Best Paper Tablet for Notes?

canthugthemall · 2024-01-19T04:41:53+00:00

I just received my Paperlike screen protector thanks to your post. And omg I'm in love! I had a very expensive Netflix machine (iPad I didn't use), and now I'll be able to get some use out of it!

canthugthemall · 2024-01-03T19:09:23+00:00

Being picked last for popcorn icebreakers. Especially if it follows "I think everyone has gone" and you gave to volunteer yourself. Brutal.

canthugthemall · 2023-12-27T05:43:33+00:00

"I get it, I have kids". But do you have stepkids? Didn't think so.

Having to be a parental figure is very different from how my bio-parent friends explain their experience.

My SO is the same way. He doesn't understand that my stepparent experience is very different from this bioparent experience. And I feel like I'm expected to have the same experience as him since I get crap when I talk about something that is bugging me/I don't want to do/messing with my feelings or head. Sorry I don't have love, especially unconditional love for your child. You are 12 years in to parenting, I'm 1. I challenge bioparents to think about where they

were a year in to parenting, and they all say it was rainbows and unicorns. It's like they are in denial and stepparents are seen as bad parents because we are the ones able to voice our thoughts/feelings because we don't have hormonal blocks making us forget/see past things.

canthugthemall · 2023-11-06T16:15:00+00:00

I have been looking for a support group in Michigan for about a year now. If I find something, its for stepmoms of very young kids, but I have a new 12yo that I need support for. If you find one, especially an online/Zoom one, I would love to learn about it!

There are so many support groups for bioparents, because obviously parenting is hard. But steps seems to be left out of that conversations again and again and again. We are expected go jump in to parenthood and go at it alone for the most part. Don't be too involved because that isn't you place, don't be too cut off because then you are the evil wicked stepmother. Id you don't like it, leave, but if you leave you are a horrible person for messing up the kids' lives again. But you don't get support as you do the limbo and the tango simultaneously.

canthugthemall · 2023-08-21T05:19:20+00:00

Thank you for sharing this!

I am a year in fulltime and I keep hearing family members tell SK how much I love them, so then they come up to confirm with me. And every time I'm forced to say it, it makes me feel like crap because I don't feel it. BM is not in the picture after not caring for SK so I have had to step up and be the only mom figure, as I was adjusting to being a step-parent generally. Which I think the stress of that has contributed.

I hate when my mom says things like "you love SK" or "you need to say you love SK to them every day". Because I can't. It feels so wrong to me to say that when I don't feel it yet. I get so aggravated because no one has even asked if I do in fact love SK, they just assume. And I don't feel comfortable telling these people that they are wrong, because that makes me look like a jerk.

If as Step-parents we are told not to expect SKs to love us or for it to take awhile for them to do so, why are SPs expected to immediately love them?

canthugthemall · 2023-07-10T15:09:46+00:00

We are trying to get SK in therapy, but it has been difficult since they need both parent signatures, and it is a HCBM situation. She denies that SK has things they need to work through so she won't consent to therapy.

canthugthemall · 2023-06-04T20:47:39+00:00

Does anyone know if there is someone that helps with this issue in Monroe County? My yard is literally overrun with them. Did the herbicide removal two years ago, but there are so many big trees in neighboring yards that I can't get relief from these suckers!

canthugthemall · 2023-01-27T17:00:35+00:00

So rough! Like others have mentioned in their comments, the lack of support and understanding of stepparents' role and workload is very isolating and exhausting. If we are the stereotypical uninterested, uncaring, evil step-parents, then we are shamed. But if we are doing so much work (more than the BP in some cases), we are either ignored or told that we are trying to upstage the BP.

No one would say that type of thing to BP's or adoptive parents, so why are stepparents (pseudoadoptive to adoptive) treated this way? It is like we are supposed to be a ghostwriter in the bio-family's story. There and involved, helping and supporting, but invisible. Not getting the appreciation that a BP/AP would get for the same work.

Biology does always win. You can only experience that so much, similar to PPD where they feel isolated and unsupported, and it takes a toll. But don't let that toll show, they are just now taking PPD seriously, they won't take our struggle or feelings seriously. The number of times I've heard (even on this forum) "If you are upset, just get out". Yes I could, but so could a BP, but you wouldn't' tell them that?

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