Honestly tell your daughter to come to this site, not everyone has the same exact feeling, but there are others that feel the about the same as she does. She might feel better just coming here talking to others in the same situation she is in.

1. She shouldn't feel guilty
2. Send her this website. She has some venting to do and some validation to receive.

Her success or failure lies in her SO's hands and how he handles her role. I have to say being first never really bothered me, it was being last that was important.

Recommend she read Stepmonster by Wednesday Martin... It will give her & you a good idea of what lies ahead.

We all have regrets in our lives. The trick is how much headroom do we give those thoughts.

yes, this man had a bad marriage and she will never be the 'first' wife... but isn't it better to be the 'last' wife? No, she will not bear him his first child... but she may give him his first son.

I am not being POllyanna but if she wants to remain with him then she needs to find a place to store those feelings so they are not out there in the forefront of her thoughts.

See, why resent the child? After all, HE was the one who married young, HE was the one who had a child. Why don't these women dislike their men for being so 'careless' as to have a relationship/marriage and have a child or 2 with someone else?

As you said, he was young and a different person then. And frankly this child did not ask to be born. If she can deal with these thoughts in a healthy manner and cope with the disappointments without much drama then all should be good.

However if she is continually regretting this child even exists and she will not be 'the one and only' then she should be honest and move on. Because she will never be happy and neither will he. Is that any way to live your life?

I remarried in my 40s to my 2nd husband. Due to age etc we will never have children together. I already have 4 and he has 2 boys. If I was 20 yrs younger we would have a child or 2 of our own but that is not how things worked out. Yes, I feel regret and sometimes in my most childish moments I resent his ex-wife. But then I am who I am today based on my life to date. If he had never married her or had children would our paths ever have crossed? I doubt it. And so this man is at a time in his life where your daughter is perfect for him. Would she have been just as perfect @ 18? Probably not because obviously he has done a LOT of growing up.

If this is her one and lasting love, wonderful.. She will enrich his life more than she will ever know. But if being the one and only is more important than being the lasting one then she should cut him loose now and look for a childless man who has never married or been in a long term relationship.

The "first" is a romantic notion. Life is rarely as romantic as we imagine it to be. Turning this into a positive, she could look at it as he probably learned valuable lessons that will benefit their relationship in the long run.

GET HER ON HERE!

I am in the same situatin!!! Mid 20's, 3rd year med (ok, ok, Vet (DVM) student), Great man...perfect minus the whole kid thing and I, too struggle with the child and the guilt associated with doing so. I will be more than happy to chat/email, whatever. Trust me, I understand her stress going through this and med school, it is incredibly taxing emotionally and otherwise. I wish her the best of luck, and if nothing else, read these forums, it's at least good for a laugh!

The only advise i have to add is to recommend a book called "dating the divorced man" It is funny and smart and helps you step away from the situation and look at it realistically. It helped me quite a bit.

Tell her to find a nice man without children - and then be prepared for her to ignore your advice. She will likely decide that she is in love - like the rest of us on here - and trash her life. I wish only the best for her but loving a man with children by another woman is a rough road. If I had known what I was getting into I would have kept it to dating only and kept it open to either wait until the kids had graduated from high school or find a man with no children who wanted to adopt with me. This is not a life that I would wish on anyone. It has NOTHING to do with the kids and EVERYTHING to do with the way the man in question deals with the situation.