Young step mum to 4

[Poodledoodle134]

Hello, I just wanted to reach out and see if there were any other people in my situation and feel the same. I’m 24 and became a full time step mum to 4 kids when I was 22. My partner and I are healthy and happy, we are getting married next year and I couldn’t have asked for better Step kids. They are all different ages with the oldest not being much younger than I so I get to experience different parental relationships with them all (if that makes sense?).
Of course it isn’t always easy, kids are kids and as a child brought up with a step mum I’d like to think I know how it feels when times get rough for the kids.

However, sometimes I can’t help but feel lonely, as I can’t relate to a lot of people in my situation and being still quite young myself. We have a break from the kids as they go to their other parents house every other weekend, and when these weekends roll around I find myself grieving the person I used to be in my early 20s. I was in my 2nd year of uni studying to be a paramedic and I dropped out (which I regret massively), I lived in a house share that I loved and I felt I was in such a good place with my anxieties. I now work behind a computer with a job that suits around my kids school. Not my ideal job but as parents we make sacrifices and it keeps my family financially secure. Please don’t think I don’t want the life I have chosen, I wouldn’t change it, I just want to know that I’m not alone! I’ve googled groups in my area, even just for stepparents to go to and talk, but I’ve found nothing.

Any advice would be appreciated, thank you so much for taking the time to read this 😃

I was in the same position for 10 years, the best thing I did was leaving. I loved the kids so much and was deeply attached to them and I still am, I miss them everyday. I found it very difficult to leave because of a mixture of my feelings and my finances, I realised that as happy as I was, my feelings always came last and I was making a lot of sacrifices that although I was happy to make them at the time I was worried I would look back and regret them. Since I’ve left I haven’t regretted it once because I’m doing things for me but I do regret not doing them sooner, I’m years behind my friends in terms of earning potential and I missed the “growing up” part of my life because I got thrown into being older before my time I didn’t do the transition part and I miss that.

I’m not saying you will feel the same and you should leave, but please don’t miss opportunities for yourself. See if you can finish uni and do still go out with your friends and do things, you need a balance.

OP the women on here have seen it all and reading this, we want to support YOU. Sorry to be blunt but they're not your kids. Please do not give up your chosen career or a similar one for someone else and their kids. Not devaluing your relationship but I want you to value your aspirations. Don't put em on hold for someone else.

Would you still be interested in being a paramedic?

Kindly, OP, please think about you in this - what are your long term goals, ambitions? Do you want children?

I ask because my cousin met a man with two young children around the same age as you - she became their step mum, did everything, worked around them at a lower paid job (she worked in school admin so she had the school holidays off) and they didn't have a child together as 'they' had children already and couldn't afford more. He did very well in his career with her constant support. Once the children left to go to uni, he left her for a much younger woman. She has been left with pretty much nothing (he kept the house as she didn't want adult step children to lose their home 🙄) and while she is still in touch with her step children, Christmases, holidays etc are with him as he is their dad, and he kicks off when they spend time with her. It's awful, she was so used, I'm not saying your situation will end the same, but please think of yourself a little.

Wow. That life sounds awful. At 24 you should be having a wonderful life! Taking every opportunity that becomes much harder with age. Returning to your paramedics course, or doing something else, you’ve a lifetime of work ahead and you’re massively affecting your potential by taking on their father’s role. He should be the one working round their school hours. You can be a step-mum and 24 at the same time, their DF is taking huge advance of you.

You may be able to resume your course, or use credits from the years you have already done towards a degree elsewhere

You are being daft. Stop being an unpaid nanny and get a career.

What a silly girl you are.

Those children are not yours, you are crazy to give up your 20s and career prospects for a penis with four children.

Good luck, you will need it!

Please don’t think I don’t want the life I have chosen, I wouldn’t change it.......but you also admit that you regret dropping out of uni and miss the weekends you had in your early 20's. It sounds like you're sacrificing a lot for these kids that you barely even know, let alone should have really have any responsibility for.
I guess they say that love is blind......

OPs girlfriend and the kids father are both exploiting this young woman by using her to fund their kids and take on childcare instead of enjoying life and getting her degree.
Hopefully OP can realise this and choose a better life for herself.

you are far too young for this!! Go and make a life that’s yours , you still have so much opportunity :(

You need to read the OPs contributions at least, not just react to the first post.

It's not a penis!

The kid's father probably didn't have any say in the matter; not sure why you'd drag him into it. For all you know he wants to have the kids more and jumping into this relationship is the way the OP's gf has avoided that.

A much older partner who's got you doing all this? Sorry to say OP, but it sounds like she saw you coming.

This thread makes me really sad and confused. What is a young 24 year old with her whole life ahead of her doing choosing to be a housewife for an (I assume) older man with 4 kids of his own? And without being married first, on top of it. Insanity at its finest.

You wrote that the kids 'DF' is taking advantage of OP.
If he wanted to be less of a deadbeat he would be raising his kids 50/50 along with OPs girlfriend.

Run away! You have a young life to live - you won't get it back to have a proper experience when the children you are caring for grow up. You will massively regret it later, even if the children and their dad are nice, properly behaved and appreciative. This is a huge and unnecessary sacrifice. Huge power imbalance, huge ask of you. You need to go into counselling - you may have been manipulated into this arrangement. Walk away now - live your young life, marry a single person later, create your own family, do not be a walk-on part in somebody else's drama.

No I didn't.

Sorry but your partner has taken your poor childhood experiences and used them to groom you to be the primary caregiver she does not want to be.

You're being played like a fiddle.

Can't people read? The Op has a female partner who is the mother of the children.

OP several posters have missed that your partner is a woman. For info, it doesn't make an ounce of difference. The core point is still the same. You should be focussing on your own aims, not playing house with someone else and their children, putting your career on hold.

You mention your parents weren't very supportive. Is this part of what you're looking for?

Again, you need to read more of the thread before commenting; then you wouldn't have to make incorrect assumptions.

@AthWat I meant to reply to the poster who I quoted, they wrote that. What I said still stands. Both parents are solely responsible for equally parenting their kids. The father is choosing not to bother and OPs girlfriend has palmed off her responsibilities on to a much younger woman.

She is still in her early 20s, not too late to run!

You're trying to make up for the parenting you didn't have by being a good parent to these kids. That's not your responsibility and it will go wrong.
The best way for you to make up to your younger self is to go back to uni and live your life.