Leah, part 5

[leahsue]

Yes, Cadence, I'll go back and re-read my post but I thought I was clear about needing more from him than the lame first thing that popped out of his mouth.... about not wanting to raise more kids.

In re-thinking how that conversation might have gone, I wish I'd said- so what if her STBXH gets their kids? Then what? She'll be back in as a candidate? That's absurd.

Like I said, the more I think about the whole thing, the less and less I feel that I would want to R, even if the chance arises. There would have to be SO much more assurance and commitment from him, and that has not come close at all to where he is.

I know his family loves me, and I don't think they would want us to D. It's not so much that they (nor he) thought I was a bad step-mother, so much as they all felt (and they were right about this) that as she got older, the lines between the three of us just became more strained, almost like a competition for his attention, which sounds ridiculous to even write those words. But I believe you GET IT. The problem was not as much how she acted, but more how HE acted, almost like he could only be attentive to one of us at a time, and as more fights about it ensued, the more of a "thing" it became. So naturally with us having zero conflict resolution skills as a couple, and his tendency to stick his head in the sand to avoid conflict, it escalated. One of the comments his sister made to me was- "well, we all knew you were jealous of D- for God's sakes, she's his DAUGHTER. That's just weird." Yet all 5 of the siblings in his family felt abandoned by their own mother, when she put a man above them, and left them for him. Although their relationships with her now are close, as they all began to build lives with spouses and children, each of the 5 was firmly of the belief that their children would always come first. That was not such a big deal in the ones who are still in the original marriage, but for the ones who have re-married and are now in step-family situations, I've heard every one of the siblings say- "I told my H/W when we married, I'm going to love you, etc. etc., but my child/children will always come before you, and I 'll make sure they know it." MY H said it plainly to me before we married! So it's not like I wasn't warned! I just wish we could have started earlier with some counseling as a step-family about how to deal with those issues, rather than letting them just build over the years until they became topics we couldn't even discuss anymore. Also, when we married, SD was 5, so it didn't start to become an issue until she began to hit puberty and began to realize her own power with her dad. I know she loves me, and I believe overall, I was a good step-mother to her. But there's no doubt that she enjoys his full, complete attention now, especially on these family trips, without me there to expect some attention from him too.

I've always been ashamed that I couldn't rise above that issue and just open my heart bigger and wider. I was the adult, and I should have been able to at least seek my own IC for the problems I had with it, rather than let it fester.

It is so freeing to her you speak of it openly, without my feeling like I'm suggesting some sort of inappropriate father-daughter sexual weirdness. It was NEVER that.

Also, his EX has never remarried, and she has been a big influence in SD's attitude about me over the years. For instance, when H's sister was dying at home from cancer a couple of years ago, EX-W wanted to come and sit in the house with the whole family as the time drew closer to her passing. My H finally agreed she could come and see his sister, but could not just set up camp there with the rest of us. (And that was b/c he can't stand to be around her, nothing to do with me.) Well, SD was about 17 and in a real rebellious place in her attitude toward me, and she saw her dad's refusal to let her mother come and stay as being all about me, and she was very angry. One afternoon I drove up and was walking toward the garage, and SD and a cousin were standing in the garage just chilling. As SD saw me approach, she turned and ran into the house without speaking to me. I followed her on into the big family room and saw that she had run to her dad and plopped down in his lap. Now there is NOTHING wrong with that, although it maybe looked a little awkward b/c she has a large frame and is as tall as her dad, so maybe it would have seemed a little weird to my anyway, but whatever..... she turned her body in a way that he could not see that I had arrived. I knew exactly what she was doing, so I just quietly went to the other end of the room and sat down to visit with others. When H looked up about 5 minutes later and saw me, he said- WOW LEAH, I didn't even know you were here! Just pushed D off his lap in one swoop, and came right to where I was and greeted me with a big hug. He didn't think one thing about the whole scene, but that CANNOT have felt good to his SD. I feel so ashamed when I think of how that must have made her feel. It didn't make me feel good either. I'd guess that most of the women in the room saw it, felt it, and understood it, but I doubt a single man in there, H included, saw anything at all.

For the life of me, I can't think how I should have handled it differently. By that time, it was such a source of stress for me, I was heavy into avoidance of the whole thing too. Felt easier to sweep it under the rug and press on. I didn't do very well at that though, because I ended up completely blacking out a the wheel of my car that night in the pouring rain and wrecking my car, with H is the car behind me, which he says took years off his life from fear. I can't imagine. I had every test known to man done after that, and finally was diagnosed as having had a panic attack. Ya think? So we both have some serious issues with conflict.

I didn't mean to ramble, but I'm finding it very healing to re-open some of this pre-BD pain and begin to pick through the ashes of the R, to own what I should, heal where I can, forgive myself as much as possible, and vow to love bigger and wider with my whole heart from now on, with ALL of the people. There is never a shortage of love to go around. It doesn't have to be divided. There's more than enough for everyone. I just wish so badly that I could have risen to that earlier and saved us all a lot of pain.

R or not, maybe someday I'll have the chance to sit down with her, woman to woman, and ask her forgiveness for any pain I inadvertently caused her, due to my own worthiness issues. There should be more self-help books out there to help step-parents navigate these waters. I could never find any, but I probably didn't look hard enough. I had no idea what was at stake.

I'm also ashamed of that whole situation, because H was a wonderful step-dad to my children. He loved them unconditionally, was the rock that held us all together when my S came out, and it just came naturally for him, I guess due to his philosophy about children always coming first. I do know he wondered why I couldn't just be the same with his D. I never had the same issue with SS. To this day, he loves me and recalls those years in our home with love and happiness.

Oh well, life goes on. We grow and we learn.