Read the first sentence and all I can say is .......lol. And fuck no.

I read the first sentence and immediately thought "no" but to be fair I read the rest.

Hell no.

Run. Your life will be a living hell otherwise.

I was already 41 when I married my DH and took on his three kids and their BM. It's killing me NOW. No way in hell was I up to that at 24.

You are already getting a taste of "the life" and you aren't even married yet. For me, the scariest thing you wrote is this: "the BM lives down the road from us..." Our BM lives 4 miles away, and I can tell you that anything within 100 miles is problematic.

There are so many guys in your age group who aren't packing this kind of baggage. I beg of you not to marry this man.

Any man who loves YOU would want YOU to fulfill your dreams and be the best person YOU can be. This would include finishing college. But your SO wants a housekeeper, cook, nanny, and bed mate.

You have a life ahead of you without all this nonsense. Go be the strong, happy, healthy woman you know you are. Isn't that why you are questioning what the hell you're doing?

I have a daughter about your age. I would tell her to learn from the experience and run as fast as she can.

"I know the problem is my schedule is overloaded..."
***********************

NO! That certainly is NOT THE problem and actually its not YOU who has a problem, that would be your partner. Stop looking at what you arent able to do (as your schedule sounds ridiculously overloaded with responsibilities that are not yours) and start looking at what your partner should be doing and actually isnt.

He should be insisting his ex take on more of the responsibility for their children. They chose to have them and therefore by feeling you have no choice but to do x, y and z for the skids because their parents are lazy twats, you are sadly enabling these parents in abdicating their parental roles which in turn will hurt their children and causes your OH to utterly and completely inappropriately resent you when you fail to fulfil your sm role to perfection in his deluded head. Your bf needs to realise the skids have a mother, his ex, and if she fails to assist with their children then he doesnt get to take it out on you and have a misguided belief that this falls on your shoulders.

Your bf should be shouldering more of the work surrounding his children and your home together. These are HIS children and he has a responsibility to consider the work this then causes the home i.e. mess, food shopping, cooking, laundry, homework. Your bf is insane to blame you, get angry at you for any and all work caused by HIS responsibilities...his children.

To warn you, there are some older guys out there who will hunt for younger women so in order to influence, mold and manipulate them into a stepford wife. Your man is a user. He procreated with another user, bm, and all these people around you want to use you as their punching bags and to get what they need and want...pil=they shun you and get the mother of their grandbabies on side, meaning they almost certainly guarantee as much access to their grandkids and the skids adulation at housing their mother...bm=she is close to bf family ensuring she sticks the proverbial knife in your chest and your relationship with them is zero, she remains close in your bfs life and her kids. So she gets alllll the perks and joys of being MOTY with no work, no responsibility...skids=they probably see you as the enforcer (no matter how nice you are), the one who shoulders the majority of the burden of work in overseeing the pratical elements of kids, while their parents are more on the fun side....and your bf=he found a generous, caring young lady who can take the burden of his 4 kids, cos his ex wont and he doesnt want to either and because she has he expects more and more...

You deserve better than this. You have to be selfless and kind to have given as much as you have to this family. You need to be as kind to yourself for a moment and excuse yourself from this situation...permanently. This is a mess created by people that do not have your best interests at heart. They are looking out for themselves first. You need to look out for you. Be selfless only to people who are selfless to you. No one who loves you more than they love them self would put you in the middle of such a disaster. Life is too short and can be too wonderful to settle. Best of luck to you!!

I feel sorry for you. You seem to have everything going for you but you are naive. I hope you listen to the advice given here by those who were once naive themselves. Many probably wish they were in your shoes because you have an easy out and you're still young enough to find a nice young man with no kids. Us old folks have a lot less to choose from LOL. Good luck!

Talk to one of your teachers at college. We have resources. We can help, often. You probably have one you trust. They can help you get in a dorm or find a roommate situation.

Please.

You have made your world so small, so stressful and so unfair towards yourself.

Please get out and find your passion. This is not a road you want to stay on. Get out now!!!!

You have made your world so small, so stressful and so unfair towards yourself.

Please get out and find your passion. This is not a road you want to stay on. Get out now!!!!

You have made your world so small, so stressful and so unfair towards yourself.

Please get out and find your passion. This is not a road you want to stay on. Get out now!!!!

Your home life is obviously not working for you right now, so something needs to change. If you are at the end of the road and ready to leave then go ahead and start rediscovering what life is like when you only have to worry about yourself and you get to be young and carefree.

If however, you are not ready to leave your family right now then as I see it you have two options:

1. step back completely and disengage from all parenting responsibilities forcing your fiance to do the work.
or
2. talk with your fiance and make him realize that it is not your responsibility to raise his children and that everything you choose to do is your choice and that you are now choosing to focus more on your studies and that the two of you need to work on a plan to adapt your lives so that it will work for both of you. He may be resistant and try to tell you that you are better at these things or that thinking about those types of things is for women to do, but you need to stand your ground and insist that he start taking a proactive approach to parenting his kids rather than assuming that you will take everything on.

If he manages to step up and things improve at home, then I would strongly urge that you two move away from the in-laws and BM if at all possible so that you can minimize the stresses that they cause.

You seem to have a lot of natural mothering instincts to have taken on everything that you have. I want to urge you to remember your position though. You most probably love these kids to have done so much for them but you have no legal rights or responsibilities towards them (apart from reporting cases of abuse - as would any adult that was aware of a child in an abusive situation). If your fiance were to die or break up with you, you would have no legal rights to even see the kids again. Equally you are not responsible for them financially or educationally or any other respect. Every thing you do for the kids needs to be an active choice that you make and are happy to do because you could end up one day living your life without any contact with them or they may even turn around one day and decide that you are the home wrecker their mother and grandparents believes and decide they want nothing to do with you.

You are too young and stupid to realize you are simply the free nanny he can fuck. Everyone else sees it, that is why they don't like you.

Wake up already, and stop wasting your life for some ass of a man who can't even be bothered to parent his own kids.

You aren't even old enough to be the oldest's parent. That is disgusting.

I am a 24 year old stepmom like you, I only have a three year old SS but his BM's drama makes up for his years ten-fold. I was also in college (I graduated on time with a BAC) when I started seeing my now DH. He and BM split up with SS was around 6 months old I think, and we started talking when SS was 8 months old.
Now knowing that we are in similar situations, I advise you to leave now. The reason I'm advising to do the opposite of what I did actually has nothing to do with the tortures of StepHells it has to do with your significant other.

Your Significant other is sucking your soul dry and when you decide to resist, he is going to put you out on the curb and find another woman naively enough to come do his parenting for him. There is a line that you crossed when it comes to "helping" our significant others and doing parenting for them. You helped him when he needed you and now he delegates his responsibilities to his children on to you like they are your own. YOU didn't get knocked up in your early 20s, YOU didn't want the housewife life at this age (or you would have quit college when you met him and moved in). YOU set yourself up for a prosperous life that would lead you to be successful, but now this guy and all his problems are imposing on your future. You need to let him go. His life isn't the life you wanted and you shouldn't feel guilty or ashamed that you aren't ready for it yet. He's gas lighting you into feeling guilty about leaving "your little family" but really it isn't a family. And it's only going to get worse, from what you've posted about how he's acting.

I might have started on the same path as you (young, employed, independent college student) but my DH doesn't treat me like yours treats you. My husband was already providing for his kid as a single dad before hand so the standard stays even after I moved in. His (your SO) kids are his responsibility and when he got his rights in court, he was making a promise to his kid, the court and even BM that HE would be the one to take care of them because they are HIS responsibility. Before I committed my life to this Stephell, I made sure that my DH understood that I was NOT his kid's mom; if I wanted a kids at this age, I would have one by now but I don't and Im not about to borrow or take care of someone else. I am required to do nothing but be his wife, anything extra like carpool and homework help is an extra that he is grateful for. Your Significant other doesn't value you as his partner or appreciate those "extras" that you are doing for him or he wouldn't be such a douchebag about you not cooking dinner after working full time and school part time on a night you weren't event suppose to be there. He's acting helpless because he knows you'll come in and do it for him and he can go back to being lazy again. You wouldn't let a friend treat you like that, so would you want to spend the rest of your life with someone who thinks you are responsible for his problems? You don't, you leave.

NO, NO, NO, NO NO!!!!!!!!! The problem is NOT your schedule, over loaded or not. The problem is that man you have chosen. You know it, we all know it.

Young lady if this "man" and I use the term man very loosely in relation to this POS you have chosen to live with, were worth a flying rat’s ass you would not be questioning staying in this situation. Since you are questioning staying or leaving then it is far past time to leave. Go, go now, and don’t look back or regret it.

Do not tie your very bright star to this ridiculous turd of a "man".

You work full time, go to school, and you raise children that are not your own, keep house and are a live in maid with benefits for a POS who can't even treat you with the respect and value you earn daily in his life.

Re-read your original post. Set your self-worth and hold any man who would be your life partner to treating you accordingly.

A little story. It may sound like a fairy tale but it is not. It is my marriage. A bit of a different slant than your current situation but many of the elements are similar.

I met my bride when I was 29 and in the last semester of my 11 year undergrad career. She was 18, in her first semester of college and a single welfare mom. She had SS when she was 16. Rather than tie her star to the idiot she spawned her son with she set her self-worth and dedicated herself to living up that goal.

We married 5mos after I graduated with my BSEE and turned 30 (I turned 30 2wks before graduation), a week before SS-22 turned 2yo, and a month before my bride turned 19. In the first 9 years we were married my bride finished her dual major BS (Mgt/Acctg) with honors, we both completed our MBAs with honors, and my bride became a CPA. She committed to meeting those goals before we met so that she could provide a good life for herself and her son. I did not detract from those goals; I augmented and supported them as she did for me and my goals. When she had class or had to lock herself away to study in the evenings after work I took care of the house and the kid. When I had late work hours or had to lock myself away to study in the evenings after work she took care of the house and the kid.

We made a life together that augmented both of our lives as individuals. We raised the Skid together. Our son (my Skid SS-22) is now a self supporting viable adult and his mom and I are living an amazing life together.

It can happen. But not with a POS like this guy you are currently with. No one should be a martyr to a relationship with a toxic POS of no character.

Move on young lady to a life and future not tied to this or any other POS who won't value you to the level you should value yourself.

When a partner of character and accomplishment comes along who will augment your life as much as you will augment his you will know it. But only if you set your self-worth and commit yourself to living a life commensurate with that worth. Leave this man and his countless tons of baggage and move on to an amazing life. NOW!!!

And no. I am not an SM. But I am a StepDad.

Good luck.

You told him maybe a break is in order and he said in effect "that sounds about right." If you were doubting all the great outside opinions you got on this thread, you need look no further than your own boyfriend for confirmation.

This will be hard to hear, but his feelings for you are very weak. You are losing nothing by leaving him and this situation.

It will feel very dramatic and painful leaving him. You'll ruminate about some sweet moments with his kids and all the tender moments that made you fall in love with the father. Notice I said "his" kids. Unless you are able to forge the kind of partnership that Rags has with his wife, those kids will never, ever be "yours." And your boyfriend, we have all told you, will never, ever be the kind of partner that makes that possible. And with bm living in gramma and grampa's house, your relationship with those kids and with the entire extended family is utterly doomed with a cherry on top.

Even before you gave your background details, I could tell you were a young lady from a troubled background that left you feeling your deepest desire was a place to belong. A nest populated by people who love you and need you. That is what you think you have right now. But, dear girl, I must tell you you have not found it yet. When you come from a family like you describe, you have a warped yardstick with which to measure true love and belonging. So it's no wonder something that looked like it had all the moving parts was "it." But it most certainly was not "it."

So breaking up with this guy will feel terrible at first. All breakups do, you will not be alone in that. But please trust me when I say that soon you will notice you have a clean house/apt and more time to study and are getting better grades and are taking on more special projects at your fabulous college of bio-med. By the way, what a wonderful choice! You will notice how good it feels not to have anyone telling you constantly you haven't done enough. You will miss the children but you will, please promise me, force yourself to start taking an interest in more age appropriate activities. That's a whole lot of words that just mean FUN! Because of your dysfunctional parents, you went straight from little girl to middle aged woman. You don't know how to be a carefree young adult. Promise me you will put that on your list of goals: Learn to Become a Fun 24 year old!

My promise back to you is that one day, before you know it, you will look back on your days with Mr. Silent Treatment not with pain of regret but with wonder, "what was I thinking?!"

"My promise back to you is that one day, before you know it, you will look back on your days with Mr. Silent Treatment not with pain of regret but with wonder, "what was I thinking?!""

This. Absolutely.

Great guidance Chief.

RUN! RUN! RUN!

This was one crazy read. You think this guy respects you? You mention that he has a couple days a week where he has to take care of the kids himself - he should be the one taking care of the kids EVERY DAY! They are HIS kids, not yours. It doesn't sound like he appreciates a damn thing you do for him either. I agree w/just about every other person on this - RUN! Don't throw away your life for someone else's kids. Find a nice guy and have your own.

OMG, what the hell! You are so young with obviously so much potential, You're kind, caring and selfless. You have got the best interest of those four children at heart. But seriously, you need to run and run as fast as you can. Who is caring for you? who is sacrificing for you? It seems to me that you are running yourself into the ground and sacrificing everything that is dear to you for people who Are irresponsible and won't take care of their own children. The fact is they won't take care of their children while you are there doing it for them. This whole situation seems very sick and twisted. You should have the support of your fiance and your fiance's family, which obviously you dont have. I cannot believe they allow her to live in their home. By the sounds of things that is never going to change. But just like you're helping all of these people, you need to do that for yourself. If you don't you're going to look back on your life and regret it. You need to experience life and all it has to offer, which includes being a young person that's not tied down to raising four children practically on their own. Do you have time for yourself? do you have a group of friends that you hang out with, that you go out to pubs or clubs with? this is what young people are supposed to be doing! When I read your story I felt like crying I felt so sad for you. You didn't give birth to those children and those children are not your responsibility. I suggest you go back to school full time get your degree and live your life. You will find someone who will love and respect you for the kind and caring person that you are, And you can have a family of your own without having to deal with all of that extra baggage. If you stay in That house with your fiance, you will look back many years down the track and think "why didnt i leave". If you stay all of your goodness, dreams and life will be sucked out of you and you will be left with what????? Resentment! Regrets! Disappointment! PLEASE DO THIS FOR YOURSELF, I know leaving will be the hardest thing you have to do but it certainly sounds like that is what the best thing is.