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Newbie saying hello & asking for advice :-)

nodiggity's picture

Submitted by nodiggity on Wed, 01/14/2015 - 12:29pm

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Bio Child Free Zone

Hello to all;
I'm new to the forum and new to being a SM. I have 2 SSs, ages 5 & 6. I feel blessed that we have a very good relationship & that DH & I have similar parenting styles.(Also I have no bio children) BM is slightly out of the picture, (DH has full custody) she is pretty much homeless with her new SO & new born baby, & rarely contacts the children.

So that's a little about me, I just wanted to stop by and say hi! & also maybe start by asking how to help the SS's deal with the hurt of their BM not contacting them? Also with them being so young its hard for them to understand...& when BM does decide to come around it's like they forget that she hasn't called/seen/contacted them in over a month. How do I deal with this & any feedback on how to help SS's cope?

Thank you in advance Smile

nodiggity's picture

Submitted by nodiggity on Wed, 01/14/2015 - 1:53pm

I definitely understand where you're coming from sueu2. I stay positive with them and always treat her with respect for being their mom, and I would never push my feelings on the children and am excited for/with them when they are excited that she has called. She is a habitual lier (not just in my opinion, but that of her own family aswell) & she tells the children she will call or come around and then doesn't, my main point is its just heart breaking to see them being hurt.

nodiggity's picture

Submitted by nodiggity on Wed, 01/14/2015 - 2:06pm

I honestly don't ever see her trying to retain custody. She is 27 years old, has never had a job or license and lies uncontrollably. Maybe if she ever decides to get her life together we'll see. But she couldn't even manage a 4hr required parenting class to maintain custody in the first place. Even with having full custody, we tell her that we want her in the boy's life. I even (thought) I had a genuine, respectful heart-to-heart with her basically begging her to come around more and still she chooses her new SO over her children.

The new baby situation is a whole other matter, and I'm not quite sure how she has been able to keep it. Basically her lying and telling dhs that she's living with her mother which she isn't...other then that I really don't know. She told the children that she wanted them to be at the hospital when the baby was born and now 2 weeks later her mother told us they received a card for BM at their address, from the hospital stating "congratulations & welcome baby Daniella" (which means shes already had the baby & went home) No one has seen or heard from her since.

Rags's picture

Submitted by Rags on Wed, 01/14/2015 - 3:42pm

I suggest that you raise your SS's as your own and be the parent to them that you feel they need and that you and your DH agree for you to be.

As an equity partner to your DH and as he is your equity life partner the marriage has to come first. As his equity life partner you are also, or at least you should be IMHO, an equity parent to any children in your home regardless of the biology involved.

When BM decides to show up you just have to be a safe and supportive mom to your boys as they deal with the emotion and drama that BM will invariably bring. As they get older keep them informed of the facts of their blended family situation and the facts of their BM's life and behaviors. Kids need the facts in an age appropriate manner so that they can be informed and can deal with the drama that the toxic side of their blended family may try to inject into their lives.

In our case my bride was the CP to our son (my SS). We met when he was 15mos old and married the week before he turned 2yo. We never lived nearer than 1200 miles to Sperm Land so his relationship with his Sperm Idiot was on a long distance visitation schedule (5wks summer, 1wk winter, 1wk spring). His Sperm Clan was extremely toxic from the day of his birth as his Sperm Idiot could not keep his pecker in his pants with underage teen girls. Sperm GrandHag is the controlling type. The combination of a serial statutory rapist and his enabling toxic manipulative controlling mother put my then 16 & pregnant single teen mom bride in a position of having to constantly protect her son from the shallow and polluted end of his gene pool. So, that is what she did for the entire 17+ years of the CO. SS is now 22 and doing extremely well. He has little to do with his SPerm Clan and as far as he is concerned he only has one REAL dad and that is me. He refers to the Sperm Idiot as Gangster Dad. SS has little to do with the Sperm Clan though he does keep in touch with the three younger also out of wedlock Sperm Idiot spawned half sibs (18,15,14)by two other baby mamas.

Like you, my wife and I made it a point not to badmouth the Sperm Idiot or Sperm Clan to my son. Neither did we allow the facts of their behaviors and lives to be a secret from him. We kept him informed of the facts in an age appropriate manner as SS grew up. If they chose not to take a visitation because they could not afford the plane tickets we explained the situation to him. If they went on a rant about his mom or I we gave the kid the facts. As he grew up we took him on a tour of the Custody/Visitation/Support drawers in our home office file cabinets as the Sperm Clan played their toxic games with him. Eventually he would do his own research when they would spout some crap that made no sense to him. In his teens he sat down with his mom and I on several occasions to lament about their crap and to work through why they found it necessary to lie to him and try to manipulate him and us. I also made a promise to him that I would not prevent him from having a relationship with that side of his family and his mom and I even paid for visitation travel a few times over the years when they could not afford the airfare. I did not like facilitating exposing him to their toxic crap but a promise is a promise so I made sure that he could see them as the CO stipulated. Particularly when they had failed to take several visitations in a row.

Your boys will need you to be the constant mom in their lives since it is highly unlikely that their BM will be much of a presence or bring much of value to their lives.

Give em hugs, read them bedtime stories, set rules, consistently enforce them, and do not let BM inject any more toxicity into the lives of your sons or your family than you absolutely have to and make sure that any toxicity she does bring causes her more pain than it does you and your sons.

IMHO of course.

Good luck.