I have lived with my DH for 8 years, and married for the last 2 of those. Our marriage has remained strong in the face of a lot of stress thrown at us by the BM and SDs, because he has not tried to stop me expressing negative feelings about either the BM or his daughters, and he has in most situations, made me his first priority, always over his ex, and often over his daughters.
Where I have taken a back seat is that I disengaged 8 years ago, so do nothing any more as a family with him and the SDs. He has one on one time with them EOW, and I do my own thing, for most of the weekend. I think he appreciates that he has this space to be with them, and I do not encroach on it at all. So as you can see, there is a LOT of give and take, a lot of tolerance from both of us. I don't think your marriage will work well, if your DH always puts your feelings 2nd, and you always feel short-changed. This will lead to a build up of long term resentment on your part which will poison your feelings for him, eventually.

Here is what worked for me. I was in a mess when we moved in together. We dated for 4 years at that point and it was great. I moved in and all hell broke loose with BM, PAS'ing and the SD and SS.

Fast forward 2 years and things are pretty good. We are finally starting to be happy again.

I will be happier when SS13 is 18 and I can go off on BM and SD15. What helped us was me disnegaging completely. Conversations with BM stopped. All done by email only and the occasional text. SS waking up and realizing that his mother only cares about his sister and asking to live with us full time. SD suing us to live with BM and not being allowed back in our home. And DH and I taking dance lessons once a week. (You can't argue about the kids while trying to learn to tango.) Worked better for us than therapy. Tried that and all we did was fight harder. We did a few weekend vacations without kids and I think that is the only thing that kept us together as a couple.

Disengaging was probably the best thing for the household. I had to no longer be involved in conversations about SD and BM. I just learned to walk away. I started volunteering more and being out of the house in the evenings.

When SD left all the drama left my house. It has been almost two years and I am starting to feel like the old me is coming back. I am still very angry with SD and BM and someday will have my say. But, for now, it gets better everyday.

We are ok.We're aren't deliriously happy but we aren't on the brink of divorce either. Mostly because I've stopped allowing myself to be responsible for protecting DH against his ex and his kid. I just step back and let them steamroll over him.If he allows it then it must not bother him so why should I let it bother me?

When SD is in my home,I stay under the radar and leave the two of them alone as much as humanly possible.That way I don't have to deal with her fake personality and babyish qualities and i'm less likely to have some sort of psychotic break at something stupid she has said or done.

I will tell you I'm looking forward to getting my husband back when SD begins driving and discovers she doesn't necessarily HAVE to come to our house.That is going to be a beautiful day.

I'll put it this way, I'm not in any way responsible for the deterioration of SD's relationship with her father but I don't mourn that deterioration either. I will be here for my husband to cry on my shoulder when SD puts the hammer to his heart and then we will move on and create a full and happy life that DOESN'T revolve around the whims and fancy's of a spoiled rotten entitled teenager.

Me & hubby have been together 8 yrs, married for 5. We we were also together a few years in highschool so we've know each othe for 17yrs. BM also went to HS with us so we are all familiar with each other. We have had challenges but what has helped is that DH has NEVER bended or allow BM to do what she wants. She did try the typica "you can't see the kids". DH response, Ok they will want to see me eventually and they did. BM knows that DH will not bend or sugar coat things for her so she can voice her opinion but it doesn' mean much in his eyes. She will only voice her negative commends to SK's and others and it does get back to us but it's usually something that is not true so we will just clear things up with SK's and keep it moving. She event went as far to tell SK's that I didnt like them because she married DH first.SS told this to MIL who flipped and told him that crap was no true and to tune his mom out when she started to talk like that. Heck, I'm actually glad they were married first because by the time we got married he was much or mature and KNEW what a bad marriage was and didn't want to go down that road again. DH has to stand his grounds or BM will continue to control your home and your happiness. Don't allow her to have that type of power over you.

Well, What I did was stop trying to be my ss's mom! I really wasnt trying to take her place, but i wanted kids so bad I would act like thier mom when they visited and then when it came down to a decision being made about them (school, health, or dieet) I THOUGHT I had a say, WRONG! Thats when I realized that I was really looked at as a babysitter, cook, maid, and taxi driver.

That when I stopped all the extra stuff. When they visited I played games with them, or mad them popcorn. But no keepin them when dh is not there, no picking them up from school/daycare, bathing them, or taking them to dr. i even stopped washing thier clothes!

YOu want to be the ONLY parent then go ahead. AND MY MARRAIGE BECAME GREAT! We never fought over them anymore. I let my dh do everything! I also stopped worrying about BM (sometime...just being honest) BUT that was my biggest issue, I realized that I was the one always bringing her up! So how could she stay off dh mind if I kept reminding him?? Sure dh took a while to lay down boundries, but it takes time.....It really makes me feel great when I run into bm in grocery store and I look GREAT and she looks run down and tired and cut all her hair off!

And now that it is windy when she sees me my hair is blowing in the wind!!! Just focus on you and your marraige and things will start to look up ....It was hard and bm/dh every now and then will do something stupid but the outcome depends on my reaction to that particular situation

I have been married 8 years and the first mistake was NOT making him stand up for you. It would have been some fights but at least you would have stood up for yourself and if he just flat refused then there wasn't a relationship to begin with. If they don't want yopu invovled then they have NO reason to bring you up period! If she is always saying that you are nothing to her son and the like then she shouldn't be bring you up get what I'm saying??

My dh and I are happy but it took a LOT of tears and fights to get there for the first few years. However I refused to let yuckopotmus talk about me or my kids. If she didn't want me involved then so be it but she had no right to utter my name or my kids names! Every time dh didn't say anything to her about it I chewed him! I refused to let them do that crap to me in the name of the kids or keeping peace b/c she sure wasn't :sick:

This is something your dh needs to put his foot down on and remove you from their conversations! And any all times that she brings you up she needs to shoot her down. He needs to start standing up for you/.