Timeline

[iamwhoiam27]

I see so many posts on here where people say others have rushed into blending families etc. So I'm curious to know how long people think is a reasonable time...
To meet children
To stay overnight with children there
To move in
To remarry

I honestly believe it’s down to each individual. I’m a step mum and people probably wouldn’t like our timeline but it’s worked for us and me and SD have an amazing relationship 🩷

• met SD after a couple of months
• we moved in together just under a year (partly due to Covid and distance)
• got married after 5.5 years together

that’s not to say it works for everyone though x

Personally I think that's great. I just see so many on here being criticised and told they rushed even when waiting that long or longer to move in together. It's as if people think you shouldn't even attempt to blend.

I am not married but I waited around 9 months before introductions. No overnights when kids were there for about 2 years.
We don't live together but would have considered it after 3 or 4 years but not to blend families (which is why we haven't moved in as my DC are still at home and so are his even though they are old enough to not be!)

I met the kids after six months but I'm not comfortable with an overnight yet. We've been together for about eight months now.

How long would you wait to blend families?
I honestly never realised some people wait so long.
When I was a child it seemed to be less of an issue with blending. My parents both had new partners who I met early on and was fine with. Same with lots of my friends.

Over a period of two years we lived separately but would have sleepovers and meet with both of our children regularly at things like soft play the park .

after two years we then moved into together .

everything has been okay , thankfully our kids have always got and have a lot in common interest wise so that's helped massively .

this is our fifth year of living together and we now have a child together and are married .

It depends on the family and the personalities involved. In cases where there is an arrangement to share care of the dc then the adults have time in every week to see a partner and there is no need to involve the dc until the relationship is well bedded in.

Ok, so another question then. How long until it's classed as a serious relationship?

For me it would be never. Ive just seen too many issues with it and I think navigating teen years etc is far easier solo than with a step parent in the mix if I am honest. I see how disengaged exh is with our kids because he's distracted with new wife and family

@Whyherewego how old are your children?

Now they are 18 and 16. I've been seeing my DP for the past 5/6 years. His are a couple years older than mine

I waited 5 Months for boyfriend to meet my children, waited 8 to meet his as they are younger.

We still live separately 4 years in, have talked about moving in together next year. We spend a bit of time all together every month and have done joint holiday etc.

Not really interested in getting married again.

Step Mum of 20+yrs

SC was 8 when DH and I got together (he’d been split from his ex partner for 6 years when we met and I was first serious relationship he’d had since the split). Both parents had been very young when SC was born.

Met SC after a few months
DH and I moved in together after 3 years (bought a house together)
We married after 5 years together
Had first child together after 8 years together and another child 2 years after that

Also meant to say but couldn’t edit my original reply that there isn’t any right or wrong answer or any correct timeline. Sometimes it will work out well and sometimes it won’t. Blending families is challenging. You will get different views from those that have been the step child or first family and those who are the step parent.

Not a blended family as such as DH didn't have any children (does there have to be children both sides?)

We met when DS1 was 2yrs 2 months, so very young. I think DH met DS after about 4-6 weeks. We moved in with him I think after about 9 months. Got engaged after 13 months and Married just after 2 years together.

Been together now for 19 years, married for 17. We went on to have DS2 (aged 16) together.

Going back to then, I wouldn't have been so comfortable with DH meeting DS so quickly had he not been so young. We did hide the "relationship" from DS for longer, in other words them meeting involved us meeting up on Saturdays and going for a wander around the shops/having lunch, no different to going out with friends.

I forgot to add. DS's Dad and I separated when he was a newborn, so I also felt it wouldn't be like he'd had confusion having seen me and his Dad together and then I'm with someone else

I wonder the same. I've been with my boyfriend technically for just over a year but I've been keeping him at arms length and only really seeing him at lunchtime once or twice a week and occasional evenings out, because I'm so worried about repeating past mistakes.

My children are all teenagers now but I met my last partner when my children were 3, 6 and 7 and moved quite quickly, within a year he had moved in. I wasn't in a good place back then and it didn't occur to me the kids might be affected by this new man coming into our lives so quickly. We stayed together for 8 years so it worked out alright. The kids dad hasn't been involved so my youngest was born, so whether that helped the transition, I'm not sure.

ETA: my mum met my stepdad when I was 6 and I've got no idea of the timeline, but they had their first child together when I was 8, so I'm sure it was quite a quick thing!

@familyissues12345 , it was similar with dp and me , I had split from ex when dd was a baby , and I met dp through friends when she was 4 .

I don't think the timeline of going forward is necessarily the biggest issue. It's the absolute refusal in almost every case for the adults involved to ever take a step backwards.

It doesn't seem to matter how bad things are, how much everyone is suffering (especially when there is just one child out of 4/5 struggling). It feels like once a blended family is formed, that's it for the rest of the DC's childhood, no matter how detrimental it is to them.

It's interesting to see so many different responses.
My mum met my stepdad in the summer and by the December we'd moved hundreds of miles away to live with him.
I wonder if times have changed and people are more aware of children's emotions now.

I have been single for thirteen years and only started seeing someone, who is not interested in being a step parent and I don’t want them in DC space (my houee). So living together is not on the agenda. DC know I am seeing someone and the someone I am seeing knows I have DC. I am not sure how or if this will even work over the medium term never mind the long term or actually if I want to give the time to this, but time will tell.

My position is skewed by the disastrous experience I had with DS’s dad who had a DD and I had a DD. I felt I moved too quickly with that as our DDs were the same age and he used to have her stay 2-3 weeks at a time. I was really the default carer for both DDs and had to teach him how to parent. I won’t go into details of quite how disastrous it was. Obviously I had DS so I would not undo the experience, but I think women are vulnerable to becoming the default carer and once you are involved in DC’s lives, it is harder to leave and you are open to abuse as are DC.

This isn't a judgement on you at all, or your partner but I can't understand a parent wanting to be with someone who 'isnt interested' in being a step parent? My boyfriend really wants to live with us and be a family but it's me that doesn't really want that.

However, I think as I come as a package with my children, I think I'd be quite put off by someone who didn't like or want children, or don't want to be involved with them.

Unless you just mean they don't want to live with you but even that makes me a bit 🤨

I don’t want someone to be a step parent though? My DC have parents.

[Edited to add: and I really don’t want someone to live with me or DC]

Fair enough. Neither would I but I'd want someone who wasn't dead against it. Probably makes no sense. And I'm probably misunderstanding what you mean by step parent.

No it wasn't less of an issue, it's that parenting standards and expectations of understanding emotional development of children is higher than it was.