Ever since SO and I met, I showed absolutely no interest in SD8 (5 at the time). I had never been married and have no kids. SO was married for 7 years and had her daughter. When we first met and SO and I would hang out whenever possible without SD since BD would take care of SD on Wednesdays which were the visit days. It never came out of me to take SD out with us anywhere. I would try to avoid SD as much as possible.

As our relationship went along I felt like SO would just play dumb and deny everything every time I would catch her in a lie and would say that we see things differently. SO’s typical behavior is to do something that bothers me but not the actual act, just something similar, just to see what she can get away with. Then plays dumb. To me a lie is a lie no matter how you try to distort the facts. Our relationship has that foundation.

 Even though we had that as a foundation we would still talk things through after fights and remain together. She was with me through some rough times but I never let her really know of my financial situation. For all she knew was that I was a business owner, veteran with various college degrees. In her eyes I was a winner, in my eyes, I did not care about what she had accomplished because I never had anyone worth while stick with me in a relationship. A red flag for me was that when we were going out she wanted me to add her to my house and business, I told her no because she did not put into any of this. She was working at the time and going to school, but I was well passed that era in my life (school that is). I eventually closed down that business and started working in a job that I hated with a passion. I decided to move to a different city. I proposed and she said yes. I was going to feel guilty if I did not do this, which I immediately regretted, and have thought about how great life would be if I didn’t get married and have a SD every single day to this day. It took a year for SO and SD to move in with me due to Covid. Through out that year I wanted a divorce and told her twice. It was mostly because she kept on playing dumb with her lies. I told her on the day that I had enough that I didn’t want to continue, she begged me not to divorce her. She lied to my mother about her ending up with nothing, no money or job because she was recently laid off. She said she had no money. I ended up buying her plane ticket along with SD8 to fly to me. Soon after I find out she had a huge pay out from her job. She spent that in about a month. Ever since they moved in the apartment, I have always been broke, no time to study for my certifications because SO wants me to go home and cuddle, feeling resentment towards SD8 cause now my life is limited to what I can do because of her.

I feel like I am living in accordance to another person’s terms, not mine. I was told that we would work together to accomplish our goals and SO is actually working against those goals and setting me back. I sold the house back home and SO wanted to know what I did with that money, she called me selfish for that and I told her I had bought it when she was married with a kid, she stopped asking about that. SO wants me to come home early when I am studying, when this certification I am taking takes full effort on my part, and a lot of hours of study, which I find that SO needs extra attention. I still show SD8 minimal attention and now SO is acting awkward, as if she’s just waiting to find a job so she can leave. At this point I just feel like I am being taken advantage of since SO and SD are now asking me to buy them stuff when this would not happen before. I definitely want out of this, and don’t want to remain married. Taking care of another man’s kid is just not for me. I know SD8 communicates with him on the regular and SO keeps all that child support and acts as if she’s not getting anything. I feel like I am not going anywhere with my life goals being in this situation and just  stuck with another man’s responsibility. SO is the type to be spending money without caring to invest for retirement and all her family is like that. I don’t feel comfortable even investing or saving on my own cause she will want to spend. I don’t feel comfortable sharing any financial goals with her and don’t feel comfortable buy a house together. I see no value in what having a SD brings to the table and do not feel any satisfaction working hard and being broke to support a family that is not originally mine. We have two cars that are mine and were paid off before we met and ofcourse SO wants a new truck and she drives the fancy car since she asked for it, and I didn’t want to argue so I drive the crappy car. Now that we are in a different city I feel like it is way harder to stop being in this relationship since they cant exactly pack up and leave. We are coming up on three months living together and I had enough.

At this point I feel like I am wasting too much time on reading blogs and posts instead of putting my thoughts to actions and letting time pass. I feel like I am missing out on a lot in this new city and life in general by having the SD8 and SO weighing me down. She told me already that she did not want anymore kids cause she felt she was too old, even though that was part of our original plan. I feel like I am so distracted by disliking being a stepfather that I cannot focus on my career.

We are on different levels on a lot of things and I feel like I worked too hard to get to where I am for them just to jump from one relationship to this one and not have anything to offer but more bills. Living in this city and married with a SK and not having that in common with anyone makes me feel like I cannot give them the typical life that they need. Especially since I am not developing any feelings for the kids and feel like they are holding me back.

We have different priorities, like SO wants a house already, I am building up my career. SO wanting a house makes it difficult for me since I have trust issues with SO from the beginning that are not going away.

Right now I am waiting for the opportunity so that we can be at our home town so I can give them the news. Unfortunately my mindset is not changing no matter what I do and I can only imagine how great it would be without having my SO’s extra baggage. SO is very controlling and I have to be careful with what I message my friends and family. I want out, but don’t have a plan yet. Not sure how to bring it up, just want to make sure its somewhere we don’t have to see each other again since she will cry and try to make me stay cause she obviously benefits from this relationship. Being married with a woman with  a kid has downgraded my life in a lot of ways that I just cannot tolerate.