Do you ever feel bad for your SO?
My husband has no one can really talk about SD with, no one he can remember fond memories of her babyhood with. Whenever he does talk to me about her I can't really respond because he will immediately get defensive if he thinks I'm being the slightest bit negative. Since I can't pretend to be excited about somebody else's kid I just try to stay neutral.
I always knew this and whenever he wanted to talk about SD I would just sort of nod. Now that we have a daughter together it's become a much more obvious. She is my actual child and I'm endlessly entertained by her and we talk parenting strategy all the time. I can't fake caring about SD or pretending to be interested when my husband shares some sort of memory that I wasn't there for or he wants to talk about her extracurriculars that he has nothing to do with other than footting the bill. Uh-huh. I feel sort of bad about this because it must be a pretty lonely experience for him.
To a small extent he can share these things with his sisters but this is one of the things that is just lost to divorce being able to really talk to the other parent about your hopes and dreams and plans for your child. On the rare occasion when he would talk to BM about SD and they would stay on topic without drama he would actually be so happy to be able to about SD and what was going on in her life with someone that actually cared. At first I was very annoyed with how excited he became after having this conversation but it wasn't about talking to BM it was about the topic. Then I felt bad for him because we are just never going to share that about SD. We will share that with our daughters together however it's just going to contrast with SD.
A part of me wondered if I would become more parental after having my own child and then maybe I would care more about SD, but I don't and don't pretend to. I am only interested in what affects my husband and is therefore indirectly affecting me. For a long time I was not really allowed to or my husband would it go on the defensive, because of that I don't bother anymore.
I suppose this makes me one of those step moms the favors my own bio kids over the step kid and therefore I'm a bad person according to mommy bloggers. But my husband was the one that choose to have a baby with this woman who left him and alienated him against his child. So when I feel bad for him if only for a moment because it's his mess that he made. Barring him cheating on me or something else horrible like that I plan on staying with my children's father and parenting them together as a team and I'm not going to let him deny our kids anything because he feels guilty about how things are with SD.
Does anyone else have thoughts like this?
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Comments
Those mommy bloggers can
Those mommy bloggers can stuff it. Great if a SM wants to love a skid as much as their own (I personally think they are lying) but if they truly do good for them. I like my skids but now that I have a bio I know I won't ever love them on the same level. I am okay with that, while it's not something I'm running around screaming from the mountain tops. I don't feel any guilt.
It's human nature to love
It's human nature to love your own kids above everything, those Mommy bloggers are just trying to make themselves look good.
Yes, I feel bad for my DH, his dreams for his only child were dashed. He thought SS20 had great potential as a young child and now he's a lazy, lying, failure to launch mess. I don't mind listening to him talk about memories, hopes, sadness, whatever, though, and never have minded. He also has a good friend who is a woman, and she used to be SS's preschool teacher, so I'm sure he talks to her as well. And at least one of his male friends, too, who has a difficult adult daughter.
That's good your DH has
That's good your DH has people to talk to. I feel that mine is also disappointed with SD turning out to be so much like BM. He'll brag about how she does in school and all that. On paper she is doing fine but he know she is a mini BM with BMs values and I know it bothers him though he won't admit it out loud.
Oh, that would drive me nuts.
Oh, that would drive me nuts. Mine has no trouble admitting he's disappointed in SS, not just his failure to launch, but his overall presentation and beliefs.
It would make me crazy if DH was in denial about who SS is.
Oh, that would drive me nuts.
Oh, that would drive me nuts. Mine has no trouble admitting he's disappointed in SS, not just his failure to launch, but his overall presentation and beliefs.
It would make me crazy if DH was in denial about who SS is.
If your DH talked to you at
If your DH talked to you at length about another relative or close friend of his, whom you also knew well, would you be able to engage without getting bored?
I get if he's going on about her favorite flavor of toothpaste as a toddler or whatever - no one cares, ha. I've had to tell my DH occasionally how boring SK trivia is (I don't find that stuff interesting even about my own DD).
But... hopes and dreams, and plans for the SKs? I engage in those conversations very much, because it's deeply important to my DH, and I care about the SKs too.
I'd be careful not to cut yourself off from the subjects that are nearest to your DH's heart... it's a large part of being a spouse.
ETA: if your DH is assuming you have negative intentions toward your SD, and her activities are none of your business, then it's all on him that he can't talk to you about her. -- like you said, he made that bed and keeps making it.
You make a point about being
You make a point about being about to talk about other relatives as length but not SD. I think the difference there is he is less defensive but the topics are more concrete. With SD it's usually more like "facts" because he's so disconnected from her daily life. When he talks about his aspirations for SD it's him telling me his plans for her but framed as if they are hers so I don't really bite because I don't want to do the mental backflips required to talk about a 12 year olds college plans. Whenever we see her she is only interested in tik tok and being famous, so I know these talks about plans and dreams (that always seem to be away from me) are just DHs misguided hopes.
Is he reminiscing about the
Is he reminiscing about the good old days with SD? Or is he talking about future plans that involve her?
If my DH tells me stuff currently about Spawn I listen and encourage him, but I don't offer much other commentary.
When DH used to compare Spawn the BD all the time I would get frustrated and annoyed. I got sick of hearing "Spawn was such a good baby she hardly every cried, not like BD." "Spawn slept through the night right away, not like BD." It was like yeah I get it you procreated with the Meth Hag and had the perfect child...well welcome to your life now, you had a baby with me and she's not perfect but she's ours so stop shoving Spawn's alleged perfection down my throat.
Ha, my DH is just as
Ha, my DH is just as enthusiastic about our DD as about his older kids, but he did compare her negatively to them on potty training. Actually said her poop was smellier than theirs. I couldn't stop laughing..."you literally said your older kids' shit don't stink?!"
Lol that's funny!
Lol that's funny!
I'm not interested in going
I'm not interested in going down DH's memory lane since the kids pulled the last stunt that caused us to drop the rope. I will occasionally tell him I don't care if he starts.
I feel bad for DH that his son is a nasty disordered narcissist, that his girls stabbed him in the back, and the family court system is a joke. But as you have said this is bed he made for insisting on having unprotected sex, knocking up, and marrying that dumpster fire.