When affection is an act
Why does it drive me crazy that my DH and SD12 share this connection over my baby DD I am excluded from? He shares pictures with SD and she remarks that the baby is so cute and she loves and misses her so much etc... (pretty sure she's just paying him lip-service and she doesn't really give much of a crap about us because she never shows real interest and always declines to FaceTime with her). If I try to send her a picture or talk to her I get straight-up ignored. My daughter is currently a baby so it's not like she's really an active participant in this but in the future I am quite worried that I'm going to be excluded from my own family when SD visits and interacts with her sister. It's going to break my heart if my daughter is excited to see SD and she is just pretending to have a relationship with my daughter just for show for my DH.
It burns me up that SD acts as though she, DH and my daughter are this perfect little loving family and I'm excluded. Not only is it rude to ignore me but her love for her sister is a complete farce. She is only acting like she cares because she thinks that is what DH wants.
Does anyone else have a SD that acts loving and affectionate but it's clearly all an act? Is there anything I can do about this? I'm pretty sure my husband is never going to wise up.
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It may not be an act. She
It may not be an act. She may just not like you, or allow herself to like you. Loyalty to BM and all that.
My SD doesn't like me, but she loves my kids. Which I think is something to be thankful for (other than I think she's a bad example at times, so I struggle with it.)
I think when you first have a baby, you kind of think your kid is an extension of you. SD sees you as two separate people. And yes, you may feel excluded, but there are times when I'm excluded without SD even being here because my kids share interests with my husband that I don't care to be a part of.
Why do you think it's an act?
Why do you think it's an act?
It's possible for the kid to love her sister and not view you as a part of her family. SMs express those exact feelings on here every day. They love their husbands but not their kids and keep definitely do not view the SKs as part of their family.
While your SD's definition of who her family consists of may be valid, ignoring you isn't.
I believe it's an act because
I believe it's an act because SD acts differently depending on who she's with. She is very sweet and polite with her grandparents but with her aunts and uncles she can become a mean girl that spits poison about her cousins and Friends. With my husband she basically likes everything that he likes. because of this drastically different behavior with everybody I feel like I don't really know her at all. I thought that her baby sister might be something that we could finally bond over but I guess not. I'm not going to ignore this kid I do make attempts to bond with her, I just always end up kicking myself after I do it when I could have gotten the same result from just disengaging. My posts on here tend to be after I extend a hand to her and really try to be a good stepmom and then get rebuffed so it makes me angry and frustrated.
I also think it's an act because she will be texting with my husband and she always says she loves them and misses them so he will ask if she wants to FaceTime with him and her baby sister and she always says no. the same thing is true for when he asks when he will get to see her next and he always gets the reply that she is super busy. She doesn't really want to see us. I imagine we are just a chore to her. Youw never tell your great-aunt anything other than you love her and miss her right? But she is still just a distant relative and talking to her is just a box you have to check on certain holidays.
But every person on the
But every person on the planet acts differently around different people.
How I behave with my siblings is different than with my parents. How I act with my extended family is different than immediate. Some friends get treated one way while others get treated others. My coworkers know a different me than people in my personal life. Totally strangers probably think I'm a b**ch because that's the face I wear.
Point is, it may not be an act. I hate FaceTime and would rather never do that except with DH when I'm out of town. The SSs love their dad and BM but never want to talk to either on the phone (they grt very quiet). It has nothing to do with "love" and everything to do with comfort and preferences for communication.
If you change your expectations for how she should react and just accept that this is how she wants to interact with people, you may find it less frustrating when she doesn't behave as you think she should. This isn't an issue of her necessarily behaving poorly as her not behaving how you think she should. That isn't her problem.
I believe it, Spawn never
I believe it, Spawn never liked BD, because she usurped Spawn's role as the only girl out of her blended life.
DH never saw it and I wanted to believe that the "love and affection" Spawn showed to BD was genuine, but once Spawn moved out BD began telling us the truth about so much stuff I only suspected.
She pretty much confirmed that Spawn was really mean to her when we weren't around and that she would pick on her and would only pretend to be nice when we were there.
If your gut is telling you this, it's probably true.
What you're describing is
What you're describing is exactly what I'm afraid of but couldn't quite put my finger on it until you wrote it out. My SD can be such a nasty little bullying mean girl and she has gotten in trouble at school for it. I don't want her to bully my daughter or for her nasty cliquey ways to rub off on her either.