my ss15 is also from the cornfield. we all moved in together about a year ago as i loved my fiance as well. i found that i didn't love him enough and we are going for seperate housing although not 'seperation' i still love him but the child is the same if not worse, it takes a toll on you. sounds like you are already uncomfortable, picture 24/7...need i say more?

She has been the lone female in her house now for 9 years, or seen woman come and go. Why not extend a branch to the 9 year old and go have a girls day with her. Go get nails done or hair done and some lunch. It may take her some time to open up but, again she has been the lone female with her dad and brother.

i think there are some more details needed.

For one thing, i would thank my lucky stars that bm is not in the picture. as you can see by many post, bm is the cause of the majority of un happiness.

From what you have posted though, i agree with libby. unless your fh has had many girlfriends or live in partners, this little girl has had no mother daughter type relationship with any one, and she is not use to sharing her daddy, or home with another female. Maybe she is staring at you because she is scared to connect with you for fear you too will abandoned her.

Hi,
You're in a perfect position to test this relationshio and the family dynamics and see if it works. I laughed out loud at your "Children of the Corn" weird - I'll have to remember that one. Seriously, what do you have to lose? Take the girl on some outings - don't spoil her but spend time with her and listen to your heart - it sounds like you have a good one.
Glynne

that is exactly what my dh says about ss. everytime i brought up weird things, like rudeness to my dad and gf for no reason, going in my BD room when he thought no one was home (ahhh she could have been changing!), sitting at the kitchen table when we are clearly getting ready to sit at the dining room table (while we had company no doubt) and my personal favourite....coming out of his room and staring at me until i looked at him and then only saying whaaaaaaat when i did. it is not shy it is abnormal and passive aggressive. The guilt or whatever parenting excuses there are it is parental denial......tread very carefully, i think if you moved in it will only get worse. if bd doesn't see it now, he may end up taking her side against you after you move in and see more, oh wait that may just be me thinking about the last year of my life.
maybe it will go better for you as she is younger. my ss was too old or too young to give it a chance and still has the bm you even though she dumped him off on bd door step when he was 7 the sun still rises and sets straight out of her backside and if we all had a brain we too would worship the ground she walks on......you have one benefit, she has no bm in the picture to compare you to, because of that you may have a fighting chance.

After being a step parent for five years to a boy now 13 and girl now 10, I can tell you that you are the 'intruder' in your partners kids life, so you will need to accept that he will probably always put them first, side with them, defend them, even if they are wrong.

Like Crayon spoke of her step kids as 'children of the corn' (I use this term myself LOL), both my SD and SS are 'weird' (mostly thanks to the bio mother's weirdness, and my experience with that is that they won't change. If anyting they just get weirder as they get older.

And as Libby said, the girl as been the only female in the house for 9 years. She will be used to manipulating her father and calling the shots. In her mind, who are you to come along and try to take no. 1 spot.

I love my husband like crazy, but if I had a crystal ball and knew that never ending challenges of step parenting, maybe I would have run away fast.

None of this probably helps you, but it may show you that what you are experiencing is very common. Best of luck.

A Step parent is in a no win role

his daughter will never leave. and if she is acting "weird' that wont stop either. stay far far away from this man and his daughter---i wish i had taken my own advice.

when i read the comment "children of the corn"! I'm not exactly a SP yet myself but i do live with my BF. His 2 older girls 10 and 7 come stay for the summer and holidays. They arent bad kids really...but they plot things. The older one is the silent instigator she whispers stuff she wishes she could say to the younger one and then she blurts it out. But in their defense...my BF was with his ex (not their BM) for 5 yrs and only broke up bout a yr ago...and didnt move to thier own apts til this past october. so i am a whole new ball game. He also has a 3 yr old with her and let me say the BM is a psycho. Sad part is he admits that but as another writer wrote "the sun still rises and sets out the crack of her backside" or something like that lol...anyways right now the manipulation of the 10yr old is really bad. She acts like the perfect princess and puts the 7yro up to the dirty work. The 7yro never had a problem with me and would follow me everywhere and always hug me and now thanks to the older one she hates me. She always crys if BD comes near me and says that he loves me more than her and all that crap. Up until early july when i sold my home...she actually thought i was just their nanny!!! His kids arent the brightest crayons. But the 3yro is strait outta the corn field along with her BM. The woman cuts her arms and stuff like that. She has has countless BF since i met BD. She spent months tryin to dig up stuff about me via internet, drives by the house, has her current man text BD, and always makes it a huge issue when he gets the kid. So of course the kid wont even acknowledge me. if i try to talk to her she either just stares or turns her head away. Any tiime she is told "NO" by anyone she throws a tantrum and BD says oh shes only 3 and this is all new to her. UMM no its called yer a disney land dad...He even says that the house rules dont apply to her cuz she doesnt live here. one morning she wanted a pop tart and he was pouring cereal so she flung it off the table. He yelled at her and sent her to the living room and proceeded to clean it up himself and then give her a poptart. not to mention this all happened infront of the other kids. and every time she is here all she does is watch the scooby doo movie. over and over and over. i have resorted to hiding it. and not buying poptarts. I have tried to interact with her and it just doesnt work and god forbid i say anything about capt. crazy (BM) I am told its none of my business. my 12yro lives here as well and has behavioral issues so strict rules and stability are a must and his older 2 kids come from a home where there BM is basically worthless and they see her beaten by her BF and there is 8 kids and 2 adults in a 2bdrm apt there. They are dirty when the do come so we keep all the stuff we buy for them here. and they have to be the most ungrateful kids. they are like seek and destroy. you cant leave them alone for a second because they take things apart and break everything. they have even come into our bdrm and gone thru our things and taken stuff. i know all this stems from how they are raised at their BM house but by the time we break them of bad habits its time to send em back. im only hoping that by next summer things here will be more stable as we will have a bigger place and it will be both of ours not just his. but as for the 3yr old i hide in the bdrm when she is here or i leave. because the lack of discapline and how badly he babies her makes me sick and i just wanna slap him when he does it. my only saving grace is that bm pulls her capt crazy stuff alot so we dont have her much. BD is upset with me as we speak becuz i refused to go with him and the 3 hoodlums to his parents for the weekend ...hell no! i need a break! But hang in there follow yer heart and pray that thier 18th bdays come fast!

I believe the 9 year old daughter has some mental and emotional issues. I actually do believe that she is "shy". But I think she could be shy to the point of paralyzation brought on by insecurity, or stress. Don't forget this girl was abandoned by her own mom - "right after she was born", as you wrote it. So her brother had her mom for 3 years and then she comes into the picture and is dumped by her mom on her dad, never to be seen again. What a horrible head f*ck.

Your fiancee may just think this girl is shy, but he would be doing her a world of favor if he would get her into some counseling. Grief counseling and/ or abandonment counseling.

SD over here was intensely shy and over sensitive. As she is going through her counseling and I am reading more and more, I am finding that severe shyness and oversensitivity can be symptoms of neglect.

Now, DH over here is a wonderful father, and SD adores him. He has been very attentive to her needs and even, when she was younger, arranged his work schedule so that he could always pick her up from school etc. He has always been there for her and she tells everyone - counselors, etc. the same. She is very very close to him and dependent on him. She is also very clingy on him at times, but is getting better as she is getting older.

SD's issue here is with her mom as well, and her feelings of "mom was never there for me", "mom won't take care of me".

At first, I thought that since she had 1 good parent (her dad) that abandonment etc wouldn't be a problem. I couldn't understand how, if she had all of the love of one parent, she could still have neglect issues. But the way the counselor described it to me, is that you can be neglected and still live with a parent. So all of those years SD lived with her mom - from baby - 9, and then 50/50 after she was 10 or so, until she finally came to live with us full time.... while she was with her mom she was going through neglect.

I don't necessarily think you should "run". But I do sincerely hope that you can talk to your fiancee and get this girl some help immediately. And if he doesn't agree, please don't back down.

Also, don't move in with him, unless you want to be in this for the long haul. I think that that poor little girl needs some stability and you need to be ready to deal with that. I moved in with DH after we had been together for a year. A year later SD asked to be with us 50/50. DH and I both regret to this day not taking her in immediately and keeping her and raising her full time.

Counseling has helped this girl more than I can tell you. It's another regret that we did not start it sooner. I wonder how much better off she'd be right now if we'd had just taken her away from her mom sooner and got her help sooner.

I think if you truly KNOW this man, and he will be supportive of efforts to get his little girl help, you should continue in this relationship. Please read some of my past blogs, I'm hoping they could help you.

Best wishes... please talk to your fiancee about this and let us know how it turns out.