Hi. I'm new here. I just needed to talk because my fiance has 4 kids. I have one. His kids range from 15, 10, 9, and 5. I love them and I love my fiance. Their BM does not have any custody of them so my fiance has all 4 kids all the time. I have been with my fiance for a year and a half now. The kids struggle with some traumatic experiences they had with their BM abusing them. Especially the 10 year old girl and the 15 year old boy. They have some major behavior issues. Most of the time things are good, but then other times, like when they both get angry at their dad for pretty much nothing, then they scream, throw things, etc. The 10 year old girl has done fairly well overall listening to me when I have tried to help calm her down or disciplined her. I really struggle with this though because my fiance sometimes will just let me be the disciplinarian and he will step out. I know that it is stressful for him as he also has multiple sclerosis, which makes it extremely difficult to handle their behaviors because stress contributes to an increase in symptoms for him. He is overall doing fine, except for a sever lack of energy and fatigue. I try and help him cope with the stress of raising the kids on his own, but we don't live together at this point in time.

I also have a child of my own, and so now he has begun to struggle with the situation, as he has been around the negative moods, which have somehow begun to escalate with the 10 year old girl, but then they have decreased with the 15 year old boy.

I don't know what to do because I love my fiance. But the behavior issues are starting to affect my son, as well as my own sanity. I don't want him to think that I am ignoring his needs and his desires for our blended family either. He doesn't like to be around the kids at all, although initially they all got along great. Now not so much.

Am I naive to think that this is going to work out? We have some amazing, awesome times together and the negative aspects of our soon-to-be blended family are not as often as the good and fun times that we have had together. My relationship with my fiance is overall wonderful and we complement each other in ways that I never had with my son's father. I never thought I would have a relationship like that. So, really, it is the difficulties that I have with his kids that get in the way. And I don't want to be the "evil stepmother" either. I want to have a relationship with them that they can appreciate the effort I have put into helping raise them and be their support system and they can rely on me. I also don't want to be the mom that the bio-children end up resenting because they put them in a situation that made it harder for them and their physical and mental well-being growing up? I need help from someone who knows how it is to be a stepparent! Especially a stepparent who has dealt with issues of abuse from the bio parents. Please help!