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Step Mother And My Teenage Daughter

richtiff1's picture

My wife and 13 yr old daughter dont quite see eye to eye,  my wife doesnt see the good in her only the bad my daughter doesnt have a mom in her life at the momment to her bio mother being a drug user and a party animal she currently has supervised visits that she hasent utilized in 2 years her bio other is a terrible role modle 

Rumplestiltskin's picture

Eye to eye. Interesting choice of words. The literal meaning of being eye to eye means you are at the same level. Are you putting your wife and daughter on the same level, or are you giving your wife the proper place as woman of the house? 

levilleg's picture

Leave your wife. Seriously. Your poor daughter has already been let down by one adult. Don't subject her to growing up in a home she is rejected in. Sadly, you'll get very biased opinions here. I'm a stepmom that runs into several problems with my stepkids but even I think some of the behavior advocated here is borderline abusive. 

Rumplestiltskin's picture

Seriously? Based on that small amount of information? Yes, a lot of posters here will default to the stepmom's side. That's because this site is "Where stepparents come to vent." It's literally on the main page.

I've noticed you only chime in to take a stance against stepparents, though. I have never once seen you do anything but jump immediately to defend a stepchild. Yes, some people here have an inherent bias toward empathizing with the stepparent. This is the only place i have found on the internet where that exists, amongst a sea of child-centric "kids come first!" knee-jerk responses. That being said, your post history shows a bias against the stepparent. This post hasn't explained a single detail of either side's argument. How can you be so sure his wife is the problem? 

levilleg's picture

Didn't stop you from jumping to his wife's defense. Yes, I do bc although I mostly lurk, the anti-kid attitude on some of these posts is over the top disgusting. Especially when the hatred is directed at toddler-aged children! When I chose to marry a man with kids, I accepted that his kids (even as adults) would be part of our lives forever. Yet what I sometimes see on here are  possessive woman who hate the fact that their husbands had kids with another woman and try to shove these kids out of the picture. Even worse when they get pregnant and are jealous of the fact that their kids aren't their SO's first and only kids. If you're the type of woman who needs to be the center of your SO's attention, that's fine. But don't date a man with kids! End of rant. Anyways I commented so that this father doesn't solely get one-sided advice and actually takes his daughter's need for a stable, loving home into consideration. He came for advice. He deserves balanced opinions. 

Rumplestiltskin's picture

If this wife (and this poster) is even real, she is dealing with a teenage stepdaughter and a drug-addicted BM. This site may be the only place she gets any empathy. If you feel it's your mission to provide a counter-argument, that's your right and your choice. We don't know the full story, or really any of it.

Maybe the OP will take your advice and leave his wife. Maybe that is for the best. Either she is in a really bad situation and he is doing her a favor, or she is evil incarnate and he's saving his daughter from her. More likely, all involved are human and doing the best they can with what they have to work with. From the info we have, who the hell knows? 

levilleg's picture

Absolutely. Obviously there are situations where stepkids are wrong and, particularly if they're adults, we shouldn't accept unfair treatment from them..or anyone! But in this situation, as in so many I see here, stepmoms refuse to empathize with their stepkids. For example, the daughter here went through the trauma of being rejected by her own mom. She deserves better than a stepmom who only sees the bad in her :( 

Rumplestiltskin's picture

So let's emphatically tell a man to end his 5-year marriage based on one vague, poorly written paragraph. No bias here! 

Winterglow's picture

OP, can you tell us a bit more about the situation, please? Your bio says that there are 5 children in your family, how old are they and whose are they? Can you give us some examples of things that your wife and daughter disagree on?

Smile

 

Wicked stepmo.'s picture

Since there is a lot of information missing. All I can say is in the eyes of a child a SP will never replace a BP no matter how crappy a parent they may be. 

If you are concerned for your BDs emotional health get her counseling. 

tog redux's picture

Need more info, please. Hard to tell what's going on without knowing the behavior of both stepkid and your wife, and YOU.

All I can say is that it's not your wife's job to replace your daughter's mother, nor is it even possible. It's not even your wife's job to act in a maternal way towards your daughter, unless she wants to.

Harry's picture

People get married have kids with a bad SO. Then divorce,  and then expect the new SO to be a mother or father to there kids.  It's not the new SO job to be a parent to the SK.  Something the SK don't want that.  Just because you love someone you don't want to pay for there past mistakes. 

As in having kids with someone they really don't like.  It's not the SP job to create the happy family, Most likely that can't happen.  It's never there fault that the marriage faild.  They did not realize the other SO was nuts. 

Even through we knew there were kids. We did not know that you want control over your kids and control over SO to set up this Happy Family that you dream of but never had