love your step kid like your own? adoption?
I've never wanted kids, but now I'm starting to think that I may want to adopt a child. I have not discussed it with my husband b/c I need to sort through if it's really what I want to do before discussing it with him. Even if I do decide that it is what I want to do, I would want to wait about 4-5 yrs before adopting.
My problem lies in the fact that I do not love my step kid. I actually feel like a prisoner in my own home because he lives with us. I look at him and I see nothing but the flesh and blood of someone whom I have not even an once of respect for, his mom. He doesn't physically resemble his mother in even the slightest way, but the fact that I know he is hers and that because of him she is in my life causes me to see him as her. She has serious mental issues (diagnosed borderline schizophrenic and has behaved in violent manners in the past) and I have a very strong fear that her son will one day display some of the same illness even though he has not yet. She has been nothing but hateful to me even when I've reached out to invite her into my home and to events involving her son. She's made up all kinds of crazy stories about me. She even said that I broke into her home while her and my husband were still married and living together. I didn't even know my husband at that time and my criminal background is 100% clean. I wish she had filed a police report so that my name would be clear of whatever happened in her crazy little mind .
I'm not 100% sure if I really want a kid of my own (adopted) for the right reasons or if it's partially b/c I'm being forced to care for her child and I feel that I should have the right to my own child. If I do adopt I don't want to know the biological parents if they are not of good character. I must be able to love the child 100%, meaning I don't need to see parents in the child as I do w/my step kid. If my step kid were the child of one of my husbands ex-girlfriends I feel that I could love him. My husbands ex-girlfriends that I have met have been wonderful individuals, but his ex-wife is a whole different story.
Literally 98% of the fights between my husband and I revolve around something involving his child. I know I probably need serious counseling regarding this, but how do you find a counselor w/o the views of marriage = birth kids automatically? I don't want to birth a child of my own. If I do have a kid I want to adopt, but I feel wrong saying that when I can't love the kid that's already in my house.
Please don't attack me for posting this. I'm not rushing into anything. I just need advice and need to vent. How many of you can honestly say that you love your step kids as much as you love your birth kids or adopted/chosen kids (only answer if you have a terrible birth mom involved)? I know a few of you can, but is it common?
I don't love my skids as
I don't love my skids as much as I love my own. I DO however choose to treat them exactly the same as I treat my own. I cuddle them when I would cuddle mine. I give them all the same things I give mine. I hold them all to the same standards, and punish them all for the same things, even if it means hurting a birth childs feelings in order to take care of a step child. I hate BM, but only because of what she put these kids I care about through, and continues to put them through. If anything she makes me like skids more lol. I am not sure if its common or not. I can only tell you how I feel.
I would try to make things
I would try to make things fair between the two kids if I did adopt, but I know I can't love the spawn of psycho woman.
Thanks stepping. I wouldn't
Thanks stepping. I wouldn't have even thought of them idolizing the parent they had never met.
I love SS8 like he is my
I love SS8 like he is my own.
SS10 not so much.
I would never suggest to SS8 that I adopt him because he is already screwed up enough from BM.
So I suffer silently because I can't have kids with DH.
Shall see how long the silence lasts.
"Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves." ~ Abraham Lincoln
If you think you dispise
If you think you dispise your ss because of his mother do you think the poor child had a choice in the matter? Did you choose your parents?
I don't think you are near ready to adopt a child. Children do not come with guarantees. You can throw as much money and resources at a child and they still screw up. And their brother/sister may be a diligent as the day is long and make a B average. And then their other sibling can sit in class asleep and still ace tests and exams.
I think you need to really think about why this child is such a reminder to you of his mother. Is this misplaced anger at your DH for having sex with his wife? And this child is a constant reminder?
I don't love my stepsons like my own kids because I married their father when they were 11 and 13. You miss so much of those early years.
If I were you I would make it my mission to help raise this child despite his mother and make him a wondeful well-rounded young man. That would be the biggest reward.
Condemning the child because of something totally out of his control is silly. Remember, he didn't choose his mother but you chose your husband. He didn't make his mother a nutcase. He is a complete innocent in all of this.
I wonder how young you are that you can accept a hypothetical child from a 'nice ex girlfriend' but not a real live child whose mother is just nasty and mean to you? Why did you even marry your husband knowing he has a child with this frame of mind?
And more importantly, how does your husband feel about adoption?
I married my husband because
I married my husband because I love him enough to want him to be my life partner. That's why you should marry, right?
The Skid is half of the man
The Skid is half of the man you love and married. Rather than focusing on the half that you detest, focus on the half that you love.
Skid behavior aside, loving them is a choice. Choose to love the Skid and guess what ...... you will love the Skid. Stephen Covey (The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People) offers advice in his book that helped me lock in the incredible love I feel for my life and has in large part resulted in our amazing marriage lasting the nearly 17yrs we have enjoyed so far. During a break from one of his guest speaking engagements Covey was approached by a man attending the seminar who told Covey "I do not love my wife". Covey responded "Then love your wife". Covey proceeded to explain that Love is not a noun, it is a verb. It is an action. To grow the feelings of love you have to perform the actions of love.
At the time I read 7 Habits I was questioning my decision to remarry. My wife and I had been married about two years and I was approaching the 2.5 years that my first marriage lasted. We were still learning how to be married, my career was stressful, she was in college, I had just started Grad school and life was pretty much a stressful shit storm. When I read the section of 7 Habits I described above I realized that my feelings were not about my wife they were about me. I was letting life dampen my love for this amazing young woman who trusted her heart and her son to me.
That was my wake up call. For the me the actions of love started off as simple little things. Changing my many work related passwords and accounts to some version of her name. Every time I log in to a computer or software application I think of her because I type her name or a password that is a reminder of some amazing thing we have done together. When I pull out a new DayTimer I flip through and wright "Random Flowers" throughout the month. I send those flowers to her work where she can see others enjoying my love and appreciation for her. I have pictures of her and our Son in frames on my desk and pinned to the bulletin board in my office. We e-mail or text naughty little messages to each other periodically throughout the day/week.
Similar but Skid appropriate things helped me perform the actions of love which reminded me how I fell as much in love with being this little 15mo old tow headed little boys Dad as I did with his amazing mother. I coached his little league teams, umped his league and games, coached his soccer team, his swim team and involved him in doing things for our home and for his Mom.
Though there have been plenty of times I have wanted to strangle him (what parent does not want to whack the crap out or their kid every once in a while?) I have no regrets about being his Dad and he is a young man and a Son that I am very proud of. He is now 17yo and will graduate from HS in ~11wks (maybe) and has many life decisions and challenges ahead of him. But, his Mom and I have raised him to be a fine young man and I am confident that he will eventually develop to be a viable self sufficient adult.
So ........ don't dwell on not loving your SKids and start loving them. Remember that their father is the father of your children and that he is as much their father as he is the father of your kids. Before they come next EOWE visit call and ask them what they want for dinner one night and for desert and tell them that they will help you make those things. Have fun while you cook and bake together. Take them paddling a canoe at a local park, go to Starbucks and get a double decaf half carafe with extra whip and a double shot of espresso, sit out front in the sun and just talk for a while.
Just my thoughts and my actions of course.
It worked for me and has given me 16yrs with an amazing woman and an incredible young man.
Good luck and best regards,
Success is rarely final. Failure is rarely fatal. It is character, courage and consistency of effort that count. Vince Lombardi (with some minor Rags modifications) To each according to their performance, screw Karl Marx. (Rags)