Dump that asshole. Any man that doesn't your treat your child well does not deserve to be with you.

***how can a single mom keep her child from being hurt like this?***

While there are never any guarantees in life anymore... My Rule #1: NEVER NEVER EVER introduce your child to your dates until your are sure the relationship is one that it quite serious. My Rule #2: Then NEVER EVER EVER live with a man until you are married and have at least THAT commitment which must include at least some understanding of what the step parent is willing to accept in the way of parent/responsibility. But like I said, no guarantees even if you have these 'promises'... people change their mind. It sucks but that's what happens. IMO

Yes, he married someone with a child...but that does not mean it's his duty to pick him up or take him to school. If you were alone, it would be your job. I see this as no different than all the women here w/out bio-kids who aré "asked", ie expected to drive the kids. If you married him and specifically told him that you would expect him to "drive" your child, babysit, etc and he agreed & now doesn't like it, then leave. But as most our DH's they married us because they loved us, and many could accept the child...but it is the duty of the bio-parent to drive, cook, clean for the child...not the step-parent.

I know that is what many single moms and dads expect of their step, yet very rarely have I heard of the bio-parent making that clear to the step before they marry.

Yikes - sounds like you'll be better off without him.

Without knowing the situation I can't really tell if there were any signs, but it doesn't sound to me like there was any way you could have known it would go this way. Typically if he is the sort of man who wouldn't date a woman with a child he knows that at the beginning...

Im sorry, Im sure he loves you and Im sure he has tried to make it work. It is very hard to raise someone elses child. Is your sons father around? I have some of the same issues. I have a Skid that I have tried to build a relationship with, tried to love, and treated him as if he were mine. Recently I have come to the conclusion that I cant love him like I love my children. I treat him good, dont get me wrong. Im not a "wicked step mother" or anything, My issues lie more with his mother. How she acts and how he shadows it. I feel like she controls parts of my life through the kid. I thnk that your boyfriend really did try. He would not have been with you that long if he genuinely hadn't. I am sorry your son has to g through this. I know it must be confusing for him. All that you can do is explain that you will always be there for him no matter who comes and goes. Whether it is friends, relationships, deaths in the family.

I won't say I have never asked my bf to pick kids up-but in 2 years I can probably count on one hand the times I've asked him. Simply if I knew he was available, and it was an emergency, parents weren't available first, or last minute craziness I ran into. I have never taken advantage of that. I don't think a serious comitted relationship it's a crime to ask every blue moon for some help.

Especially when we as stepmom figures put up w/a lot more shit then that.

My DH drives my BS13 to his sports practice. I don't get home in time to do it and he gets home before I do. I disagree that one should not expect their partner to shuffle kids around that aren't theirs. WHen you are in a relationship it is a PARTNERSHIP. And as with any partnership you are supposed to share the load. On occasion I have had to leave the office to pick up SD10 at school for my DH because he was stuck in traffic. I don't mind doing it. When you get together with a person with baggage (SKIDS) you go into it knowing that it will not be easy. I'd be very offended by the way the OP partner is acting.

I can't help but think that maybe he was taking advantage of you from the beginning. You say that you were the only one working for awhile and now that he's working he has this total change of attitude?
Could it be possible that he told you the words he thought you wanted to hear? A man that can come into this relationship and requests that your son call him dad, then to have this kind of change knowing the negative effects on your child just seems very strange. As a father he should have known better than that. As your son's mother though, the full responsibility lies on you to protect him as best as you can.
DoingItAgain gave some good advice to hopefully prevent this from happening again because it would be tragic for your son to go through something like this again.
As far as doing things for a step child, that is something that definately varies from blended family to blended family. Were you doing things for his child? In my first step parenting marriage, we both brought children into the marriage and granted, his were older (13 - 23) and mine were younger (3 - 13) but it was never an issue to do things for each others kids.
In my current relationship though...Hell NO...I would never do anything for my SO kids even though he will do a lot of things for my kids. The reason I wouldn't just comes down to the way his kids treat us, and especially the way they treat him. He has a better relationship with my kids than his own.
IMO he doesn't sound like an honest person and you would be so much better off without this man.

It does not sound like you have done anything wrong. The old guy changed his mind. He is an ass for bonding with your daughter then withdrawing, but you, your daughter and likely even your SO have done nothing wrong. It is far better that your SO left now than after spending years being "dad" to your daughter.

Unfortunately, when one or both partners bring children to the mix, the pain associated with the end of a relationship can have significantly more impact on the kids in many cases.

I wish I had a simple answer to your questions. Depending on which "expert" you listen to the key to minimizing the impact of failed adult relationships on children range from "Don't date until your kids are 18+ and out of house" to "they are kids, they are resilient and they will bounce back. Live your own life".

I think that the right answer, from my perspective, is somewhere in the middle. If the parent is going to date then the GF/BF should not interface significantly with the kids until the adults have established a mutually agreed focus to make a long term relationship. Once both adults have clarity on this then a well managed introduction and increased time together campaign can begin. As things progress both for the adults and for the kids in this situation then a blending of resources and assumption of some kid related responsibilities by the newly added partner can begin.

Until the adult relationship gets to the point of “permanency” and commitment the kids need to be protected and be the primary concern of their parent who should be highly focused on not allowing the adult relationship to have significant negative impact on the kids.

Here is where it changes. When the progression reaches the commitment and long term future phase then the relationship must become the priority over the children. At this point the quality of the adult relationship, the example of commitment, the example of a healthy, affectionate and mutually supportive adult relationship should be the priority of the adults but is now the core of the “family” and the kids benefit from it. This is not to say that the kids should not be important and a significant focus of the adult relationship, but the adult relationship has to take precedent.

The children will be beneficiaries of the quality adult relationship but not superior to it or a party to it. At this point the “marriage” comes first.

I do not mean to make my input sound devoid of emotion or the human factor but removing the emotion and hormonal elements of any relationship from the decision process of how to manage the relationship, minimize the potential negative impact on the kids, and establish and grow the relationship in a way that meets the needs of the adults requires a high level of awareness of all of these things.

In many ways establishing a healthy adult relationship, caring for the wellbeing of children, raising children to be viable adults, and meeting the needs of the adult SOs in the relationship are all processes that need to be nurtured and managed in order to establish the best opportunity for success.

IMHO of course.

In my case, I have no BKs. After my XW ran off with her Geriatric Fortune 500 Executive Sugar Daddy I moved on rapidly to dating. After several years of dating I met and began dating a young (early 20's) single mom with a son. We dated for a few months then I met her son. After a single experience of spending a weekend with she and her son I refused to have anything to do with her kid again. We still dated but I never saw her boy again. He was an animal and I knew after the first "kid play date" that I could not commit to her. We dated for a few more months then things fizzled out.

A few months after that relationship fizzled I met another young single mother. Contrary to my experience with the first single mother I dated, our first date included her son. So did nearly every subsequent date we had. Her son was about a year younger than the first ladies kid, well behaved, mellow, etc.... Ultimately we married. When we married I committed not only to be my wife’s husband, but I committed to her and to her son that I would be his dad, raise him as my own, and have his back.

I am notably older than my wife (12yrs) and have been dad to my SS-18 since shortly before he turned 2yo. Our son is about to leave home for the military and his mom and I will move on to a phase of our marriage that is new and uncharted territory. This will be the first time it has been just the two of us with no financial or daily care responsibility for a kid since we first met and married.

WE have raised the child she brought to the marriage, we did it together, and we have grown a mutually respectful, successful and passionate marriage. Our son knows what a healthy, committed and mutually respectful adult relationship looks like between equity partner and equity parents.

I would not have asked my wife to marry me if I was not her partner in life and an equity parent to her child. If I was going to marry his mom and the three of us were going to life as a family in the home that my wife and were creating then I saw no other way to make it work than being his dad and an equity parent to his mom and to his SpermIdiot (a completely different, long and extremely distasteful story of it's own).

Just my thoughts of course.

Sorry for the long answer. I do not think there is a short one.

I think the picking up your son from school isnt a big deal especially since he isnt working but that kind of has to deal with your relationship and the tone it was set up on. When I started seeing my SO I knew he had kids and I did not want to really be a big part of their lives. I got to know them and I told my SO I want to help raise them. I pick them up from school everyday, I cook, I clean, and I do everything their BM should be doing but that was my choice. So if he knew you had a child and said he didnt want to play a major role asking him to pick him up does go against what he wanted but I still dont see how its a huge deal for him to be breaking up your relationship. I truly agree that you are the other woman. I am sorry but good this came out now and not ten years from now.