Is it easy to be married to a man who has a child from previous marriage? My answer would be NO. There definitely comes huge work on psychological issues concerning everyone – you yourself, step child, your husband, and his ex. Even if your husband is a very caring, attentive, understanding and loving person there still will be situations to work on in each individual case. And this requires great psychological endurance.
According to personal experience, private conversations and forums, the main fear for women who are in such a situation is that their children would be 2nd-rated comparing to the children from the first marriage. It also is a big problem that women feel less special during pregnancy if their husband already has a child from another woman. They keep overthinking and comparing, and here is the time to work on the relationship for both partners.
As I’ve already mentioned, I am a stepmother myself to a boy who lives with his mother, but spends quite a lot of time with us. I do love my husband and his son very much, and I did understand very well that by marrying him I will “marry” his son and ex-wife as well. Still, that did not save me from anguish and suffering until my husband and I built harmonious relationship taking into consideration his son and ex-wife. As I feel this topic is of interest to many women, I’ve decided to share my personal experience on how it worked out for my husband and me.
“SO THEY ARE NO LONGER TWO, BUT ONE FLESH. THEREFORE WHAT GOD HAS JOINED TOGETHER, LET NO ONE SEPARATE.” -MATTHEW 19:6
1.The first and most important thing to do was for my husband and me to become two parts of a single whole. It is very important that partners realize that there is no longer “just me” or “just you”. Now there is “us”.
In this particular situation it means that all the decisions are made together and that we spend time with the boy together – thus I never feel lonely or unwanted. It is always fun time together and we all decide together what we would like to do.
2.Do not interfere in parenting of your step child.
Of course, there could be exceptions and sometimes the relationship with the ex-wife is on a decent level, but in our situation we found ourselves stressing out all the time as our understanding of decent parenting did not coincide with the understanding of my husband’s ex-wife at all. We spent more than a year in a such tense relationship. It felt as if we had one big family, and the feeling was not a pleasant one. The stress we suffered also had an impact on our relationship as a couple and we felt that things have to be changed. We went through serious psychological work and were able to accept that the mother of a boy is the one who lives with him permanently, so we decided that she should be the one who determines the principal way of parenting. My husband no longer discusses parenting issues with her as it leads nowhere, but what we try to do is to give the best we can to the child by educating him and to show that at our home there might be different rules of behaving from ones he has with his mother. We are trying to show him best example we could on how to be a good person and we hope it’ll help in the long run.
3.Do not lose your heart and get discouraged if the mother of a child sets the child against you or your husband
Nothing could be done here. Just behave with dignity. Do not try to set the child against the mother. It’s just disgusting. I know it is quite easy to say but REALLY hard to do, but try to isolate these emotions from your communication with the child. Be yourself, show the child your care and love. The hope is that the child will understand everything one day. And if not – you still know you did your best and did not lose your self-esteem.
4.Give the child your unconditional love
The relationships of the triangle you-your partner-his ex should not be taken into consideration. Not when you communicate with the child. It also doesn’t matter whether the child is behaving to your expectations or not. Always remember that the child is struggling being pulled between parents all the time. Yes, you should try to help the child to become a better person. Just try to control your negative emotions, as misbehaving of a child in your opinion could be considered as normal behaviour with the mother. The child is not trying to make you angry on purpose. He or she just sticks to things that are everyday practice for him or her.
All in all being a step-mother requires from you to become a better person all the time. It teaches you to become a steady, balanced person. It strengthens your relationship with your partner if you do it right. Every little victory and achievement makes you proud of yourself. These all difficulties actually make you a happier person if you’re not running away from them. Just remember, that you’re not alone out there. Your partner is there for you, and together you can move mountains.
APPROACHING IT WITH RIGHT ATTITUDE, THE QUOTATION BY FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE SEEMS TO BE QUITE TRUTHFUL: “THAT WHICH DOES NOT KILL US MAKES US STRONGER.”
If you have any comments, please, do share your thoughts and experience, discussions are fun!