Being a stepmother is NOT easy. Knowing your husband will talk to his ex-wife for the rest of her life or his life or yours (whichever ends first) is NOT easy. Knowing that I have to deal with her is NOT easy. Dealing with my stepson and the fact he is half her is NOT easy. Dealing with him living with us for the summer after just having my own child is REALLY NOT easy. Having to balance being a new mom and all of the emotions and sometimes postpartem depression that brings, loving a little being so much that I feel like I am going to burst, being protective of said little being, having a stepson come to live with us for the summer after only 8 weeks with my baby, returning to the workplace to a job I hate, attending to my stepson and helping him and the rest of the family (down to the dog) navigate this new situation, and trying to even out the guilt my husband feels, etc…is the most difficult task I have ever had.
Being so in tune with everyone around me and being able to not only read their emotions and thoughts, but able to see the big picture, context and how they affect everything in their surroundings drives me fucking insane. (I swear for pure emphasis.) My stepson is just like his mom in the sense he is chalking up to be a highly sensitive person like her. And he is confused. For the love of God no one has explained to him why he is in North Carolina with his mom and his dad is in FL with me. Then throw in the fact he has a new “baby brother” on top of everything that is his brother but is not from his mommy but they share the same daddy and you have one confused little 4-year old. I feel his confusion every single day. And it pains me. As a result, he has turned into a very needy and whiny child. He was like this prior to his parents divorce, or at least trending that way, but this has brought it out more. Despite my empathy and wishing I could help more, I also honestly find myself irritated at his presence. Irritated at his sensitivities and his lack of being able to do for himself like other children his age. i get angry that his neediness is pulling his daddy’s attention away from our little baby who also needs his dad. If I hadn’t had to go back to work, I could fulfill more in my baby boy, but I simply can’t. Dealing with my job and inevitable corporate drama drains me. I can’t come home every night to a husband who sits with his 1st son for an hour to console him leaving me with the baby AND dinner to make AND trying to keep the house up after a full day at work. I simply can’t do it. I’m going to lose my mind. And get angry.
After a lot of extra time spent on his 1st son tonight, my husband (DH for short) informs me that this type of night needs to happen more often because his son really needs him and it will be good for him etc… When I try to ask questions or present more balanced scenarios for consideration such as doing things as a family he retorts that “we” are not family to his son…at least not me (implying that our son, his baby brother is). My suspicion that he had some drawn out discussion with his ex was confirmed by his sudden outburst. So I quit waiting for him to tell me he had talked to her and just asked.
We resolved the discussion after I was able to articulate why I was hurt and irritated, but it left me angry. I’m still angry and have been unable to return any affection at the moment. Despite apologies and a thank you from him to me for explaining why his “presentation” had offended and a promise to work on it, I’m still pissed beyond belief. i haven’t exactly been able to come up with a why other than feeling offended.
The why is this… Stepparents of ANY kind know they are not instantly family to their stepkids. And to be honest, my stepson is not family to me yet. (This aspect seems to always be missing from stepparenting advice givers and the natural parents of the child that has been “stepped”) He is still a rather foreign person to me that is living in my space, my home, my time, my resources and most of all, my relationship building with my baby. Yet despite all of this, I love him and I love his father and I am 100% committed to working toward being a family with him. And then to have the whole he is having a hard time with this and he needs more of his dad’s time and YOU are not his family thrown in my face to tonight…well, it has sent me over some sort of invisible edge. Part of me wants to remind my husband right now at 11:45 at night that if I’m not family, then I should not be expected to continue to share my bedroom (yes, he’s sleeping in our room), my son (genetics do not entitle you to be family), my time (which right now consists of fulfilling most demands of this child), my money, or any other part of me or my resources with his son. After all, I’m not family. THEN WHAT THE HELL AM I? Some sort of hostess with the mostest? Some sort of Betty Crocker, “here let me do that” and “of course I’ll make you your peanut butter and jelly sandwich even though I’m fixing chicken for everyone else” robot?
I digress. I’m simply angrily blithering at this point. More and more anger keeps building up thinking about this and the other thoughts this thought is leading to at the moment. All of a sudden I’m really tired. I hate the ex. I detest her very existence in my life. No, I had no idea what I was signing myself up for even though I married someone with a child. I’m feeling hateful towards my husband right now (yes, I still love him though). But all I want to do right now is go get my sleeping baby out of his crib, drive over to my parents house and curl up with just him in a bed and shut out everyone else. Boiling it down even further though, all I really want to do is let myself cry. Despite promising myself that I would let myself go emotionally when necessary, I still find myself tightly bound, controlled and refusing to give in to the tears that need to be shed. *sigh* I must sleep now.
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