what if you dont love them? i care about them, but love? no. i am working on getting along with them but i dont feel like i have to LOVE them the way i love my babies. we have a bond that can never be compared. dh thinks i'm bad to his children because "i dont treat them the same" and i probably dont treat them the same. im never mean or make them feel unwelcome. i cook and clean for them and try to talk with them just to see what's going on in their lives, etc. dh on the other hand is totally playing favorites with HIS children, meaning the skids.

My SS is 8 and he has a very busy schedule during the week. Monday through Friday he goes to school and then he has evening activities Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, which does not get him home until 8:30-9PM most nights. He just got signed up for another event which is directly after school but on the nights that he has other activities, he has 2 hours to fit in getting home, getting fed, and doing homework before running off to something else.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39463768/ns/health-mental_health/

Hopefully this link will stay, sometimes they change the story but here it is for now.

A national discussion on the issue! should be interesting

So DH and I had high hopes for this weekend being a good one - SS was dropped off early (5 minutes early but it's an improvement from 20 minutes late!!) and SD was on time, as normal. We sat around the table for a good dinner, and then started discussions about school and things (hear the missle getting racked in the gun). DH was having an active convo w/ SS8 about carrying his cell phone (that we bought him and pay for) in case of an emergency or so DH can get in touch with him.

As both a BM and a SM I go through and read posts just as they are to be taken... normal people coming in and blowing off some steam so they can hopefully continue on with their day as usual.

well no surprise but after asking if i would watch the kids for three days even though the ex doesnt want them spending time w/ me or picking them up from school she has the nerve to ask me if i will now pick them up from school; which remember she told the kids if i did so again she would have me charged w/ kidnapping; and watch them till her new husband gets off work to pick them up for...wait for it....the next month. :jawdrop: the damn gall.

I am VERY new to all the stepparent stuff. I was a childless widow when I married my DH in January. We had discussed his children early in our relationship and I knew there was a good chance that SS10 and SD5 would live with us at least part time at some point. That point occurred last weekend when we drove 4 hours to pick them up from BM.

So, FDH has scheduled Skype with Skeletor for tomorrow morning to tell her the "conditions" to him signing her second mortgage mod. They are things that she will never agree to as she thinks that she can have her cake and eat it too. The conditions are:

1. She will stop threatening to get a restraining order on me for using a few curse words. Realize that I am younger than she is and different things are acceptable in different generations (although I will never make that mistake again and will NEVER even utter another word to her).

I am to the point where I'm starting to think life would just be easier if I lived on my own.

This site is so rad. I know I have been a posting machine over the last couple of days and let me just say, having this place to just vent out everything that I'm feeling inside has been SO THERAPEUTIC.