for those who have children from a previous relationship and more?

[6inchnipples]

I am in a relationship, have ds from previous and 2 dd with dp. I find i am hyper sensitive to the way dp is with ds.

Itrust him, he is good kind and loving but little things drive me crazy with paranoia.

Ds is the most hard work out the kids, could be age(4) or the fact that he is male!! or maybe his dads genes cos he is a twisted shite!! no harm to him but he is! I find ds the hardest but i still find myself critical of dp when i think he is unfair or too hard on him. I so want to be a 'united front' as such but i can't when i don't agree with some of the stuff dp does.

Posted earlier elsewhere and responses prompted this thread. Post was..

i had a huge row with dp this morning as he insisted on trying to give ds(4) dd's(2) leftover cereal. Ds was not having it and kicked up a fuss whinging and crying, but despite my saying don't be ridiculous thats horrible, dp then added some of the leftover stuff to some new stuff but old stuff soggy so ds wouldn't touch it.

I was furious, dp said it was a waste but why should ds suffer when dd wastes something, in the end up dp wasted more as the mixed bowl didn't get eaten. Dp remains in a bad mood currently and i have told him he is definitely wrong on this one. Is he? Would you like to eat your siblings leftovers?? I'm really surprised dp thinks this is ok.

Can i have people in similar situations thoughts. I've been with dp since ds was a 10 mnths and ds has regular contact with his dad (incase this info helps).

[6inchnipples]

how do you know if its a one of? How do you know if the other 'stupid' things dp does are genuinely just stupid mistakes? and not just the over protective mother being paranoid.

Ds still wet at night. His sister 2 is dry, dp and i had words because he kept saying when helping getting them ready for bed ' is x still wearing a pull up?? and when i say of course why mention it ' oh for goodness sake i was just asking you know incase it has changed' what over the weekend??? can't decide if i am making little things into big things, dp is different with dd who is 2 but shes a girl and not as demanding as ds. I often feel ds and dp are like siblings arguing and this pisses me off as he is obviously the adult. But he laughs it off saying he has a better relationshiop wi ds than dd they just wind each other up. But i don't like it

[2rebecca]

I think the stepfather/stepson relationship is a tricky one. My husband and son don't get on, with my husband being hypercritical of my son in a way he isn't to my daughter or his kids. He doesn't see it though and feels my son rejects him and ignores him. There is some truth in that as well. It ends up with them keeping out of each others way, and I'm glad my son sees alot of his dad to have a more loving relationship with a father figure. This is 1 reason I think it's really important for mums to try and encourage the bond between biological dads and their sons as I think it's rare for the stepdad bond to ever be the same. Most of the women I know are better at being stepmums than the men are at being stepdads. They try harder.
My stepson has a similar problem with his stepfather, who is a nice bloke and gets on well with my stepdaughter but he and my stepson just clash and also end up avoiding each other....

[6inchnipples]

thats makes me really sad. Dp has been in ds life since a young baby. Can i ask how old your son was 2rebecca when he and your dp met?

[6inchnipples]

and i do encourage my sons relationship with his father altho to be honest i feel my dp resents this slightly. I almost feel things like this crop up more when ds returns from spending time with his dad. But then that is also when ds is most bolshy.

[Lins75]

I have one 13 year old from my previous marriage and my new husband has 2 of his own and we have a 2 year old DD together.

To be honest, DH isn't as close to my daughter as he is to his own kids but there's no way he'd ever think about giving any leftovers to her or treating her differently.
You are all a family now and while trust me, there's no one who knows better than me how hard it is to form a family unit, you need to do it now before it's too late and your life becomes one big mess and your child is unhappy because of the way he is treated.

[Flightattendant27]

Oh this is horrid. How did dp react when challenged?

It reminds me of my ex, who came into our lives when ds1 was 3. He soon started to make a point that I ought to punish ds in different ways - ds once took things from the fridge, into the garden - being naughty I suppose in a 3yo kind of way. I put them back, was briefly cross but nothing else happened. Dp insisted when he was a child he would have had a completely over the top bollocking and that I ought to deal with ds in this manner also.

He went on to start a whole campaign about his style of parenting being better, and mine storing up trouble for the future - of course it was bullshit but he was desperate to be obeyed and treated as font of all childrearing knowledge - he wanted in short to be head of the household, and he didn't even live with us.

It was a control thing and a respect thing and he didn't feel he had enough of either. Eventually I left him for being a shit. He would look at internet forums and point at something saying 'Look, this post says you should beat your children, what do you think to that?' and I would say 'it's ridiculous' and he would say 'I think it's too damn right' just to provoke me and try and assert his authority. Not that he would have beaten a child but he wanted me to be scared of him when in fact I looked at his serious 'I am so hard' expression and had to try not to laugh.

He was such a twat. I hope your dp is not like that.

[Flightattendant27]

Oh and he was jealous that I put ds first, of course, and was kind to him. Dp basically thought ds was a threat to him as man of the house - he was all set to treat him as a 'little b*stard' but I saw it coming as he was already like this to his own son - and got rid fast. We were together about 7-8 months altogether.

[6inchnipples]

in all fairness to dp i think he may have offered dd what ds had left if the other way round but she is 2 and doesn't find stuff yukky like you do at 4. she is dif too, more like her dad and ds is like his dad which is chalk and cheese really.

my ex bawks at stuff easily and passes out in hospitals. dp could wipe the neighbours arse without so much as batting an eyelid!

[Flightattendant27]

It's not the differences in parenting like this that matter too much, it's how they are dealt with. If his attitude is 'Oh I'm sorry I upset ds, perhaps I was a little too harsh, can we discuss how best to handle this in future' rather than 'You need to make him eat porridge all day, I'm telling you that lad is a hooligan in training' you are prob ok.

[6inchnipples]

flight thankfully dp not like that. He mostly very good with all the kids just some stuff irritates me. Think he also has a problem with me putting ds before him tho, but its all my kids then him i'm afraid. And i do think being a step parent is very hard.

[6inchnipples]

flight thankfully dp not like that. He mostly very good with all the kids just some stuff irritates me. Think he also has a problem with me putting ds before him tho, but its all my kids then him i'm afraid. And i do think being a step parent is very hard.

[6inchnipples]

oops!

[2rebecca]

He was 5. He is quite an opinionated boy and a definite mummy's boy. He has never sworn or been aggressive to my husband though. I think several years down the line the behaviour patterns are so engrained I can't change them. I love both my son and my husband dearly but do feel they both tend to compete for my attention and I wish husband could be more adult about it all. My husband's mum was quite strict with him when he was young and i think he feels I'm too soft with my son, where as I feel I'm fairly strict, although when you do just have children with you part of the time it's hard to get the discipline right.

[6inchnipples]

Its more like i'll say 'stop mentioning him being wet at night and pull ups, its not good to compare them and not constructive' he'll say 'oh for goodness sake i was just saying blah blah' and i'll say 'well don't' then if it gets mentioned again in any way i frown at him and he knows what i'm frowning about!! We sound really good at communicating don't we!!

[Flightattendant27]

Oh that's good 6inch!! There are bound to be a couple of things you disagree on. I think in any marriage that's the case.

[6inchnipples]

2rebecca interesting that your son was young too, its so hard. Dp is gr8 in most ways just wish i didn't have this to think about. Does it not get easier?? Is your son much older now?? My son like his dad and dp thinks he is an arse, so not helpful!!

[2rebecca]

It's only easier because my kids are only with us part of the time and are with their dad for the rest which means husband tends to do his own thing alot when they are here, particularly regarding my son who is now at secondary school. I do the helping with homework, playing with them, taking them out etc. The kids and I also have some sporting hobbies which husband doesn't share, he has other hobbies. My son looks very like his dad and is similar to him personality wise. I probably don't help by automatically taking my son's side in arguments between them as sometimes my husband is right and my son has been unreasonable/ messy etc. My husband always seems to just get more annoyed with my son and be less gentle with him than he is with the other kids. He had a difficult relationship with his own son when he was younger though and his son felt his dad was always getting at him so maybe I'm a bit paranoid about it being a stepfather thing.

[6inchnipples]

2rebecca i also take ds side in arguments, also i'm guilty of butting in when they are perhaps sorting it out between them which probably makes it worse.

like your last paragraph i wonder too if this is more a personality thing, fact that ds so demanding etc rather than step parent issue, i often wonder if we had a son would he be like this with him, but then he wouldn't have my ex's genes and personality traits so maybe not!

Step families are so complicated.

Thanks for your help tho its good to know its not just like this in our house but in others too.

[Monkeygi]

Oh and in mine too! I'm so glad I found this thread. Not glad, obviously, that anyone else is having similar problems, but to know I'm not alone.
My ds1 is 13 and I met my dh when ds1 was 7.We have ds2 together, who is 15 months. Ds1 has always seen his real dad, although his real dad can be very unreliable when it suits him. Dh and ds1 clash so much, with ds1 even shouting horrible, hurtful things like "I wish you'd die" and "I hate you" to my dh. My dh can be (I think) very harsh on ds1 with punishments but then, I don't know. My own dad wasn't around when I was old enough to notice his treatment of my brothers so I have no idea what is 'normal' between fathers and sons and what isn't. I try v hard not to favour either side unfairly but always seem to end up more upset than either of them OR being told by one or other that I'm being unfair!!!
Maybe it's harder cos my dh has TOTALLY taken ds1 on as his own- he is the one to come to parents' evenings, he is the one to help with homework-and he pays for everything as exdh is useless and never pays maintenance.
Sorry for long and rambling post
Needed to vent, I suppose.
But as regards the cereal-yeuch. Although tbh, dh would probably have hoovered it up himself. He's like that.......

[marie1979]

ive got to answer to this one as i had the same problem my now ex treating my2 other kids diffrently to my oldest my ex would always pick on my oldest and call him names behind( yes the grown up) my back and annoy him so i would tell him off and send him to his room i found my ex smileing when i told my son of and my son stopped in his room to avoid my ex and everytime my son would come in the room to watch somthing he would pick up the remote or even come in frm the kitchen and say he was watching something when he wasnt and etc... anyway i split up with him i cud not stand that forever and my ex still doesnt see it was his fault hes says he done nothin wrong it was all my sons fault arghhhh

[monkeylaine]

I'm sorry everyone's going through this. I just want to add that I felt this way with my ex, who is the father of both my children. He favoured our DS and was not really interested in our DD. So I ended up protecting her.

I'm now divorced and am planning to marry my current partner - we have his son and my two kids living with us. My two see their dad a lot about 30% of each week, and my DSS is with us 24/7. We found we ended up being more protective of each others' children rather than the opposite, although we're trying to work towards treating them all the same. My DS (7) reckons I treats them all fairly and equally, so at least I give the impression of doing so.

I really do think it's more a personality issue, and possibly related to favouritism than being a step-parent.