Holidays?
I am new here and am trying to learn the abbreviations! I have been married to my husband for 3 1/2 years. He has 4 adult children and I have 3 adult children and a 6 year old who he has helped raise sines he was 2. My kids all accept my husband and have gone to many family functions with his family only to be totally ignored. Christmas was the last straw where once again everyone was totally ignored. I told my husband we will no longer go to holidays and family stuff with them. He still wants to go to holidays with them and I feel angry about it and I am not sure if that is right. I just feel like we are good enough every other day of the year why should holidays be different. His kids don't bother with him often. His middle daughter doesn't like me because we wouldn't foot the bill for her entire wedding, we paid half, she felt we should pay it all, she has been living with her husband for 4 years and are older. We paid half and told her, her mom can pay the other half and his daughter and siblings felt their mother shouldn't have to pay. My husbands son doesn't like me because at his wedding he wanted his parents announced together and walk in together and my husband refused to walk in together with her as a couple. His youngest daughter doesn't like me because of her siblings. I really have been very nice to them and I don't see anything wrong with paying half for a wedding. Anyway my question is what do we do for holidays and should I be angry. I just feel like I am second to the kids and they don't bother with him and it annoys me. I feel like I can't spend holidays with my husband because they are rude and can't treat people with respect. Sorry for the ramble. I am just not sure what is right.
Here are just a few:
Here are just a few:
SM = stepmother
SD = stepdad or step daughter
BM = biological mother
BF = usually biological father but every now and then some use for boyfriend
SS = step son
BS = biological son
BD = biological daughter
DW = dear wife
DH = dear husband
DD = dear daughter
DS = dear son
POA = power of attorney
CS = child support
MIL = mother-in-law
FIL = father-in-law
PAS = Parental Alienation Syndrome
SO = significant other
O before ss or sd = oldest
M before ss or sd = middle
Y before ss or sd = youngest
SF = step father
CO = custody order
GBM = biomom's mother;grand BM
CP = custodial parent
NCP = non custodial parent
OP = original poster
MOTY = mother of the year
GUBM = golden uterus bio mother
Sounds like splitting the
Sounds like splitting the holidays or alternating would work best. I would not try to blend your families.. and I would just go see my own kids..
Your feelings are in reaction
Your feelings are in reaction to being rejected. Of course you are angry. What you don't need to do is take it personally. ANY woman would be treated this way because you are the reminder of their parents not being together. This will never be a happy blended situation. It's time to sit down with a calendar and figure out when each of you can celebrate with your own kids. I'd start though with putting holiday couple time first. Mark those days off first and plan with the kids around that. There will have to be some compromise and whatever you decide, this should all support your marriage, not tear it apart.
For some reason, DH never put his kids on notice about common manners and hospitality. Does it even bother him that his kids act like this towards you and yours? Is it acceptable to him or is it that he just takes the easy wAy out ? How much of this comes out of a BM that encourages it?
Just the title of your post
Just the title of your post made my blood pressure raise ten points. I hate the holidays -- used to love them.
DH and I have never found a solution that works for both of us. Alternating doesn't work because all our kids (we have none together) live within a few hours of each other, but not close to us. So if we see one, we see them all.
I want to find a place mid-way between Skidville and our house and schedule times for his kids and mine to spend time with us separately. While DH agrees that's a reasonable plan, he's too chicken to tell his kids that's what we're going to do this year.
The holidays don't exist for
The holidays don't exist for me anymore. My DH's blues and nastiness have killed the joy. Honestly, I've forgotten how it feels to have a "merry" Christmas or anything else.
Don't worry about blending anything. He and his ex created the things that despise you and, sadly, it's never going to change. Enjoy your own children to the max. Don't allow joy to be stolen from your family. In fact, have you thought of leaving?
Yup. I'm over the whole
Yup. I'm over the whole "holiday" thing. I'll see my 27 y.o. son but that's the extent of it. The Hallmark holidays...ugh...Father's Day is a real joy ((sarcasm)).
Figure out a new schedule.
Figure out a new schedule. Enjoy your holiday with your kids and DH and then tell him he can go to his family's holiday events. You are a grown person who does not have to go anywhere she does not feel welcomed unless you choose to do so.
Split down the middle
Thats amazing you guys paid half for the wedding. And utterly horrible that there was such a complete lack of appreciation. SS trying to create some false sense of "happy first family" completely inappropriate. Happens all the time. In dysfuncional wedding scenarios.
DH wanting to spend holidays with HIS family who ignores your children from previous relationships? Sounds like relational agression due to the skids. Same with you.
Its workable as long as you schedule your time right.
Welcome to steptalk!
When you say his family, do
When you say his family, do you mean his adult children, his parents, his siblings, his extended family, all of the above? Do they just ignore your children, or do they ignore you, too? How does your husband react when his family behaves this way? Does he call them out? Does he leave you on your own at these family functions? If he just allows it to happen without addressing it, then he's not doing right by you.
I agree with you deciding not to go to his family functions where you're not treated well. Although I would be incredibly annoyed with him going to his family functions at the holidays without me, it IS his family, so I would accept it so long as it was not interfering with YOUR celebration of the holiday. So if you want to have Thanksgiving dinner for your immediate family at your home, he has dinner with you and does not run off to his family. If you want to open presents at home with your little one on Christmas morning, then he is there for that. YOUR immediate family takes priority over his family functions. If he wants to celebrate Christmas with his kids, well, he can do it on a day when you're not having your celebration. It is not acceptable for him to leave you on the holiday unless that's OK with you. Pull out the calendar and you can find a time that it's OK for him to go off to his family functions. If they want him at a time that's not OK with you, then he shouldn't go. That's the price he pays for allowing his kids to be jerks.
I'm astounded at the lack of gratitude from his daughter when you paid for "only" half of her wedding. Let's see . . . there's several others who could have contributed - BM, the groom's family, and his daughter and her husband. These days it's ridiculous to expect the father of the bride to pay for an entire wedding. My dad did, but it was his choice and DH and I were incredibly grateful. We were grateful for anything anyone did to help with our wedding. I can't imagine being mad when someone paid for a large chunk of your wedding. SMH. Your husband does realize that this is unacceptable, right?
Holidays reply
His family is his mother and sister who treat my children and myself fine. His adult children treat me and my children the same and my husband says he didn't notice a few of the times and there were a few things my children and I went to because he was out of town and again were treated the same. I just don't understand why adults can't just be civil. My adult children do. It's insane.
i am so happy I found steptalk!!!!
Saved me
Steptalk saved me! I have been able to vent and hash things out with people who truly understand.
I might also add.. that this
I might also add.. that this may just be a situation where you both have to just "divide and conquer"..
you each go to see your respective kids.. then do a personal celebration.. at another date that is just special for the two of you.
This is not totally unique to steplife.. things can get more complicated when you have kids that marry into other families with other traditions etc.. my folks always just had our christmas or thanksgiving around some day that was "close enough" to the actual day.. but allowed us to go to more traditional celebrations with our SO's... since our family was just basically 4 people and we didn't have large traditional meals etc..
I'm in the same circumstance
I'm in the same circumstance but I will no longer go to my in laws at Christmas with my husbands family and SD s . After continuously being ignored. So we have our Christmas with my BS and then another day my DH will go to his family alone . Annoys me as I wanted to get on with everyone but will no longer put myself through the hurt .