For some I believe all the shittiness of step life creeps in slowly. It aint what people say "You knew what you were getting into". Oh hell no I did not, and many can agree with that.

So once you are in and slowly you see how dang crazy it is, you feel invested, maybe things will get better. Jumping ship is easier said than done. I did jump ship, but took me time to have that final straw.

So its not always about not loving yourself, it is a slow gradual realization of what step life reality is about.

My previous exes were sh*tty people. My husband is a good person with a sh*tty situation. If we didn't have to deal with his family, BM or SD it would be perfect. The main issues come from him being too much of a wimp about them. I complain about family and step issues here but for the most part our marriage is good. 

I ask this question from myself every single day. 

Why don't i love myself enough?

To put myself in this sh**tty situation.

I have thought about this. We have been married going on 6 years and within a month of us getting married I was looking into divorcing.  It's gotten better now but in the begining I had no clue the BM was going to just dump her young kid onto us.  Anyways...at times I think I looked at it as some sort of competition.. like I won't let her win.

But make yourself some boundries and take time for self care.  Do the best you can to look at this all as an observer and not get to entangled in the drama.  It will just eat you up. 

For us, the situation also changed after we got married. BM was difficult and mean, but she did not engage in full alienation until after DH and I were married and settled into our own home. Then we became a threat to her, because SSs might actually feel like our home was their home. 

I will say that I completely underestimated the impact DH's dysfunctional family has one us. DH is an eternal optimist and wants to believe that his family is wonderful, even if deep down, he knows that they aren't (and has finally been able to admit to me that things were never quite rosy for him with MIL). I think we would have had some of these problems without skids, although problems with the in-laws are definitely made worse by the fact that DH is a divorced dad. MIL, BIL, and SIL have not moved on from the fact that DH got divorced and all hold it against him and feel the need to "intervene" on behalf of SSs and BM. I have said something about this to MIL and she always acts like I'm just being crazy and she doesn't actually think DH is at fault or meddle (even though I've heard her tell DH that he "just doesn't love" his children enough and is "always at war" with BM). You'd think that the fact that he fought not to get divorced because of his children or the fact that BM has now gotten divorced again (from the man she met before she filed for divorce from DH) would help them to see that the situation is clearly more complicated and maybe it's BM, but no, they don't. I interact with MIL just enough and actively avoid BIL and SIL. 

I think it has too do with society to some degree. Step parents seem to always be perceived in a negative light for example. We don't know what we're getting into because it's impossible to know until your really in it then and its harder to get out then. The first thing people ALWAYS say is "you should have known because they had kids". Then they guilt you and accuse you of abandoning the skids because you want to leave the relationship or that you must accept it cause it's a "package deal". The issue really is from the person your with not the kids truthfully. They CAN control their kids but they DONT care to.

I think alot of people stay because society and the significant other guilt them for wanting to leave. That can take a toll on people forcing them to put up with more. When skids are involved, the relationship literally starts to evolve around them no matter the reason the people got together. If you look at alot of blended family movies  the kids ate always the center of the movie. In reality they should be their parent priority but some parents raise them horribly which causes it to effect their relationship by them treating the stepparent like garbage. At the end of the day it's all about how much a person can take from it.

There's a reason we all get on this site because truthfully we would be put down and insulted for ranting about it the stuff we rant about by society or other platforms or other people who have never experienced it.. But here we all know what it is really like and are usually feeling the exact way about it.

I'm not on the boards much anymore, but decided to check in from time to time to see how things are going with others. 

I think alot of people stay in these types of relationships because they don't know how to set appropriate boundaries with others. Some are likely afraid to address their partner. Either you set boundaries with people or many will walk right over you. Alot of these men have serious entitlement issues, and lack proper skills to have a healthy adult relationship. Alot of times it's not just BM and SKids with the major issues, it's the men. My ex was extremely entitled and in having different conversations with him, it became apparent he had this issue long before I ever met him. He couldn't grasp the concept that significant others have no responsibility for kids or adult kids that aren't theirs. Oh and significant others surely don't have to tolerate crap from SKids, Bm, or anyone else. You definitely have to enforce your boundaries early on. Letting things go or just hoping they will resolve on their own isn't going to work. When you truly love yourself, people can't guilt you into compromising your standards.  What that techniquely amounts to is manipulation. NOONE could ever make me feel bad, for not supporting, financially or otherwise, kids that are not mine. Good men are not wimps and they sure as h-ll don't let their past lives infect their current ones. I'm not sure if it is lack of self-love, learned behavior, or fear of being alone that would cause someone to stay in steph-ll. What I do know is we only have one life to live, so try to enjoy it with the ones who really matter.