Disengaging advice needed – stepkids plus mutual kids

Omamma had this to say about this morning’s Disengaging post:

Wondering who has a yours, mine, and ours blend and how disengagement worked for that situation…

I am facing the beginning of disengagement and have two biokids, one with DH. How do I strike a balance that is right for everyone?

As a stepmum without my own kids, I’m not exactly the oracle here.

Does anyone have advice or personal accounts to offer Omamma, and anyone else who might be wondering about disengaging in a stepfamily that includes mutual kids and/or your own kids from a previous partnership? (Often called a “complex” stepfamily.)

Did you try disengaging in your complex stepfamily? How did it go?

Disengaging

Disengaging is not a new concept in step-land.

But it was new to me when I first came across some articles a few months back.

At that time, I was trying trying trying to get the Lovely Man’s kids, and especially Boy A, to like me.

There were thoughtful little gifts, special efforts to make their favourite foods, questions about their interests and opinions.

Boy B was mostly ok, though he was wary and occasionally rejecting. The day I overheard him tell Boy A that he hated me I went into our bedroom and cried.

Boy C was, as ever, fun and funny to be around, offering me a level of mostly unconditional trust and pleasure at our friendship that felt like it was all that was getting me through.

Boy A, though, was really letting rip. Everything I did was stupid, he felt free to criticise my appearance, my cooking, my family. The sighs of disdain rang out and the eyes rolled and his gaze and ears were always averted from me. He actively sought to exclude me and tried to build alliances with the Lovely Man against me.

My poor sister used to patiently hear out my venting and say:

B, you’ve got to stop trying so hard! Just ignore him if he’s being nasty.

That was her approach with her own (heavily alienated) stepdaughter, and she found there was less pressure on them both.

But me? I Wasn’t Giving Up.

But then, after a particularly awful visit, I came across the disengaging concept.

Here’s the classic piece about The Disengaged Stepparent.

And Help! My Wife is Disengaged, an article aimed at men with frustrated stepparent partners.

And finally, Disengaging Made Easy.

(A lie, I’m afraid. It’s not actually easy. But it’s easier than the alternative!)

I didn’t follow the suggestions exactly.

I haven’t refused to do laundry, or made any big announcements. I will if I need to, though.

Here’s what I now do differently:

I’ve mostly given up cooking for the Boys.

It was causing me way too much grief to have my nice meals rudely rejected, so mostly I allow the Lovely Man make the dinners. If I do cook, it’s something their Dad makes that they’ve had a million times before, or a dessert that they’ve eaten in the past and liked. School lunches, when I make them, are exactly what they had the previous day.

The best thing? I’m not giving anyone a hook to hang their loyalty issues or desire to reject me on.

I now almost never buy little treats or presents for the Boys.

I liked doing it, but I didn’t like being expected to do it or not being thanked, so I stopped.

If, for instance, I decide to go to the fancy deli to buy Boy A’s favourite gourmet jam so he has an extra breakfast option, I don’t mention it, or I let him think the Lovely Man bought it.

It’s not that I don’t want to do nice things for the Boys – I do – it’s that I don’t want the stress of being unhappy with the way they choose to react, or to add to the “pity spoiling” they already get from other family members.

Instead, I aim to be completely present in the time I spend with them, whether that’s wrestling on the floor or helping with their homework.

I play with Boys B and C and hang out when and as much as I feel like.

Generally, we have a play session each day, but if I feel like staying in my bedroom with a book, then I do it without feeling guilty.

And because I’m actually enjoying the time I spend with the younger Boys rather than forcing it, we have more fun. They beg me to come and play now.

I no longer try to include Boy A. He’d be welcome if he wanted to join in, but he never does and I don’t mind at all.

I try to do what I say I will rather than “give in” to be popular.

So last visit I told the Boys they could choose a treat for two days of smooth morning school runs. If both mornings hadn’t ended being smooth, they would not have gotten their treat.

I tell Boy C exactly what time I will read until in the evenings, and it is his job to be in his PJs and in bed with clean teeth before that time. The longer he takes getting ready, the shorter his reading time. I don’t give in to cries of “just a few more minutes!”

Because I said I wouldn’t, that’s why. And I want them to know that I can’t be swayed by begging, pouting or bad behaviour.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Ironically, I’m both happier in myself and more popular with the Boys as a result of my decision to disengage.

There are different approaches to disengaging as a stepparent. Depending on the situation, it may not need to be full-scale, on-strike, you’re-hitchhiking-to-school revolution. But I bet there’s a few things in almost every stepmother’s life that might benefit from a strategic disengagement.

What do you disengage from in your stepfamily?

What could you disengage from?

Remember?

….how I was saying in my last post what a Lovely Man the Lovely Man is?

I was feeling a bit sad on Thursday night, while he was working late.

He must have noticed, because when he got home on Friday he waited endlessly, like for three hours patiently for me to finish and submit my assignment, then told me he had picked something up on his errands that afternoon that he needed to show me.

He left the room.

I could hear him bumping around in the laundry.

He said I should close my eyes.

When I opened them, I saw these:

I took the photo on my iPhone and played about with it using an image processing app recommended by Dooce called TiltShift Generator.

Even without ridiculous levels of colour saturation and creative vignetting, though, they are really, really beautiful.

And I am really, really lucky.

Lovely Man, if you’re reading this – thank you so much. Your thoughtfulness makes me even happier than the flowers, and they make me ecstatically happy every time I look at them.

I love you.

Not just when you bring me home flowers, either.

The question

My sweet, concerned Dad asked me a question the other day, in the aftermath of my first meeting with the Lovely Man’s ex-wife.

Dad: So, uh, do you see things working out with you and the Lovely Man long-term, B?

Me: Huh?

Dad: It’s just that you seem to find the situation with the Boys and the Boys’ Mum so stressful sometimes. Is it all worth it?

Me: (Thinks.) Well, I would say that the Lovely Man’s and my relationship is three times better than any relationship I’ve ever had. The reason that you see me struggle is that it also has at least three times the stressors that most really good relationships have to cope with. Things will get smoother with time, I guess. So, yes, absolutely.

Dad: Alright, I’m glad. Your Mum and I just want to know that you’re happy.

Me: I am, Dad.

It’s not always ever easy, being with a man with kids and an ex-wife.

But it’s always interesting. I often enjoy the Boys, and a whole new World of Step has opened up that fascinates me and has gotten me writing again.

But more than anything, I couldn’t ask for a better partner than my Lovely Man.

So when you add it all up, I think I’m very, very lucky.

What makes you feel lucky to be with your “partner in step”?

Another naked stepmum story

I had to chuckle reading Stef’s Naked Stepmum post.

(Unlike her, my title is a completely shameless trawl for readers. Sleazes and spambots, come on down!)

Boy C, as much as I love him, is unstoppable when it comes to nudity.

For a seven-year-old, his eyes-on-stalks are precociously well developed.

He’s a master exhibitionist, too – of the “bend over and spread the bumcheeks” variety.

Last week at the Kidhaus, he wandered into the bathroom while I was showering, ostensibly to ask me if he could have a snack.

He never bothers asking when I’m not naked, by the way – just climbs up onto the kitchen bench and helps himself.

Anyway, I was fairly relaxed about him being in the bathroom briefly. My seven-year-old nephew occasionally sees me nude, after all. I don’t have huge taboos around nakedness, and nor does the Lovely Man. Generally, it seems better not to make a big fuss and to just be matter-of-fact.

The problem was that after I’d said that yes, he could have a snack, he stood in the doorway, eyes-agoggle staring at me until I had to say:

Alright, Boy C, that’s enough. Out you go and give me some privacy to finish my shower now please.

No response.

Boy C, out you go NOW, please.

And with a huge, cheeky grin, he finally went.

Bookalicious

Oh my, but there’s a motherload of stepfamily books heading my way.

Nurse, it’s time for my shot of Vitamin Step Literature.

This order is so bitchingly huge that Amazon has comped me express shipping on many of the individual items. In fact, based on the quantity of emails arriving about this or that item being sent early or shipped ahead of the anticipated sending date, I’m starting to wonder if Amazon have allocated me a Personal Book Concierge.

It’s probably lucky they’re going to be showing up in dribs and drabs – the health and safety of the postman might be in jeopardy otherwise. I can just see him struggling up to the mailbox, tiny motorbike at a sickening lean as half the world’s annual output of stepfamily books weigh down his panniers.

Is it only me with a groaning shelf and a hotkey to Amazon’s stepfamily department?

(Before you write me off as a total self-help tragic, most of the upcoming haul were ordered for one of my uni subjects – I’ve enrolled in a graduate course in Alternative Dispute Resolution and have chosen stepfamily mediation as a research topic…. but that’s a series of intrusive questions for another time.)

Do you obsessively read step books? What are your can’t-live-without favourites?

The Unnegotiables

Boy A once described something as “unnegotiable” – I’ve never forgotten the clumsy word.

A brilliant post from Urban Stepmom got me thinking about what is “unnegotiable” for me.

In the past, I’ve tended to put up and shut up a lot, endeavouring to silently tolerate situations that leave me grinding my teeth.

It’s not that I’m planning to institute a Reign of Terror, but there are certainly aspects of our stepfamily life that give me so much stress or plain niggling annoyance that I need to try to change them.

In the end, gritting my teeth and trying to endure just causes a kind of overflow effect, where the pent-up stress makes me less able to handle other stresses that wouldn’t normally rock me.

The little things often seem to create more frustration that the Big Bad Majorly Ugly Issues.

I’ve always taken the view that I can’t make changes happen by myself; without the Lovely Man on board nothing will be different. Some of these I’ve half-heartedly tackled in the past, been met with assurances that things will change and then watched, frustrated, as the same old song kept on a-playin’.

Maybe it’s a question of really speaking clearly and firmly about my feelings, negotiating solutions and then following through with determination.

In a stepfamily don’t ask, don’t get sometimes translates to don’t insist, don’t get.

One thing I’ve learned is that in selected matters that are REALLY important to you, you can’t afford for your concerns to represent the path of least resistance, or the extended family members who don’t mind recruiting Nasty or Whingy to get their way will automatically prevail.

After all, if I say I really want something, but back down from insisting, the Boys or their Mum’s contrary wishes will always bulldoze through, leaving me waving my tiny garden trowel and squeaking But!.. But!.. in their wake.

So here are some matters I’m going to aim to have formally added to the Family Unnegotiable List over the next few months.

No kids in my ensuite bathroom.

The Lovely Man recently commented that if we were to do a planned remodel where we move the weirdly-sited back toilet into the main bathroom and turn the extra space into a walk-in pantry, we would need to be flexible about letting the Boys use the ensuite if another kid was already in the main bathroom.

If that’s the deal, I’d rather keep my cooking appliances in their current unreachable ten foot high storage cupboards and retain my ensuite sanctuary.

After all, we have another bathroom that the Boys can use in the studio.

Our ensuite is the only place I have in the entire house guaranteed kid free. Otherwise known as The Sanity Room.

Sanity and wee on the floor are mutually incompatible, in my view.

No toys in the loungeroom

Our loungeroom is basically a wide hallway. I’ve tried asking the Lovely Man to encourage the kids to keep toys out of the walkway. I’ve even corralled toys onto one rug so we can transit the loungeroom without clocking up painful Kid Recreational Equipment Injuries.

No matter what I do, the lounge instantly becomes an obstacle course of Lego, remote-controlled vehicles of various descriptions, comics and general junk the moment the kids arrive in our city. I can’t handle the complete encroachment of kid chaos any more.

From next visit, there will be a designated playroom set up near the kitchen.

(Oh, and please don’t tell me That’s just living with kids. We are talking about domestic crazy of Hurricane In ToyWorld proportions here, not just normal kid mess. I have the pictures to prove it.)

Pleases and Thankyous – every time!

Self-explanatory… I don’t feel good about giving or doing for the Boys unless they Use Their Manners.

They’re getting a lot better already – at the instigation of the Lovely Man, impolite requests and answers are met with Pardon? Pardon?

I’m sure it’s violently irritating to them. But it’s also highly, highly effective.

Effective is good.

Kids who don’t answer when offered food/asked for their flavour preference/their opinion don’t get what’s on offer/don’t get consulted further.

I am not going to stand begging them to pick from raspberry or chocolate like they are doing me a favour.

Currently they know that the Lovely Man will make sure he persists until they eventually decide to pay attention.

This visit, they’re going to learn that if they’re not on the ball by my second inquiry, the opportunity to get whatever it is will just fade away.

What’s on your “Unnegotiables” wish list? Or what would you like to put on there if you could?

No place like home

Another week in stepmother land is over. I’m home, back in my city after what feels like many weeks but has actually been a little over three.

The Lovely Man, on the other hand, worked out mid-last month that he would spend four nights in our home in our city in the six weeks ahead.

Admittedly, we were on holiday sans enfants for over two weeks in the middle of that time, but the time away from home brought about by our fly-in/fly-out step/parenting schedule costs us both in terms of feeling settled and as though we have a secure base.

The Lovely Man is still with the Boys in their city. The time apart can be hard to cope with, too. It’s doubly hard for the Lovely Man, who, of course, is almost always away from either the Boys or me.

Still, we’re lucky we have the option to maintain this two-city life. Financially, in terms of our work commitments, even our energy and health, it’s a stretch – changes to any of these factors could potentially derail our opportunity to sustain our base in our city, the one that actually feels like home.

As I’m sure any non-stepmom would be happy to tell me, I knew what I was getting into.

Of course, as any stepmother could affirm, you never really know what you’re getting into.

It’s very hard sometimes – the travel, the sense of dislocation, being away from my friends and family, going so quickly from single to having three kids to help care for.

I wouldn’t change it. Not for a second.

But I’m so, so glad to be home.

A sticky one

Boy C, in the car on our way home from dinner last night, within earshot of Boy A, Boy B and the Lovely Man:

B, I want to ask you a question?

Me:

Sure. What do you want to know?

Boy C:

When will you have babies?

Me:

(Gulps, hearing Boy A’s ears swivel around to listen)

Boy C, continuing at warp speed:

If you do, will they be girls? Will they be super annoying? Will they try to push me off a cliff?

Me, very relieved at where the second, third and fourth questions took this discussion:

Ummm. Well. What I can say is, if I ever did have babies and they pushed you off a cliff, that would be much worse than annoying.

Perhaps I should have engaged with this question seriously and dug to find out if Boy C was feeling a bit insecure, but attempted in front of Boy A it would have been a straight-back-to-Mummy, lose/lose endeavour.

So I didn’t.

Divided loyalties

Loyalty conflicts are perhaps the key to the challenging nature of life in a stepfamily.

Loyalty binds of various kinds for kids, a sense of loyalty imbalanced or even betrayed for step-parents, divided loyalties for repartnered parents.

Recently, I read a superb description of the problematic but central role of loyalty in stepfamily life in an article by therapist William J. Doherty, originally published in the Family Therapy Networker, May/June, 1999, pp. 32-38, 54.

Given recent posts on Wednesday Martin’s blog, and subsequent discussion in the comments, about the importance of finding a therapist who is knowledgeable about stepfamily dynamics, I found this article particularly topical.

Interestingly, Doherty notes that he has no personal experience of life in a stepfamily. That being so, all I can say is full marks for empathy!

I really, really recommend reading the full article.

For non-clickers, though, I have included several paragraphs that, for me, eloquently encapsulate the challenges and achievements of stepfamily life.

More than anything else, stepfamilies make us face the unpleasant truth that core goals of adults and children, and of husbands and wives, sometimes diverge in family life.  We want a divorce and our children want us to stay married to their parent.  We want to remarry and our kids want us to stay single–or remarry our original spouse…. We want our new spouse to love our children the way we do, and they are… counting the years till the children leave home.  When stepfamilies nevertheless succeed in creating a nurturing life together, as many ultimately do, it is a striking human achievement.

….

Conceived after a loss and born in a love affair that represents the renewal of hope for grownups but not for children, stepfamilies strive everyday to reconcile that which cannot be fully reconciled… Stepfamilies are the moral pioneers of contemporary family life, showing us all how to love and persevere in the face of loyalties that multiply and divide but never fully converge.*

*This extract is quoted under the Fair Use doctrine of the Copyright Act 2009 for the purposes of criticism, comment and education.