To those SPs on their knees. I quit step parenting a year ago and it’s bliss!

[IQuitStepParentingandILikedIt]

I know my pov is quite rare so I wanted to share about the most peaceful year of my adult life.

DSD and her abusive mother made my life hell continuously in large and small ways. I was ready to leave DH last Christmas due to the unhappiness I felt trapped within.

Instead, I told DSD (17) and her mother that neither were to come into my home again. Ever.

There was the predictable slew of abuse etc but nothing they weren’t returning my decade’s worth of kindness with anyway, so I took it on the chin and blocked them on all platforms.

In this one year, my mental space has opened up so much room for creative pursuits, friendships, lovely outings and holidays with DH and our DD. No drama, no abuse just peace and safety.

I’ve just had the most calm, warm and beautiful Christmas ever and I don’t regret my decision one bit.

As women, we are held to saintly standards and expected to love another man’s children, carry a huge burden of domestic labour and mental load to meet their needs. We’re expected to allow step children to get away with overstepping our own boundaries and often feel like strangers in our own homes. Weekends interfered with, plans changed, no thanks from anyone ever despite the enormous sacrifices.

Best decision I’ve ever made.

Sad it had to be this way but DSD and her mother wouldn’t even meet me half way so I was out. And it’s bliss.

Abuse is wrong. Step Mothers the only acceptable Victim Blaming that MN tolerates. it's not about who comes first - it about protecting a child, and a woman, from abuse.

The reactions would be completely different if the abusers was the OP's child. She'd be told to protect herself, and her other children. But a Step Mum - oh no, she can be physically and mentally abused til the cows come home and MN would tell her she deserved it for marrying a man with children from a previous relationship. The innocent child? Apparently she doesn't matter either.

What’s not the point?

This thread perfectly highlights the way society (especially mumsnet!) despises step mothers.

It highlights how step mothers are treated with suspicion and how their very existence strikes to heart of people and causes them fear.

This is why step families fail because women are expected to be human punchbags and scape goats for everything and anything that happens within the family unit.

For these reasons it is the most thankless, soul destroying task going.

If our society could learn to be more compassionate towards women- even notice their unconscious misogyny and ridiculously high expectations of women and take them down a notch or two, step families would thrive.

As it is they survive at best.

This thread is for step mothers who are struggling. I’m telling you, you’ve tried, you’re a good person and there’s a time to give up and direct your resources to your own peace and the people who actually love you. Stay strong 💪🏼.

@IQuitStepParentingandILikedIt I'm just interested in your DH's part in all this, as you say you don't owe anyone anything and it's misogynistic to put it all on stepmothers, so what has your DH done to support you and his child in your decade of terror?

This says in a much fairer way what I think your original post was a tad clumsy over.

We have all tried our hardest, for some ot works (my dsc with my ex a prime example) and for some it doesn't (current dp). It is almost never the fault of the SM/SF and almost always the fault of the parents who cannot or more often will not parent their own kids. I grew this also applies to the poor teachers who frequently get a bashing too!

The fact I have 1 hugely successful step-parenting relationship under my belt which is still successful 6 years after we split shows the issue is not with me where current dp's son is concerned.

Your DH certainly does not love his daughter unendingly. Quite the opposite in fact. Shame on all the adults involved.

Nobody doubt OP has been through a lot because of the lack of boundaries of her husband ex and his older daughter. However, the post is written as a thriumphant statement when it is not. The post it is a very sad statement that show us a disfutional situation that lasted too long because people sometimes behaves like idiots and situations are allowed to go longer that they should.

Her husband should had been more empathetic with her all this years and don't let the situation surpassing OP patient. OP should have done it as well. All of that should had happened in an ideal world, but you know, this is the reality.

I don't see winners here, just OP trying to have a peaceful life. That is not winning, that is just coping.

Your op will come to resent you for making him choose.This is tge beginning of the end OP.Blood is thicker than water!

@Chocolatebuttonns

Of course you can't imagine the exact scenarios. I didn't think I had to spell that out.

But you do have to accept that in a blended family / one with SC you will not, ever, have the same dynamic with your partner & joint DC that you might have had without SC.

That's hard. It's fine not to be ok with it, so then choose appropriately.

Does that mean you put up with awful situations? Of course not. But you can't have exactly what you want. OP is perfectly correct to protect her DD. And not to want to interact with her DSD.
But she chooses appropriately - she can't just ban her husband's daughter; she can split up, live separately & agree access to her DD with her ex. Or some other agreed solution with her DH.

But to 'ban' her husband's daughter from his home (both their home) sounds like a unilateral decision and is wrong.

I too don't understand why they are all living 3 doors apart. Seems madness given the challenges implied.

She can do it. She has. But it's wrong for several parties in this scenario, even if right for OP.

This exactly! OP seems so quick to highlight misogynistic expectations placed upon SMs (which I absolutely agree occurs on MN and in real life), but then seems to completely fail to hold the dad / her DH accountable at all for this awful situation.

I say this as somebody who grew up in a blended family and now also has a blended family.

@MySecret21

The point isn't about an Evil Stepmother thread.

It's that he has a right to be a parent to both DC, and OP is preventing this, at least in part.

I assume there's also some backstory, again not shared here, that her DH had failed to suitably parent his eldest DD. I don't know.
But putting him in a position where he cannot do so, is wrong.

Yes. Completely this. The poor children.

The gloating posts hoping for the marriage to end, regardless of the abuse and the impact on the other child, are disgusting. MN encourages step mothers to put up with abuse, physical and mental. There is no care for the younger child, only sympathy for the abusers.

This thread perfectly highlights the way society (especially mumsnet!) despises step mothers.

This is such nonsense. I don't come across SM that much (it's much less common here in Ireland, as in, people seem slower to move into family scenarios in second relationships, just probably the legacy of divorce being still comparatively recent here) but I've no inherent view on step-parents or step-parenting

I simply know I couldn't and wouldn't do it. For my own DC. And for any possible SC. I love my kids but being a parent is hard & I make lots of mistakes. How able I'd be to be in quasi-parental role with other people's children, I don't know.

I agree there are some vituperative threads on MN about SMs. But there are about a lot of things! (Teachers, parking, MILs).

I am struck by the utter selfishness of so many involved in step-situations - men & women. At the detriment of the children.

The "abusers" are usually children who've been messed around with the changing parental relationships, just to keep that in mind.

it is the most thankless, soul destroying task going
I don't doubt this. I cannot imagine how hard it is.

If you disliked his daughter who he did a shit job of parenting then I don't think you should have ever got with him in the first place. Would you be in a relationship with someone who didn't like your child? He sounds weak and pathetic.

But I don't think you're able to see yourself as anything but some kind of amazing role model to step parents. Your advice to any problem being - refuse to let step kids in the house. Well done.

OP hasn’t prevented it.

She said the contact arrangements between her DH and her stepdaughter remained the same for 9 months after she went NC with the stepdaughter and the ex.

The same contact arrangements continued but at the step daughter’s house instead of his.

She hasn’t stopped DH seeing his daughter, she’s just said that it can’t be in their home anymore because of the way stepdaughter treats her and her other child.

I’m telling you, you’ve tried, you’re a good person and there’s a time to give up and direct your resources to your own peace and the people who actually love you.

Sure.

Then split up, move out, share parenting with your ex.

Don't force your spouse into a situation where he cannot have his own DD in his home.

(And again, apparently there's a back story but I'm going on what you've said in this thread alone).

@MySecret21

(I can't quote quoted posts as on the app, in case you wonder why I keep tagging!)

It's not true. Banning the DD from her DH's home is affecting contact. Was it ever going to work out, him staying in the ex's house?

I get there's a messy complicated situation here which is probably atypical.

I really take issue with OP's gloating self-congratulatory tone. This is a tragic messed up situation for all concerned. Except OP possibly.

The 3 adults here are an absolute disgrace.

OP, good for you.
You are not a doormat, a punching bag or any other analogy.
You are a person in a relationship with someone who has baggage. You do not need to carry that baggage for him.

Oh FFS no it doesn’t.

You can’t pretend to be strong and then admit you’re with a man who has less personality than a mushroom.

You are willingly with a man who is a shit parent and shit partner and as always the new women is fighting with the ex woman, instead of dealing with the actual problem which is the wet wipe of the man in the middle.

You should be encouraging women to find their worth and end the relationship, not finding ways to keep the man that doesn’t care about you.

It is inevitable that you will start a new thread about how you’ve wasted your time on this man and I hope for your sake you realise that sooner, rather than later.

If you disliked his daughter who he did a shit job of parenting then I don't think you should have ever got with him in the first place. Would you be in a relationship with someone who didn't like your child? He sounds weak and pathetic.

No that's the mother's fault remember, it's only misogyny if it's against the SM.

Not sure what OP is celebrating. Obviously there is a backstory of horrendous behaviour by DSD, which I haven’t read. But this is partly down to the dad. So is OP celebrating the fact that she has married someone who is a shit dad to his eldest child and then celebrating the fact she had brought another child into the world with a shit dad