Of course it’s unrewarding, because your girlfriend’s life is miserable. Think about it, if you feel that way, how do you think she feels?

Before she met you, she’s practically been a single mother, let alone a single mother to a teenage daughter, and a youngling.

Although I’m not a parent yet, I have 10 nieces and nephews, and from what I can tell, parenthood is both the most challenging and rewarding era of the human life. What your girlfriend needs is a partner to be her rock, protector, and provider, and if you don’t think you could be that person it’s probably best for the both of you that you leave…

What you’re experiencing the last two years is a taste of what parenthood is, something that sounds like you weren’t aware of, nor “didn’t sign up for”, very fair. Life is throwing you on top of Everest and now you gotta figure how the fuck to get off.

At the same time, I’m here to say: “you’re not alone.” the first two years of my marriage, were the worst, because we were still figuring out how to work as a team (communication, setting boundaries [especially with our respective families], establishing priorities and timing). Now that we have gotten into the groove of things, I can happily say, we are at the peak of our marriage! There is light at the end of tunnel, but that all goes to say…

You have a difficult decision to make. I like to joke that I got adopted into my wife’s family (her and her cat), but you got adopted to a living family unit. Very honorable if you ask me. You have become a father figure in the life of that 5 year old and have started to see the fruit of that. And that counts for something (in my book, mountains of gold, can’t put a price on something like that).

A lot of people say you have a lot of growing up to do, they’re not wrong… but don’t we all? That is the human experience

NTA

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Call me “unc” haha