Tips on how to cultivate individual relationships with my new family!
Hi everyone!
My fiancé and I are now living together with his 22 month old son. I am so grateful to have these wonderful two people in my life and look forward to our growing family together. I want to do everything I can to keep the fire alive and grow/learn more in our new relationship while at the same time balancing this new little family unit we have while also create a bond with his son.
I understand that relationships grow, change, evolve over time and I am happy to see where the road takes us, but I would love some tips from fellow step parents on how to make time for just my fiancé to grow around the new family package AS WELL AS what things I can do to grow closer to his son. I don't want to be to pushy nor do I want to be too involved. It's important to me we have family time, alone time, father son time, me and him time, etc. and I'm having a hard time finding activities or ways to grow those separate relationships that ultimately grow us closer together as one.
If anyone has any tips of ways to communicate, actives that have brought you closer or created bonds, etc. I would love to hear them and see what I can do to grow in my own relationships!
Thanks again! I am looking for positive and helpful comments to help uplift my situation. We all know things can be hard, i'd like help being positive and moving forward 
I posted on your blog as
I posted on your blog as well. I've been a SM for 18 years. My SSs were 3 and 5 when I met them. I can tell you all the things I tried. For starters, EOW when they visited was ALL about them, ALL the time. Whatever food they wanted, whatever they wanted to watch on TV, wherever they wanted to go, what they wanted to do. We bought them things, took them on vacations, took them to cool museums, amusement parks, read to them as a family (I'm an English teacher turned lawyer who taught BOTH boys to read.)We had elaborate birthday parties for them. Every holiday was about them. Both DH's and my extended family readjusted their family schedules around the SSs and their visitation schedule. Many family/holiday celebrations were postponed/arranged so the SSs could be present so as to feel part of the family and not left out. I truly felt we did all we could with the time and resources we had, especially given that my DH and I had to work very long hours as young lawyers and given that DH paid exorbitant CS that financed BM's lifestyle. She could and did outspend us to win their affection. (Now that DH and I own our own law firm almost 20 years later, I could out spend BM 10 times over with just my salary, but I'm not interested in competing with or buying anyone's affection.)
I wish I could tell you as a result of all our efforts, we have the most wonderful, loving relationship with the SSs. We have almost no relationship with youngest SS, who's 21. BM allowed him to drop out of college and travel with his "band," and he's wasting his life. He knows DH does NOT approve of this and doesn't want to hear it, so he has no contact. Oldest SS and his wife are superficially friendly with us. They have 2 girls and come on birthdays and holidays to be celebrated and given gifts. We took them on a family vacation to Florida and spent about $15K. They are polite to me, but I'm sure if something happened to my DH, I'd never see or hear from them again, nor would my DSs, their half brothers. That's just the way it is. I was 29 when I met DH and now I'm not too far away from age 50, and I'm too old and tired to play their games. I look for my happiness in my own family.
I don't mean to be a downer to your positive attitude. I'm sure there are step parents who have the type of relationship you're hoping for. I think those people tend to be custodial parents where the other bio parent is either dead or not in the picture. And while I'm not sure what I could have done differently (other than, understand my place and not try so hard a lot sooner) perhaps some of the things I did will help you establish the long-lasting loving relationship you crave. One thing I can say with confidence is that I tried and I did my best, and that's worth something I suppose, though it came at the cost of my feelings. Best of luck to you.
Ditto for me too. I've been
Ditto for me too. I've been a SM just about as long and am now in my 50s. Pretty much had the same experiences you did, and pretty much came to the same conclusions you did.
Again, don't mean to be a Debbie downer. And, your experience may differ. It is just that there is so much out of your control that goes into determining how SM and SKs get along. You may even get along fine with them as children, only to find "superficially friendly," as stated above, as adults. The main determinants of how things go for SM are actually her own husband or SO and bio-mom. Both need to pave the way for you to be accepted, and DH needs to be able to insist on it sometimes. How nice you are to the SKs can be a determinant, but there are studies that show the nicer a SM is to her SKs, the more resentful the SKs may become. As children, many don't want a blended family; they want mom and dad back living together.
Do the best you can do and what you feel comfortable with. Do what works for you, because every step-family situation is different, and many will find fault with you (even some so-called professionals) for basically not forfeiting your role as DH's wife and letting SKs, BM and even DH walk all over you. Remember, neither you nor the SKs asked for their parents to divorce. Yes, you knew DH had children from a previous relationship when you married him, but that is just about it. Like most SMs, you certainly didn't have any clue you could be signing on to be family-servant of the year for years and years.
At the end of the day, if you've done the best you can regardless of what anyone else may say, then to me you have been a successful SM, although you may get no recognition or reward from anyone else. Remember your needs matter too--a lot of SMs put so much focus on making things work, that they often forget about themselves, and then years later realize no one else in the family really takes their needs or main role (as dad's wife) that seriously.