How I survived and how I'm still surviving
Reading about Crayon's dilemma brought up some painful memories of my early days as a stepmom. This may seem counterintuitive, and it may not work for everyone, but here is the NUMBER ONE thing that has helped my situation more than any other thing.
I TOOK CHARGE.
I took charge of everything. The kids, interaction with BM, picking up and dropping off sd, ALL OF IT. I jumped in with both feet, fought my way through the objections (and there were LOTS of them, as you can imagine), and refused to give up the control over my own life that I deserve as a grown woman. I never let anyone tell me that it wasn't my business, wasn't my concern, and wasn't my place. The way I saw it (and see it), its all my business. Every last single part of it. It all affected me, and I wasn't about to take a back seat any more.
In short, it was take charge, or get a divorce.
It saved my marriage, it bettered my relationship with my sd, and in the process, bm and I came to an understanding and now things are pretty smooth for the most part.
But this only worked because I had my heart in the right place. From the outset, my goals were to have a better relationship with my husband, skid, and bio children and to have a happy family. I didn't want to dread my weekends and I didn't want anyone else to dread them either. I recognized that I was more critical of my sd than my other children, and always tried to keep that in perspective. I trained myself to start thinking differently and meeting challenges in more productive ways.
I don't have a perfect situation, but its pretty good at this point. Drama is kept to a minimum. We still have our issues, and there are still times that we butt heads as parents and with bm. But my sd is a happy kid, happy with her situation, and we are pretty much all one big happy family.
It about killed me. But it was worth it!!!!!!!!!!
wow!
good for u! im happy to see you took this approach and even happier to see that its been successful for u! congrats!
"Given the right reasons and the right two people, marriage is a wonderful way of experiencing your life."
~the late great George Carlin
Awesome!
Can you tell me how to do this with a crazed BM that is unwilling to cooperate? Was the BM you dealt with a total nut job? I'd love to feel great about my weeks when the skids are here. I'd love to have peace in the house with minimal tension!
No kidding
My fiance got told I could not meet the babies because I "need to learn my place."
To every thing there is a season.
I have to humbly disagree...
at least in my situation.
I 'took charge' as well and it ended in disaster. I went toe to toe with BM and was losing the fight. Mainly because she doesn't fight fair and I wasn't willing to do the same.
I thought that because DH and BM couldn't communicate properly, I would do it for them; I thought that because the two of them could never agree on financial matters, I would handle that as well.
I had not a clue that BM would not only not cooperate but would do everything she possibly could to keep the animosity in our lives. If I suggested anything, she said no - no matter what. When she didn't get her way, she withheld visitation and my husband's heart would break.
She was a nightmare. I was miserable, DH was miserable, the kids were miserable. We were all fighting and arguing all the time.
When I threw in the towel and insisted that DH handle her 100%. All the turmoil ended. She appreciates my absence as much as I love that I can count on one hand how many times I've seen her in the past year.
No one can tame my beast of a BM. I tried and failed. She's a sociopath and is void of all human decency. DH can skillfully appease her to the point of agreement and it's his burden now. He married and bore three children with the woman...he should have to be the one who figures it out.
"For every ailment under the sun....There is a remedy, or there is none;
If there be one, try to find it; If there be none, never mind it." ~ W.W. Bartley
i agree CG to an extent
i think it really, sadly, just depends on the BM. when i tried to do the above for seriously one hot minute, she responded much the way yours did. mine will probably never be at the place where she and i can safely be in the same room, let alone deal have her deal w me...she cant stand that i breathe for heaven's sake!
"Given the right reasons and the right two people, marriage is a wonderful way of experiencing your life."
~the late great George Carlin
For me, what worked was refusing to engage altogether.
I didn't fight to the death, but I didn't give in, either. I just refused to engage. I didn't marry her, I didn't impregnate her and I didn't divorce her. I leave dealings with her to the guy who did!
Once I stopped trying to defend myself to her, she stopped taking pot shots at me. Not right away, but eventually. We get along fine these days.
♥ ANNE 8102 ♥
Think it's like anything else in life
Not a BM thing for me (cause that's still new), but I continue to approach that the same way I do other things in my life. My father and I had an awful relationship when I was in my 20's. After sometime, I figured out he just liked to argue about everything and I just stopped participating. I just had to walk away, or "take charge" of the way he affected me and the way I reacted to him. I used to think that was giving up or letting someone get the better of me. Now, I realize it doesn't matter. I could argue til I was out of breath, but I was never going to change his mind on any subject. It didn't change our relationship overnight, but taking charge of the conversations and interaction we have saved me a lot of greif. Every since then, I just live my life with that in mind.
I'm so glad that what you're doing is working for you!
"I've never been a millionaire but I just know I'd be darling at it." Dorothy Parker US author, humorist, poet, & wit (1893 - 1967)
In my case, I'm dealing with
In my case, I'm dealing with a bm that was pretty tiresome, but at the end of the day, she wanted her every other weekend free for her own life. She never tried to withhold visitation or anything like that, thank goodness. In my case, I didn't take over all in one day. It was a subtle progression. I started small. I don't even remember but it was something like sending her an email and asking her to confirm details for something with me. She even told me then that she preferred to keep that between her and my dh. I made it clear (kindly) that sometimes it was going to be necessary for us to communicate directly, and that hopefully we could do that maturely and responsibly and keep sd's best interests at heart. It went from that one time to a little more and a little more until basically we do all the communicating. If it were a serious matter concerning child support or something, then I would definitely let dh handle it, but at this point both dh and bm know that I am not going to be taken advantage of and that I will be an equal partner in decision making (at least on dh's side).
Trust me, I didn't turn the world upside down in one day! But from one small victory to another, I stopped letting others control the things in my life that were causing me so much misery.
I know that this wouldn't work in every situation. I know that some people are dealing with truly crazy bm's and that there is little hope of anythign working. But workign with the bm is only a small part of the equation. There is so much that goes on in our own homes between our spouses and our skids that cause us unhappiness...that really have little to do with the bm in reality.
I am a huge advocate for stepparents to reclaim their sanity by getting control of their own homes. So many of us (I have done it plenty) let our spouses and/or our skids take advantage. That is something we all have some power over.
So even if your bm is a crazy psycho, there is always hope for the rest of your situation. Bm's can't control everything (although I know they try sometimes).
Me too crayon
It's just too much stress for me to try to help DH with SD. He knows that he needs help but when I try I am "picking on SD" in his eyes. He can't get past the love, love, love part to get to the discipline, boundries and limitations side and pointing that out to him makes him defensive and sensitive to everything.
I figure I made my mistakes, he will have to make his. As far as BM goes, he can deal with her 100% unless she crosses my line in the sand, if she does, all bets are off. Basically DH will have to take care of his own responsibilities and reap what he sows.
~Evil
If you want children to keep their feet on the ground, put some responsibility on their shoulders. ~Abigail Van Buren
My DH was uber sensitive
My DH was uber sensitive about sd for the longest time. He had that same issue with not being able to see the difference between discipline and picking on sd. We went round and round on this for years (and still do a little bit of it here and there). I think what helped the most was after we had our children together, and he got a healthy dose of REALITY when it comes to kids. I think he realized that sd didn't have enough boundaries and that it didn't work to have different expectations for the kids.
For me, it was more stressful to be left out of things where sd was concerned. Disengaging felt impossible when I had my own kids and they were relatively close in age to sd. I realized that taking charge of the situation was the only thing that gave me any peace of mind...
And as a pp poster said, it was 'his way or the highway' when it came to sd. I simply got to the point where I was going to take the highway. I told him I wanted a divorce, and I told him exactly why. Next thing I knew we were in marriage counseling and we started sorting it all out a piece at a time.
Now, my situation isn't with out its stress, but its about 95% better than it used to be!! Some of that was making some mental shifting of my own, but some of it was his adjustment, too. All in all, that marriage counselor saved our marriage, no question about it.
And here I am replying to my
And here I am replying to my own post!
I thought it might be useful to share one thing I learned in counseling. I had a huge problem with my dh getting upset with me whenever the subject of sd's behavior or discipline issues came up. What came out in counseling is that my tendency was to focus on the negative with sd. So the counselor had me talk for a few minutes about what I liked about my sd. It kind of took me off guard and I was ashamed that I had to really think about it. It became apparent to me that I did focus too much on her negatives and couldn't easily talk about her positives. Bio parents are typically good at being able to talk about their kids positives and negatives...with positives being a much preferred subject. For me, the negatives was a much preferred subject. That was very eye opening. So the counselor challenged me to start talking about my sd in a positive way...to my dh, to myself, to my friends, etc...just like I would my own kids. Once I started doing that, it was like a shift started taking place on its own. THe more I did it, the more my dh loosened up and didn't feel like i was picking on his daughter. The more I did it, the more I found that I liked about my sd. Now, we can typically have a negative conversation about sd without there being some heat. Not 100% of the time, but most of the time. And I think I gave my dh the tools to do that by not being so focused on the bad stuff all the time and helping him realize that I do like his daughter and do want her around. That was completely necessary, though, in getting him to loosen up.
that is great advice
i can see where that would work...maybe i will try it...sad thing is w the way BM is raising her, i cant really think of anything i like about her except that she is FHs kid. and even that i struggle w.
"Given the right reasons and the right two people, marriage is a wonderful way of experiencing your life."
~the late great George Carlin
See, that was my problem
See, that was my problem too. I had spent so much energy focusing on what I didn't like about her. When the therapist asked me to talk about what I like about her, I was struck silent. I am not someone who can give phony compliments, and I had to admit that I didn't really like my sd much. Which I have no doubt was obvious to my dh. Of course he was going to be sensitive to whatever I had to say about her. So it all started making sense at that moment.
I had to really change my thinking and start looking at my sd in a different way. I had to let go of some bad habits of mine to nit pick her and let her be "her" if that makes any sense. It didn't take too long before I could find some things I liked about her, which improved my interaction with her, which in turn improved her interaction with me and then I found more things I liked about her.
For my dh, it was as simple as relating a cute story about what she had said at lunch or showing him the cute pictures I had taken of her. Or it was as simple as saying something about what great manners sd had at the store that day. Just any little thing.
So I agree, it needs to be sincere, and you'll need to start looking and cultivating a situation where you can feel positive about something. There are things about my sd that drive me NUTS that I know are a product of her being raised by bm. I just remind myself as hard as I can that she can't help it, and that its up to me to give sd some balance in life and help her be normal someday.
Good luck!
I've run the gamut on this issue
I have tried it all with the exception of moving out. I have found more peace by allowing DH to raise his kid the way he sees fit. This too has it's stresses and I disagree with what he does A LOT, sometimes I will weigh in an opinion but I try to detach myself from the outcome. I think my DH saw my "taking over" as an attempt to change him into someone else and he resisted, I can't blame him.
I am glad you have found the right thing for you and your DH. Keep up the good work!
~Evil
If you want children to keep their feet on the ground, put some responsibility on their shoulders. ~Abigail Van Buren
whatever!!
wait...letz see... life saving medicine is the same as fritos and m&m's ....duh'!!
"Better a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without one."