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Wicked Witch

Dad's horrible girlfriend's picture

Long story but to give it context I wanted to explain the background.

I met my lovely OH 4 1/2 years ago and we quickly grew to live each other. His youngest was 14. She is now 18. He also has a 26 and 28 year old. I get on with the oldest (a son) but the youngest hates me and is so precious (she's even been called fragile) that everyone forms a protective ring around her and her older sister sides with her. Nobody has ever pinpointed anything I did wrong but I'm the one who isn't allowed near the fragile snowflake ... even though whenever we've been in each other's company we've got along just fine, with her even seeking out my company at her grandmother's birthday which she didn't get the opportunity to exclude me from. I was excluded on her say so from a recent family christening (because she was fragile), several birthdays and her prom night gathering before she left for the prom. We've been on holiday together and got along. We always got along ... but that isn't the story she tells other. So that's the SD.

There's another character in this story. An ex neighbor of my OH and his ex wife who was a massive fan of them as a couple. So much so that she still refers to that old house as if it still belongs to them (they moved out when they divorced more than 10 years ago). I was not on the scene then but his ex wife's new partner was. This ex neighbor, the wicked witch (WW) has remained close (like a mother) to his ex and the children. My OH took me to meet her very early on, thinking her to be a friend. I sensed immediately that she had taken a dislike to me, not least because she told me we would never last because of our star signs (Taurus and Scorpio). She is very much at arms' length to us but very close to his youngest daughter and ex wife.

Recently one of his friends told me that she had been defending me to WW who had been vey keen to say how much she dislikes me when actually she barely knows me. I also, quite separately, saw a text from his ex wife saying how close YSD is to WW. Ordinarily that wouldn't cause me to bat an eyelid but I'm convinced this is a big part of YSD's mental ill health. Am I reading too much into it or is it possible that WW has turned YSD against me? Why would anyone do that? I am nothing to her but actually YSD's mental illness has nearly cost her life. I know I'm making assumptions but I won't be far wrong as the mutual friend told me that YSD and ex wife now blank her since she defended me to WW.

Personally I expect responsible adults in a young person's life to encourage that young person to foster good relationships, not cause ever widening rifts. YSD hadn't spoken to OH since I moved in a year ago. All efforts to build bridges have been met with, at best rebuttals and at worst, mass hysterics where YSD screams that she hates my OH and never wants to see him again.

I am happy to disengage. My brother died four weeks ago and I can't involve myself in their dramas but I quite actively hate WW and also worry for my OH as I know this has taken its toll on him. He refuses to discuss as he says it's futile. He's not wrong but the fragile princess has also demanded he doesn't discuss her and so is it just him, once more, giving in to her demands? It's so tiring and depressing.

Dad's horrible girlfriend's picture

Because all any of them have ever done for 18 years is bow to her every whim. He hasn't a clue how to stand up to her or to any of them. When he allowed his middle daughter to exclude me from the christening on account of the fragility of the youngest when I've never done anything to her, something died inside me ... probably exactly what they wanted to happen. I still love him. That was the point at which I decided to have nothing more to do with either of his daughters.

Dad's horrible girlfriend's picture

Well yes. You're right. He doesn't want to alienate her. Yet guess what he's achieved by not standing up to her?

Dad's horrible girlfriend's picture

Well yes. You're right. He doesn't want to alienate her. Yet guess what he's achieved by not standing up to her?

SacrificialLamb's picture

What he is achieved is the loss of your trust and respect for him. Many of us know this feeling well.

Dad's horrible girlfriend's picture

Yes. You're right. I do love him. I just want nothing more to do with his daughters. I'm not convinced he realises. I'm still waiting for an opportunity to refuse to see them. Hard when you so rarely see them anyway.

Dad's horrible girlfriend's picture

But what I really wanted to talk about is the Wicked Witch. It's eating away at me and I have no one I can mull it over with. Any thoughts anyone? Am I just overanalysing?

still learning's picture

I haven't gone to meet any of BM's best friends, if DH even suggested such a thing I would flat out refuse. BM's friends are going to be automatically programmed to dislike you. Why would your DH would set us such an awkward meeting?

Not sure why she's saying your signs aren't compatible. From what I've read Taurus (an earth sign) and Scorpio (Water sign) are very compatible. The earth holds the water so you are complimentary. She's an obvious *B* and would say you weren't compatible no matter what signs you were. He and BM certainly weren't a good match, I wonder if the B saw that one coming.

Remember the popular StepTalk saying, "Ignore the Hoor." BM, SD and WW all have their little drama club going on, stay out of it. Don't be their target!

Dad's horrible girlfriend's picture

True. She's nobody to me. I was thinking more of the impact of her behaviour on YSD who, in spite of what she tells people, does get along with me. Even whether she does or doesn't get along with me is irrrlevent. What's eating me is that a responsible adult might have encouraged her dislike of me which has culminated in some mental health issues. We could say it's none of my business or concern ... but it does concern me because a family has fallen apart ... even more apart than before ... and WW would love everyone to believe that's my fault but I suffer with my own issues and know I can read too much into things. I should probably just let it go and let everyone else do the worrying. She is, as you say, nothing to me.

still learning's picture

It's likely that WW has encouraged SD to dislike you. Yes that's a terrible thing to do but WW is aligning w/BM and staying true to her friendship w/her by creating a hate group against you. You'd think all of this immature crap ended in jr. high but no, it's alive and well anywhere there are bitter women with an ax to grind.

*Responsible* adults often exacerbate and feed off of others mental health issues. I see this behavior all around me. My mentally ill SIL has been told by MIL and other SIL that she'll get raped if she rides the bus. Way to keep poor SIL scared and totally dependent on them. My ex is enabling my oldest son, keeping him a child and under his thumb. DH did the same thing w/ss31, enabling up until recently and now ss is mad that DH has closed his wallet. Responsible adults encouraging unhealthy behavior for their own sick needs, it's quite common.

Get real busy living your own life and ignore the drama club.

Maxwell09's picture

I think it might be a bit of insecurity or jealousy that the YSD has aligned with this old neighbor instead of giving you a chance. Regardless, people can be friends with whomever they want. You don't have to understand their friendship and it's not really your business. You'll drive yourself insane trying to figure out why they chose her instead of you. I've lost a few friends who I thought to be close to BM and it made me crazy angry to think people who I've know for years, who agreed with me about BM for years would suddenly change their minds knowing the hell she put us through. I cut them off completely and told myself their friendship with BM is none of my business. I tell you to do the same, cut off his daughters as much as you possibly can and let go of trying to figure any of them out. Worry about yourself and how to make your own life with your husband (sans kids) better.

Stepdrama11's picture

I could have written this, with some minor variation.

After 10 years with my DH, where his 2 kids were polite and we took many family vacations, SS's new GF (for whatever reason) convinced both kids that they could try to ruin our marriage. So no, I don't think you are imagining things.

It does come down to whether your partner will have your back.

To me, this means (at a minimum)
1. DH does not treat you in a way he would never ask of or expect from anyone else (ie, excluding a partner).
2. DH does not tolerate anyone talking poorly about you, at least to him. He shuts that sh*t down.
3. The way he treats you is not determined by what they want. If someone is dictating what he can or can't discuss with you, that is a boundary violation.

Disengage? I will never again have more than a superficial relationship, if that, with either SK. But just bowing out of the picture, when DH does NOT have your back, just reinforces and supports their belief that you are disposable, because that is what DH is reinforcing and supporting.

Rags's picture

There is one glaring absence in your post. Where is your DH in all of this and why isn't he girding his loins and destroying these morons for interfering in his marriage and regarding how they treat his wife?

This guy truly is a ball-less wonder isn't he?

Time for a new husband I think. One with some testicular fortitude.

mgfun13's picture

Your man has no testicular fortitude...neither does mine. I have been married to DH for 16 years and this whole town is full of WW's because the BM and I grew up here and went to school together. What I married is a spineless man who lets his princess poppsie pie crawl all over him, continue to pubically shun and humiliate him all the while treating me that I'm trash. Brainwashing at its finest. Now I'm the wife that stays home while he's out galavanting around with princess. She's first priority...I'm not even sure what number I am but it's NOT first or even a close second.

Dad's horrible girlfriend's picture

He does lack testicular fortitude where his daughters are concerned but they are so horrible to him that one stays completely away and the other only surfaces once every few months. Apart from his inability to defend me against them he is a genuinely nice guy. He introduced me to WW in the early days. She had previously been a good friend and I think he thought that would continue. He realises now that that isn't the case and just shrugged saying she doesn't matter. We will surround ourselves with friends who like and love us, not with toxic people.

He is not a confrontational man hence the struggle with his daughters. However, he is kind, caring and charitable. We connect and genuinely enjoy being together. I feel he would walk over hot stones for me except where his DDs are concerned. However, they play a tiny role in our rich and fulfilling life which is otherwise filled with love and friendship, I'm not prepared to sacrifice that for these girls. I will just disengage.

WW is only a problem (albeit relatively minor) in that we see her because we walk past her house and often she is outside. She still speaks and I used to be polite and friendly towards her. In future I shall just keep walking if he wants to chat, however I think both of us have had a realisation that her intentions are not friendly and she is indeed a WW. I think we just need to accept that other people aren't as nice as we are! Smile

He is cross that his ex wife and YSD have started ignoring the other friend who defended me to WW. She was a friend who had actively tried and managed (until this) to maintain a friendship with them both. That was only doable until she decided she like me. Liking me lost her her friendship with YSD and BM but she just shrugs that off saying it's their issue not hers. I like her. OH is Cross that BM and YSD now ignore this friend but as we know, he won't do anything about it. Ah well. What's the saying? Least said, soonest mended. I wish!

peacemaker's picture

You are dealing with the same issue most of us as second marriages have to grind through...history. When we come into a second marriage, there is the reality that our spouse has a preset situation resulting from a previous relationship. When there are children involved, it becomes more complicated. It is a unique circumstance depending on all the many variables that were created from the previous relationship.

With the breakdown of that relationship comes a wave of emotions (usually negative) which are most often intensely strong that become a common denominator with all the people involved with the pre existing relationship, (including close friends and family)...It is real, and it needs to be dealt with.

...it is the issue of their history, The challenge is, it is their history, and we were not part of it, but we have to deal with the realness of it infringing on our present life. Because it becomes their common denominator, many people get "stuck" there. Many people have a hard time moving forward, while the new relationship has been started and is all about change and moving forward...the ability to deal with the issue of history, and concluding it (even though the previous relationship has suffered an epic failure event resulting in a divorce which has divided an existing family)...which is devastating for most of those involved. It is loss. It is a process to grieve the loss, learn from all the mistakes made, deal with their own personal issues, and how people were effected by this failure event....is a lot to deal with.

A lot of dh's have not processed those issues before they decided to start up another relationship with a new marriage. Unfortunately, for us, the undealt with issues begin to trespass on our relationship with our dh's, because they are pre-existing conditions that still have to be dealt with one way or another. Oftentimes, we just want to move forward with our marriages, but we are constantly confronted with dh's mess. My dh was just fine with passing it on, and letting it land in my lap,...leaving me with the challenges of his leftover mess...and I was too young to realize what was really going on at the time it was happening. I tried to "fix things" for a lot of years, only to learn...I couldn't, and it wasn't mine to fix...It was dh's mess. He and his ex created it, and even though we were now married, those issues were not going anywhere, and were constantly showing up on our doorstep, creating chaos.

The chaos was the power of their present bond, because the good stuff from the past was no longer what was holding them together as a family unit. It is the life support many of these failed relationships are on to have a common denominator. Dh is puling out of it with his new wife, and now their relationships are taking on a new dynamic that they are not willing to embrace, so they are kicking and screaming all the way...Their opposing everything about his new relationship is their resistance to change. They do not like this change, and become dedicated to resist it with everything they have...because it signifies that the previous relationship is truly no longer what it was.

Yet, here we are trying to get dh to move forward when he is constantly being pulled into the past...a past that he helped create. In order for him to move forward, he needs to truly be done with the bonding forces of his past. The soul ties he has with those that came before you. He has to become truly divorced in order to be committed to his now relationship. He needs to draw boundary lines to notify his past that it cannot infiltrate his present life. The challenge is, the children that were created in his previous relationship are here to stay forever. and they bring the past with them by the suitcase full every time they participate in his life. It is a reality that is messy, and complicated.

While he wants to move forward with his new life...his old life is holding him back. and both are important to him. The new life is demanding to be first in his life, and so is his old life....and he is stuck in the middle because he is the one who created this situation by the choices he has made.

We are unhappy because he is failing to deal with the pre existing issues, and his children are unhappy because He has failed to deal with the pre existing issues and is trying to move out of that way of life and enter into a new chapter. They feel pushed aside and left behind, and we fee pushed aside and left behind....so conflict arises because the blame for his inability to deal with his past gets passed on to the new wife. No one is ready for her. but...here we are.

I have learned after dealing with this for 29 years, is that I can advise dh to make the right choice, but his character ultimately trumps the situation at hand. I have also learned that this is not my issue to deal with,,,I wasn't there to create it, and it is not mine to fix. I have also learned to draw strong, but healthy boundaries around my relationship with dh, and my children. While i can acknowledge that history exists before i came into dh's life, I do not worship history...or the catastrophe of events that it has created.

While our value is in the problems we solve, there is wisdom in realizing the problems that are not ours to solve. Dh's inability to draw boundaries, hold his children accountable for their actions, taking responsibility for his own actions, learning to say no... are all dh's issues...not mine. And once I was able to learn the difference....then I could identify when he was allowing his inability to deal with things he needed to be addressing himself as a man...to effect my peace...things began to get less confusing. He would passively let his issues with his pre existing family land in my lap by refusing to deal with it himself...I learned how to push back his undealt with issue onto him.

Then step away. The discomfort of not dealing with it should be his...not mine. Once I learned that...things became a lot better for me in my own personal growth. i learned to live with uncomfortable situations without letting them trespass on my personal space. yes i love my dh...yes it gets me ruffled to see them mis treat him...but there is a line...a line where they do not get to come past, and he does not get to push his stuff onto me...Those are my healthy boundaries for my personal self.

Once I learned what not to pick up, and what matters, the issues became a lot clearer to me. Everything was no longer put into an "us against them" mentality. I learned that many times there is an issue with a step kid, it is just them struggling with themselves...it has nothing t do with dh or I.

Once I learned to not take it personally, and to not let it get into my personal space, life became a lot happier, and I could focus on moving forward with my life. Their relationship failure was no longer the defining moment for anything . It was no longer a point of reference...it was no longer a condition to be considered in order for me to live a happy life...Life was not hinged upon the past failure events. It was not going to remain our common denominator. It takes intention and a strong resolve to live that way when it is all they have ever known...

It was "their way"... and dh had to choose whether he wanted to reside in the past with the old way of doing things, or move forward into something new by forging a new way. (which is what he signed up for when he chose to marry me)...Because, as an individual, i chose to move forward with my own life...It isn't necessarily about the people per say...as much as it is about deciding about "the way" you are going to choose to do life. He can say goodbye to the old way without having to discard the people. it isn't easy...to make the transition...but it is worth it...they will either move forward with you or choose to stay stuck in the old way of doing things...Neither of you can control that...that is their choice. Peace.

SacrificialLamb's picture

Please move to my town and become my therapist. Very insightful, as always. I have learned so much from you!

sandye21's picture

Thank you Peacemaker. "He can say goodbye to the old way without having to discard the people." This is the hard part but it CAN be done. In my opinion this should be communicated to the skids by DH - that even though he has a new life, they can still be part of it if they wish to practice mutual respect. The problem with many here, including me, is that this communication never occurs or it occurs too late so that too many bridges have been burned to restore a path to understanding and help the skids to arrive at the present.

Sometimes I feel sad for DH because he ultimately alienated his DD by his actions, and he is still, after 26 years of marriage (today is a our Anniversary) is too afraid to sit down with SD and have an honest discussion about the pain of his divorce from BM. But as you wrote, this is their history - not mine.

Dad's horrible girlfriend's picture

Peacemaker, thank you for making perfect sense of everyone's feelings in all of this. Your insight has given me ideas of how to proceed with disengagement without being a total bitch - the exact approach I was seeking. Thank you.

Also, HRNYC makes a very good point too. The only thing I would say is that our starting point was to be nice and polite to everyone hence the hurt and anger caused by the nastiness but you're right, I'm now coming down to their level so need to shut up and get on with it.

Somebody mentioned how they would not relish meeting BM's friends ... OH was married for around 20 years. They met through work. All their friends were through work. It was all very incestuous. His ex wife is now married to his ex best friend. I was introduced to a lot of people who would have known and been friendly with his ex wife, without me even realising. When we first met he took me to a masquerade. They were all work people. It turned out they were all very close to his ex wife but I had no idea of that.Thankfully ex wife wasn't there. He also took me walking with a female friend. We really hit it off and have become great friends but what he failed to tell me at that time was that they had had a very brief relationship. That was naughty. I only forgave him because I liked her so much.

Four and a half years in, I think I've met everyone now and know who's who. Thankfully I've handled most of those encounters with a good manner and so have given them nothing to use isgajnst me, although I'm sure they would find something if they needed to, as Ww did. Still, I'm happy with how I've handled things. The problems are all their own, as peacemaker said.