of the stepdad’s life most of the time. So generally both men aren’t giving each other any headspace and they just crack on with their lives.

As wrong as it is, I can see why a stepmum might feel driven to piss off the ex wife if the ex wife has been meddling in her life.

So again, a big difference between stepmums and stepdads and another reason why the stepdad has it easier because of there being none of this unhealthy point scoring on Facebook.

Tbh, stepdads or dads behaving like dicks do it differently in general.

As an example, one if the many dramas related to his Jeremy Kyle ex (that my STBXH tried to gaslight me into believing wasn’t the ongoing influence of his very poor choices) has involved TWO of her boyfriends threatening him with violence.

The latest one was in response to STBXH’s generally higher than average narcissism as demonstrated in his need to tell his children how much better he is than their mother or any man she’d be with. His son had said something related to that and the boyfriend (and his ex) both went into Jeremy kyle mode. They then (briefly) broke up and she stood on STBXH’s doorstep shouting about how their son had caused yet another of her relationships to fail.

So let’s not feed into this misogynistic bullshit about how women are just so terrible, unlike poor, long-suffering men.

Lots of men behave poorly. Lots of stepfathers have problems too. Unsurprisingly, they aren’t on MN. Instead what we see is their partners’ view of their stepfamily, and contrast that with SM’s views of their stepfamilies.

In both cases, the male view may be very different. For example, my STBXH definitely believes himself the victim of crazy women.

We're happy for folk to have this discussion but please don't link to other threads within this thread as it will be veering into TAAT territory if so and we'll have to remove the entire discussion. Thanks all.

Poor long suffering men. LOL. I don’t think that at all. If anything I think my ex and his ex’s partner had it good just playing the laid back men not getting worked up about anyone (stepdad had hero status too of course).

But you’re right, it does maybe affect them differently. With men it’s more violent and knocking on the door type of stuff. Vanishingly rare I bet.

I just can’t imagine the dad becoming upset though if the stepdad buys an ice cream for his toddler while the dsc are either at home with their mum or elsewhere. School maybe. But mums get way too emotional about stuff like this. That’s the type of stuff the stepmums have to put up with, lots of little petty things that build up over time.

Agree, I've seen loads.
Probably on the relationship board than step Parenting board as the mum isn't necessarily a step parent?

Also (and in generalising) but often the issue in a lot of the step parenting issues on here, it isn't the DSC that are the issue. 9 out of 10 times women complain about something and it's a resounding reply along the lines of "its not the kids that are the issue, it's a DP/DH issue you have" - usually that there are discipline/Disney dad issues or boundaries with the ex.

I wasn’t saying you thought that.

I obviously wasn’t clear that I was commenting on the misogynistic bullshit being pedalled by the OP.

I think that, in many cases, this board functions as ‘relationships as viewed through the stepfamily prism’. This particular prism has the effect of focusing attention on the SC and/or their mother such that the man’s role in all the problem is rendered invisible to the woman he lives with.

So posters have to wade past the various usual suspects desperate to blame the SM to explain that the problem is him.

most of this is why.

Gender bias & Stereotyping are at fault.

As other people have touched on and in my experience the men in the scenario seem to leave each other alone whereas the women don’t which is where most of the problems come from.

My dad never asked anything of my stepdad they were just polite whenever they saw each other, contact was consistent and rarely changed

My stepdads ex on the other hand was high conflict/demanding did the whole sending crap clothes and nice ones bought by my mum/sd never coming back, specifying uniform from a certain shop when I got mine from Asda, certain brand trainers (I got nicks) etc changing contact, constantly asking for money, putting in new claims through CMS as she thought she’d get more ( she was actually entitled to less) demanding my ss had her own bedroom and I share with our half sister so a room sat empty most of the time . It never stopped and that was just what I saw as a pre teen.

Im also having a similar experience as a sm.My exh is polite and asks nothing of my dp. I get £150 a month as he doesn’t earn loads, half of big school trips, half of uniform and ask for nothing more our co parenting relationship is low contact as we really don’t need to discuss much and no conflict.contact with my ds is consistent.

My dp ex is hard work…constantly asking for more money and she gets a considerable amount as well as dp paying for clothes, trainers at £150 each, uniform, hobbies, pocket money, phones, bikes etc asks for money for a takeaway as she’s got no money till pay day. My old school view is you simply don’t have a takeaway if your skint. Contact changes constantly she demands we do certain things on our time with them but it’s the emotional side of things that’s the hardest. She involves them too much in things kids shouldn’t know about like money and disagreements between her and my dp so there is constant drama with his kids and it feels like he is always taking them out to talk to them to try and smooth things over when they shouldn’t even be involved. I’ve also been brought into things saying I don’t do enough, talk to them enough etc which is ridiculous.

Anyway both exw in my experience demand far more of the sm, with the stepdads having no demands from the dad. I think there is something to be said for having consistent contact as well as it removes a lot of the need for communication and risk of conflict over changes.

As other people have touched on and in my experience the men in the scenario seem to leave each other alone whereas the women don’t which is where most of the problems come from.

This is true. When my DH learnt of his exes then boyfriend he didn’t pay much attention until his child started asking who his Dad was. Turns out BM had told DSS to call her BF “Daddy” on questioning she said this was because they were getting married soon (they had known each other 3months) and she considered he would the be his dad by virtue of marriage.

Other than objecting to the BF/fiancés title DH has only ever said “he seems alright and DSS seems to get on with him.”

Whereas I was overstepping by breathing in the same room as DSS and his Mum starting sending packages addressed to Mr X Rawr and Mrs X Rawr” presumably to remind me they were once married. She also picked her married name back up and changed her bank account to it 😂