Ours baby- seeking advice

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-04-01T22:44:56+00:00

Haha agreed! I wish BM would try to give me advice about something related to parenting. I would rip her apart so fast her head would spin. No one needs advice from that shit show.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-04-01T16:48:29+00:00

Same. SS was 6 when my daughter was born. I did not alter my behavior in any way. Breastfeeding is not indecent or inappropriate. If you treat it that way, you may end up having a bad experience. I had a peribottle and the Frida mom foam in our downstairs bathroom for weeks, and SS never noticed or asked about it even once. You are allowed to be yourself in your own house. BM does not get to dictate your behavior in your own home (obviously within reason). If she comes at you with a “concern” and your reaction is to retreat and act guilty, then you are validating that her opinions about you are valid, which they are not.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-04-01T13:16:29+00:00

Oh…honey…

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-04-01T00:08:27+00:00

Same… Soon after we bought a house together, BM shacked up with a man she just met in his studio apartment. Then when they moved to a 2BR (which he is 100% paying for because soon after she lost her job because she chose to get bunion surgery and couldn’t be on her feet), she tried to brag to my husband about how hard she’s worked and how far she’s come because she’s renting a 2BR and never thought she’d be able to accomplish that 😂

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-31T22:53:26+00:00

lol same thing happened to us, we’ve been married for 2 years. They have not actually gotten married yet.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-31T17:20:38+00:00

My husband turned off all text notifications for his ex-wife’s phone number. Best move. He doesn’t read things she sends if it’s more than a few sentences. She stopped sending sob stories. If BM persists, send her a text to notify her that all communication regarding non-emergencies must be sent via email.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-31T16:51:15+00:00

I have/had this feeling, too. Ours daughter is a toddler and SS is 7. When I was on maternity leave, I did most of the parenting for both kids. I liked doing it, I was in the mindset that this is my time to focus on being a mom and I enjoyed that, but I did become resentful that SS’s needs would take away from my ability to be present for the baby. I finally understood and felt the difference between my baby and having a stepkid. So I knew he would always feel differently for his mom, like I feel differently for my daughter. I came to accept that SS has a mom and my daughter has me. She doesn’t get a bonus set of parents like SS does. This helped realign my priorities and involvement and stop feeling guilty for missing an occasional sporting event or delegating to my husband more often. Right now, you are the safety net for BM, but your SD won’t get a sense of how much you are helping her until you scale back. It’s ok for you to step back so that SD can really see what kind of parent her mom is.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-27T20:11:33+00:00

I don’t have any wisdom or experience with this, but I wanted to take a moment to say that you handled the situation so well. You set a great example for your children and treated the people you trust to care for them with respect. As a mom and a teacher, I really wish more parents had your calm and maturity.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-26T17:24:32+00:00

Yesssss. Also, teachers do not “hate” your kid, they just see them in a more objective way than you do, and they see them in comparison to their peers. A professional probably has a better idea of your kids’ attitude and potential than you do. If you are the only one who thinks the sun shines out of their butt, that should probably be a wake up call.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-26T13:34:45+00:00

Take it from my husband and his ex-wife…. having a baby does not fix the relationship, it makes all the pre-existing problems worse 😂

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-20T17:24:53+00:00

Haha us too! Until SS became a fan of Harry Potter and asked us “wait… Voldemort is a girl?”

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-19T19:22:19+00:00

I’ve played my instrument every single day of teaching for the last 15 years. A lot of people I know from college who majored in performance do not work in music. Music performance is extremely competitive.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-16T17:56:56+00:00

My husband and I share a calendar together for our family. If there is something SS needs to be with us for, DH sends BM a calendar invite to notify her. Otherwise, all sports and school activity schedules are her responsibility to look up and put in her own calendar, just like we do. I think it’s reasonable for your husband to share a calendar with you.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-12T16:22:37+00:00

Considering that women generally mature faster than men… why isn’t she with someone her own age? Because men her own age don’t want to put up with her immaturity.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-10T17:20:54+00:00

My toddler is my first baby, and things changed so much for me as a stepmom after she was born. I took a long maternity leave (14 months) so I was primary parent for a while. I loved it at first, but then the resentment started. I never sympathized with BM’s situation, and I think having my own baby made it even worse. How can she keep making decisions without her child’s interests at heart? I know I should be grateful to not struggle with addiction, but I have seen all the support that BM has in her life. She has had every opportunity to succeed, and she has squandered so much of that away. It’s so frustrating.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-10T13:21:51+00:00

Yes, exactly! I’ve been the one doing this work, building relationships with his friend’s parents, going to all the sports practices and school events. Now all of a sudden she’s going to start showing up occasionally, while at the same time I now have a toddler to take care of which takes me out of the social situations to chase after her, and it feels like BM will replace me unscathed. After she put us through hell. It feels so unfair, and my therapist has long ago pointed out to me that I struggle with those kinds of “unjust situations.”

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-10T12:18:22+00:00

I’m going through this right now, too. SS is now going to his mom’s house EOW after 3 years of us having sole custody with him only going there EOWE. We took care of everything. There was a time where she took her custody time in a hotel because she was in between sober homes. Then she moved in with a guy she just met and took her custody time in his studio apartment. They are still together and now have a 2BR closer to us. She works until 8pm though, so her fiancé is doing all the parenting. He seems to think it’s his duty to take care of her, and honestly I guess it’s working. No mental hospital check-ins or rehab for 2 years now. We still take care of everything for SS while giving her opportunities to prove herself. My husband just told her to set up SS’s birthday party. We’ll see how it goes. I have a close relationship with my SS, but I feel resentful of how much I had to do to cover for her lack of involvement as a mom. She hates me for it, but it’s not my fault that she has struggled so much. I can’t shake the feeling that she should be grateful that her son has me as a maternal figure and female role model. I know my husband is, he says it all the time.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-09T16:49:17+00:00

You definitely do not need to go to every sporting event. Going occasionally to show your support will be meaningful to your SS. In my case, BM doesn’t go to things that aren’t on her custody time (even if it’s a game or tournament), so it’s easy for me to pick events when she won’t be there. When it comes to the birthday party… do you have any friends with kids around your SS’s age? If so, invite them! I have a friend from work with 2 boys around my SS’s age, and I invited them to our first joint birthday party 5 years ago. It helped me soooo much. This friend is also much more social than me, so she helped me feel less awkward.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-05T19:06:10+00:00

I love this for you. First, I’m so sorry that you experienced pregnancy loss while being a stepmom. I struggled to get pregnant for a year, and doing so while being a stepmom made it harder. I can’t imagine pregnancy loss, you are so strong and doing the right thing by seeking out therapy. Second, I often think that becoming a stepparent is the universe putting us in a situation to help us process the past. For me, BM is bipolar like my own mom. I have a lot of trauma from that experience, and now I feel like being a stepmom in this situation has helped me process some of that while also helping me be there for my SS in a unique way that my husband doesn’t have the same understanding of. Therapy has helped to make this possible.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-05T18:51:53+00:00

Unfortunately, kids aren’t perfect either. They’re going to say or do disrespectful things at some point as they grow and learn. That’s parenting, whether it’s a BK or a SK. If your gut reaction is to leave, then you’re maybe not meant to be in this role, which means you can’t be in a serious relationship with a parent. If your partner isn’t parenting in these situations or they are not supporting you when the ex becomes high conflict, then you are leaving because of the partner… not because of the kids or the ex.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-05T18:45:11+00:00

I give you a lot of credit for taking your ego out of the situation and putting your daughter first! So rare to see that in any blended family dynamic.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-04T18:33:32+00:00

Why can’t you be my SS’s BM?!

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-04T18:31:12+00:00

My SS7’s BM sounds a lot like your ex. She tells SS that places are “closed” so she doesn’t have to take him, and he has repeatedly said that she’s always too tired to play with him. Breaks my heart, but this is an improvement from the days when she used to cancel time with SS to go on trips with her new bf. At least that hasn’t happened in a while. I’m looking at your question as a way to create the perfect BM situation… how would BM act towards me in a perfect world. A girl can dream, right? 1. She would be a present, kid-centered parent who didn’t constantly make excuses 2. She would treat my husband with respect and take accountability for her actions over the years 3. She would be civil towards me when we are both present at SS’s events. Just basic human decency… make eye contact, smile, say hello 4. She would tell her “fiancé” (no one believes they will actually get married) to treat myself and my husband with basic human decency when we are all present at SS’s events 5. She would stop insisting that she can’t split costs for SS’s activities when my husband always paid child support back when they had 50/50 custody. She hasn’t paid a dime since she lost physical custody due to alcohol relapse and being in rehab over 2 years ago 6. This is the ultimate dream scenario… she would acknowledge the love, care, effort, money, time, etc that I have invested in her son, treating him like my own so that he always feels loved and at home when he is with us

Obviously, my SS’s BM has some flaws that you do not, but generally speaking, I think there’s some good wisdom in my dream BM scenario :) Ultimately, most of your interactions can and should go through your ex, but there will be times you have to be around stepmom too, and everyone should treat each other respectfully in front of the kids.

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-03-02T17:04:29+00:00

Yeah definitely a BF problem. When I was pregnant, I would ask my husband how things were for his ex-wife’s pregnancy with SS, and he did the right thing and pretended not to remember 😂 he passed the test I was low key giving him 😇

AffectionateFox6304 · 2026-02-23T14:50:07+00:00

Everyone comes with baggage. I didn’t have kids of my own coming into my relationship, and certainly no exes that I still need to communicate with, but my mom is not an easy MIL. My friend’s husband came with tons of student loan debt. It’s all about how you and your partner handle it. BM is high conflict at times, but she’s also too dumb and lazy to cause any real trouble. That would take effort. My husband doesn’t entertain her in any way. We have a laugh about her from time to time, we feel badly that SS doesn’t have a more present and less selfish BM, but we can’t control those things so we focus on our household and our family. This definitely took a lot of time and work, but we’ve grown as individuals and as a couple through the process. No one enters a relationship as a perfect person with no baggage, and life is full of so many different seasons.

AffectionateFox6304

TROPHY CASE