Step mothering plays into the hands of patriarchy

[Stepmotheringthepatriarchysdream]

Dear step mothers,

Hi 👋 ex-step mother here. I hope you are okay in these difficult summer holiday times.

If you are struggling, please ask yourself whether the expectations placed on you by your partner, your partner’s ex, your partner’s children and society at large are fair, when compared with the expectations of a step father by the same people.

If you feel you are failing to personally thrive under the weight of said expectations, please don’t be surprised. It’s set up to cause you to fail.

Think about how it’s mainly women who contribute unpaid labour to our society to keep it running. Childcare, elderly parent care, emotional labour of family friends, organising play dates, Christmas, birthdays, holidays etc.

Observed inequalities:

•Often male partners just expect step mothers to take on emotional labour of running the home, fill in child care gaps and using their own money on children’s holidays/ activities, birthdays and Christmasses.

•Step fathers allow step children’s mother to meddle with timings so step mother has to endure a life where the calendar is dictated by an external force.

•Step mothers are up against assumptions that they are evil from children’s books (another woman hating strand) whilst simultaneously getting the rough end of the deal and doing all the work.

•Step mothers provide respite for birth mothers but their sacrifices are never acknowledged by anyone. Usually just criticised.

•SMs are scapegoated by everyone in the dynamic when things go wrong. Including their own partner, the person who she’s making these sacrifices for!

It is okay to:
•Not take on any kind of caring role of the children.
•To ask your partner to not label you a step mother. Unless you want this job title.
•To insist that children respect your boundaries and respect your home.
•To not have the presence of these children impact your personal finances negatively.
•To leave all parenting to child’s father.
•To go on holiday without step children.
•To not be liked. You won’t be anyway so make boundaries to respect yourself, you home, your sanity and your money.
•No one can force you to be a martyr so it’s important you show people how to respect you.

I hope this resonates with some of you. I wish someone who had told me years ago.
a I can’t believe how many times I hear step mothers talking about all of the free labour they’re doing for their step children.

This doesn’t happen to step fathers because women are usually covering everything.

Given the fact you seem to despise your step children OP, ITS probably a good thing that you are an EX stepmother.
I bet they were blood glad to see the back of yoi!!

Probably. The feeling was mutual.

Why are you tagging me?

Its probably not her fault her ex evidently didn't value or care for her enough to ensure she wasn't expected to do things she shouldn't have been.

I mean this sounds more like a husband problem than a stepmother problem. Useless men gonna be useless - with or without children. Get involved with one at your peril.

In many cases (especially when the am is financially vulnerable compared to their male partner hence in built power imbalance) step mother stands on her own on an island bearing the weight of the world. Unless she enslaved herself to everyone’s needs but her own, she will be knocked down.

In many cases, it’s a conspiracy. Evil step mother is a convenient (extremely lazy) narrative.

Win win for all involved apart from sm who is set up to fail.

I have seen this play out hundreds of times.

There is no conspiracy. You just chose a dud to get into a relationship with. Ask yourself why you felt like you had to take on the responsibilities that you did. Not all women feel like they have to. And, guess what?...their relationships still thrived with their partners and the children. You can't expect other people to respect you when you don't respect yourself.

It is not a conspiracy either you have an agenda or you genuinely need some serious help

It sounds like you're trying to say everything was against you and nothing was your choice. When perhaps there's more to it than that?

I certainly don't buy into the victim narrative of 'bearing the weight of the world', that's just hyperbole. Step parents have chosen to enter into a situation. They can also chose to leave it. If you're in a terrible relationship with an ineffective lazy parent then own the decision to stay or make a change and go.

Agree.

Well said OP.

The few contented step mothers on here manage to like their step children, aren't overly involved, more like aunts or older friends, have strict boundaries that ensure they aren't taken advantage of, AND are with decent men.

It CAN be done.

Step mothering plays into the hands of patriarchy

Might as well argue being any sort of mother is “playing into the hands of the patriarchy”. It’s all rampant nonsense of course. We are not sea turtles who lay eggs and then fuck directly off back to surfing the waves, leaving our eggs to hatch and fend for themselves.

Matriarchies have a lot of expectations around mothering including step-mothering as well

@Stepmotheringthepatriarchysdream
with this kind of post, no wonder step-mothers get a bad name. How about just thinking, these are the children of the man I love, therefore I’ll love them just like he does. They’re not a commodity, they’re a human being.

This. Don’t date trash. Make your life easy, pleasant, peaceful and enjoyable by not picking a shit bloke to live with.

Its the fault of the lazy men, there's no global or wider societal conspiracy for this, the father who has autonomy and control over his actions is to blame if they treat their new partners like this and expect them to do x, y and z and many are facilitated by weak women, yes. But it doesn't have to be that way, there are plenty of relationships where a man actually cares for his new partner and parents his children whilst also respecting her role and advocating for her when needed. Invariably this is better for the children too as there isn't bitterness and resentment rippling through the house, and a step mother who can choose to build a relationship that works for her and the children without the expectations some men place on them is probably a happier one.

No, you don’t. You don’t ‘take on the children’ unless you want to. Unless it works both ways and you get to discipline them etc as in normal parenting.

Just the caring and not being able to assert any boundaries and expectations, fuck that.

Yes, you do. If you're living with the children, you may have to take on at least a small caring role. If you can't cope with that, stay single or date someone without children.

So what do you do? 8 year old wants to go to her friends house.

" sorry Emma, I'm not doing that " and child misses out. "Don't care if f you like me or not, it's my boundaries"

Dad is sick

"Tim, you better look after these kids, it's not my job"

You can't live like that. SMS should not be saddled with responsibility though, that's unfair

I love my "DSD" (in her late 30's now) and after me and her dad divorced she remained in my care (she had lived with us both full-time since she was 4), can't get more involved than that. Although I do admit our situation was more the exception rather than the rule.

Yeah this is true to be fair. It's not just stepmums who are expected to do the majority of work when it comes to kids and household tasks. It's mum's in general. Obviously this doesn't apply to every situation and the common denominator is lazy, shitty men.

I think the difference is mum's generally choose to be mum's. Some stepmum's choose to be childless but then end up finding themselves in a parenting role.

What should happen is DH/DP asks if SM can help him out. Then says thank you after. There should not be an automatic assumption that anyone else will do his job for him.

So,

Emma asks if she can go to a friend's house. If she asks her dad, but he can't do it, he asks DW/DP "Are you able to drop Emma off at a friend's house for me, please? If not, it's ok." SM is more likely to want to help if she has been treated with respect and gratitude on previous occasions.

Dad is sick. He asks DW/DP, "I feel like crap. Would you mind sorting Emma out this morning for me, please? I'll make it up to you later." SM is more likely to want to help if she has been treated with respect and gratitude on previous occasions.

I'm quoting you and responding to your message

Very poetic and idealistic.
I’ll give you few examples:
What about when they speak to you like you’re a piece of shit?
When you take them on holiday and they spoil it with rude or bad behaviour?
When they are violent?
When their mother wrongly accuses of stuff you haven’t done?
When your partner doesn’t share your parenting ideas?
When they damage or steal your belongings?
When they don’t even say hello when you walk into a room?
Would you be happy to take this on the chin for ever increasingly flimsy reason that you ‘love’ their father?

Your post reads as a fantasy.
Love as a word means nothing in these scenarios. Action means everything.

Poster's experiences probably vary depending on their ages and generational expectations. Until very recently men have been the providers whilst the women have been the care givers. I remember mums of kids now in their 20s, expressing relief at meeting ex's new partner, and making comments such as "she's the type to always have Calpol in her purse", meaning she'll be the grown up whilst Disney Dad plays with the kids. Mums spoke about woman to woman chats and bonding with their ex's new partner, again with the expectation that she is going to be the responsible one. I'm quite pleased to read that a lot of the respondents are disagreeing about a step mother being expected to take a care giver role, because it means that expectations are changing for the better.

You make an interesting point but by now women need to know what they're getting into. I mean when I was single in my 40s I had no time for men with kids who were very transparently hunting for a new house drudge. Don't tell me how much your kids would love me on our first date, hire a nanny and fuck off!

If you’ve not had children before and you enter into a rl with someone who has, you are not making an informed choice.
How could you have any idea about the many ways you’re opening your life up to unpaid labour, Inconvenience and at times outright disrespect.