Step Children advice Desperately needed
I am a new step mom of 3+ years. I have two step children who are now 15 and 12. I met them after I started dating my current husband. He asked them how they like me, they said I was fun. Then we sat them down a couple mos later and told them we were getting married. Radio silence. I met the ex several times at sporting events of the kids and after she met me the whole atmosphere changed, I am 12 years younger than my husband. She started telling the kids that I should be their sister not their step-mom. When my husband and I got married, they did NOT accept me in any way and things continued to get worse. He had every other weekend visitation, so they would come stay with us. They started making it so uncomfortable that I felt like a stranger in my own home. I would walk into a room, they would walk out. I would try to start a conversation and they would pretend I wasn't speaking to them. They would talk about me to my husband (in front of me!)and tell him things like I was the spawn of satan and not their family and that their mom said they didn't have to be nice to me. It became so stressful that both of us would do nothing but fight the whole week before they came over. They told him they didn't want to see him anymore unless I wasn't there so I needed to go away the weekends they were there. My husband stood his ground and told them that we were a family now, that they had two separate families and I was his wife now and their step mom and they needed to show me respect. They refused. We tried everything from telling them they had the option to come over and didn't have to if they didn't want to, we tried just offering to take them for the day so they didn't have to spend the night, we tried just my husband taking them out for dinner, they wanted nothing unless I was completely out of the picture. So my husband told them until they decided to grow up and accept me as part of the family, they were not welcome in our home, but that if they ever changed their minds, our door was always open to them. My husband has talked to them several times a week on the phone and they all text regularly, but we haven't seen them now for 2 1/2 years. Life has become stress free & we are so in love & happy. I am 8 mos pregnant and we told them on Father's Day that we were expecting a baby. The response was that they wanted to start seeing us again now. I am afraid to let them back into our lives when they wreaked so much havoc and tried to get us to divorce the first time. I don't mean to be mean, but I want NOTHING to do with them. I had hoped they would contact us after they had grown up and were 18 and no longer manipulated by the vindictive and jealous ex. Their actions hurt me in so many ways. And now that Mark and I moved on and are starting a new family I feel like they are only wanting to get back in to ensure they remain the center of attention. but I will NOT let them treat our child like they treated me. Please help! I want to be a supportive wife to the man I love with all my heart, but I don't think I can emotionally deal with the stress, anger and hurt that I have towards those two brats.
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Comments
I think that you could look
I think that you could look at it as a series of steps and stages, so that you can all get to know each other again and you can rebuild your trust in them and relaunch your relationship. Just because they want to come over doesn't mean that they get to come and stay all weekend right away. Take it in stages. Let your husband meet up with them outside of the house, they can do that for a month or so and see how it goes. If all is well, then maybe you can join them once and see how the treat you. If that goes well then maybe you could join them in their visitations outside of the home once or twice a month (and with your baby when he/she arrives). If they seem like caring siblings and are respectful towards you then maybe after a few months you could invite them over to your house for lunch or something. See how that goes with them coming over once a month for a few more months then if that goes well in about 6 months or so perhaps you might start to feel comfortable enough to have them stay the night. I would let your husband know that you are happy for him that his kids are reaching out again, but that you need time to build a relationship with them and to regain your trust. Then take things slowly, don't let your husband skip ahead in the stages, be firm, take each step one at a time and assess how the children behave. Only move on if they are respectful and kind. If they aren't, move back a step. If things aren't going well but you all want to build a relationship then as tog suggested some sort of therapy might help move beyond past behaviors.
^this^ is great advice!
^this^ is great advice!
What was your husband's
What was your husband's response to his children saying they wanted to start seeing you both again? If he is overjoyed at the prospect of reconciliation and keen to have them in your home again then the danger is that despite your good reasons for wanting him to keep his relationship with them separate, you will end up looking like the bad guy if you refuse to have them visit.
In my experience the flashpoint in this situation is potential defensiveness from DH if you tell him that his children are not welcome in your home. My youngest stepchild, SS17 hasn't set foot in our house for 3 years because he refuses to have a relationship with me and is harbouring a personal grudge. Like you I have gone through a lot of stress, anger and hurt over the situation, and cannot conceive of his just being allowed to walk back in as thought nothing had happened. But I know that DH's defensiveness over his children is such that he would welcome SS over the threshold in a heartbeat if SS said he wanted to come. So we have had many difficult conversations about the situation is order for him to understand and respect my feelings.
On a positive note, it's highly likely that your stepchildren's interest in your baby will be short-lived and if you let them visit a couple of times, whilst encouraging DH to focus on seeing them outside your home, things will run their course. They're at ages when a lot of step children lose interest in spending time in the non custodial home, so it's unlikely that they're going to start staying over or even visiting on a regular schedule at this point. It just depends if you can face seeing them at all at this point.
^^^^^ I agree with this. And
^^^^^ I agree with this. And yes, stop the "we". You have not been parenting these kids so we does not work. He needs to do his job as dad.
Sorry the BM was such a jealous one.
^^^^^ yup. Agree to this as
^^^^^ yup. Agree to this as well.
Discipline isn't necessarily
Discipline isn't necessarily physical. No one is going to jail over grounding a step kid or taking something away from them like a tablet or phone (or my stepkids' step father would be rotting in prison somewhere). If you hear the word "discipline " and automatically think of beating a kid's ass, then you might have issues. Just sayin...
I'm pretty sure the poster who made this comment meant a step parent should be able to dole out a non-physical consequence for shitty behavior in the event that bio parent won't or cannot. I really doubt she meant to start beating on anyone. Please. Not sure even Evel Knievel could have made that jump.
I'm confused, what would you
I'm confused, what would you suggest they do?
This! I totally agree. If a
This! I totally agree. If a CO is in place, it should have been enforced. Kids don't get to decide. If they don't want to be with dad, only a judge can change that.
I would hope that your DH
I would hope that your DH would put some conditions on their attempt to reunify. Such as apologies to both you and your DH along with serious discussions (perhaps written) on why what they did was wrong, why they felt the need to do that and what they have learned since then.
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