Is anyone else in a similar position to I? and do u have advice?
Im new to this so im unsure about the abreviations so i'll do my best.
I met my boyfriend 3 years ago, he had been previously married and had 2 daughters which now are 7 and 11, they are very much like there mum i am told, as they do not show any personality traits of their father. I worked real hard on trying to build trust between the kids and i and to make sure they were comfortable around me so when they came to stay every other weekend they would look forward to it instead of dreading it. We had some good days and some bad, bad meaning they would say some hurtful things that their mother had past on.
Eg: Their mother said they are not to take anything home that i have made, brought for them including birthday and xmas presents and clothes, they are not to use our toothpastes and soaps! and i wasnt to wash their clothes! That is just a couple of examples. It doesnt sound that harmful but when you want them to except you and see you as a friend its actually hard to hear.
I still have not yet met the ex and i have recently just had a baby girl with my boyfriend, his daughters love her i think unless the attention they give her and how they never put her down is maybe to make sure their father does not give our little baby attention. His daughter constantly like to remind me that my baby girl is not their sister but merely their half sister.
My boyfriend baby's these girls when they are over, i assume because he feels guilty for leaving them, but when he does this it is usually underminding what i have already said or asked them to do, i know they are perfectly capable of doing things like grabbing a drink or something to eat themselves, and tidying up their bedroom and he always jumps up and helps when they play the helpless little girl routine. They are no longer babies.
His daughters always remind me that they are over to spend time with their father and not i, so why most of the time they are hanging around me wanting me to entertain them while my boyfriend lays asleep on the couch watching football, dont get me wrong he does his best but i feel extremely underappreciated and quite often i get put back in my box when the ex complains to him about the activities or things that are spoken about to his daughters when they have been bored.
When they are over i constantly run around for them making sure they are fed, bathed, slept and happy not bored at the same time looking after my first born baby girl.
I think the main issue here is how the ex lays down the rules, not by speaking to me about them but saying hurtful, untruthfull and pathetic things to her girls, and controls my boyfriend and makes the girls scared of doing things and things happening...like there dad loving our baby girl more or even myslef getting some attention when they are over! My boyfriend and I do not show any type of affection in front of them and im not sure if this is healthy or not.
Our relationship is starting to crack and its because im reaching boiling point of all the pathetic things that come out of his daughters mouth that you can tell is really coming from their mother. Im worried for my baby girl and my relationship with my boyfriend.?
any advice?
My husband and I had this
My husband and I had this problem with his daughter at first. He was living with his mother when we got together. At the time, his daughter was 8. We met through a friend of mine who is his cousin, and I lived an hour and a half away at the time, so I would drive up on the weekends to be with him while we were dating/engaged. Everytime we even tried to leave his mother's to go see a movie or go to dinner his daughter would cry and call her mom and tell her she wanted to come home cause Daddy left her. It got so out of hand that a couple months after we got engaged (we had already set a wedding date and started planning)that I told him that I wasn't going to do this that I realized his first responsibility was to his daughter...but if he was going to allow her to act that way that he obviously couldn't balance her and an adult relationship. He finally sat her down and talked to her and told her, "I love you, but I'm not going to stay single forever. Daddy has to be happy too, and I love this woman, and I'm not going to allow your behavior and disrespect drive her away." Grant it, we still have our problems, but she doesn't pull the "poor me Daddy help me" act anymore.
Maybe you should sit down and talk to your boyfriend about your role in the home, and how it's not fair to you to have to act one way when his kids aren't there and another way when they are there. It's not normal to show absolutely no affection in your own home even if his kids are there...that's living like roommates instead of a couple. I'm not saying go overboard with it, but you know what I'm getting at. The behaviors aren't going to change if you can't talk to him about how you feel, and if he won't sit his girls down and talk to them. It's not going to mean jack coming from you...he needs to do it. (hope this helps and good luck)
This is definitely a case
This is definitely a case where your BF needs to step up to the plate and parent. If you're going to be their stepmother, you have rights too. You have the right to be respected in your own home, your daughter has the right to see her mother treated with fairness. Your BF has the responsibility to do as much as he can to undo what their mother has done to turn them against you. It's his responsibility to ensure that they respect and obey you - they don't have to like you but they have to respect you as a part of theirs and their father's lives. I agree that you should think about sitting down with him and setting some very clear boundaries.
"There are two things over which you have complete dominion, authority, and control over - your mind and your mouth".
I can so identify with
I can so identify with you...being a stepmom seems to be about taking on all the responsibilities, work, heartache etc of being a mother without any of the joy, none of the recognition, and probably a load more abuse. You also don't get to participate fully in the decisions which have an impact on you, so a lot of your control is taken away leaving you feeling helpless. I can't contemplate life without my fiance and the years ahead of building a life together, and I would never ever want to be the evil step mom who excludes the Skid and causes them emotional damage, but there are times when not only having his child, but having some other woman be able to dicatate on my life seems like a really tough job. All I can say is that at least for you it's only on weekends! As long as you stay calm and do your best I think it'll work out, and even though it's hard try to remember that children are only the product of the adults who raised them up until that point.