Let's liven up this board a little!

[CurlieWhirlie]

I know posting stuff about blended family situations in a public forum can make people nervous sometimes, which is why the Blended Family regulars on TB mostly moved over to a private FB group a while back. But blended family life can be really hard, confusing, taboo, isolating, etc. etc. so it can be really nice to have a touchstone with other people going through the same thing and I would love to see this part of our new forum get a little more life to it! 

A bit about me and my blended family: I have a five-year-old son in kindergarten, he is the product of my first marriage, which ended in divorce about three years ago (it ended earlier than that, but the divorce was finalized three years ago). He shares his time equally between my house and his dad's house, but he sees us both every day because we are very close friends and live in the same small town. I feel extremely lucky to have the relationship with my ex that I do.

I have two step sons, 10 and 8. They live with their mom most of the time in a city about a 30 minute drive from our town, and they come to our house every other weekend and half of all school vacations. The relationship with their mom is chilly most of the time (I don't really have a relationship with her, but she's always nice and polite to me — it's DH she doesn't like).

Together, my husband and I have a nine-month-old son. So if you count 'em up, that's FOUR boys. Sometimes we have one child in the house, sometimes two, sometimes three, and sometimes all four. We refer to those weekends as "the circus is in town".

I basically have no idea what I'm doing most of the time. :-)

[QuitcherBitchin]

Hi, CurlieWhirlie

My husband and I have no children together yet (FET #2 in a few weeks), but he does have three children, 12, 14 and 15, from his first marriage. They live allll the way on the other side of the country, so we don't get to see them nearly as much as we'd like. Of course when we do it becomes extremely expensive between flights, hotels, rental car, eating out for every meal... but we try to get out there at least twice a year, and bring them to us for two weeks over the summer. I just really wish they didn't live so far away, because it's hard for me to get to know the kids like I'd like to, and there is still a little awkwardness when we do get together because our meetings are so rare.

Their mother has been polite to me the couple of times we met face to face, but I don't deal with her regularly at all; it all falls on H. I am a little worried about how she and the kids will react if (when!) we do in fact wind up pregnant, but we'll deal with it when it happens.

[jess9802]

Hello!

DH and I have been married 3.5 years, and together we have a 2.5 year old son and plan to start TTC #2 later this year. DH has a 15-year-old son from his first marriage, who now lives with us during the school year. Prior to starting high school, however, SS lived with his mother and only saw us at Christmas and summer breaks. DH and his XW have a decent relationship. I've never met her, but by and large she has been pleasant to me, and she has repeatedly told DH and my MIL that she appreciates all that I do for my SS.

[ladyannibal]

Hello all!

SO and I will be getting married at the end of this year (is November here yet?) but I always call him H or DH anyway 'cause that's what he'll be soon. Together we have no kids, but I'm pregnant right now and he has a 4 y.o. son from another relationship.

I love that kid more than anything in the world and hate that I don't get to see him as often as I'd like. His mother isn't nice to any of us, her son included so it's really hard to see him. She's been talking about moving to Atlanta for awhile now and that's been really stressful for me because I've grown to love this kid so much in the time that I've known him. He's a very smart, hyper kid and I just can't wait to see how he'll react to the news of getting a sibling. We haven't told him yet because we don't want his mother to get upset and keep him from us.

[malelz]

Hello!

DH and I have been married nearly 3 years. Baby #1 is due in August. He has an 8 year old son from a previous marriage that lives an hour away. He comes to our place every other weekend and most of his vacations. We used to split 50/50 when we lived closer together, one week on/one week off.

My SS calls me 'mommy' and his stepdad 'daddy'. The title was something DH pushed, probably because he had been calling his stepdad that since he was 2. The ex insisted. He's been calling me mom for years now, and I have grown to love it. I have always adored him.

The relationship with the ex is very rough at times. We don't agree with her parenting styles and she is generally very difficult to deal with and demanding, no matter the situation. We make do though.

There is one blended family issue I worry about in the future. DH has some methods with SS I don't agree with at all. Such as, letting him fall asleep to TV since he was 2. I wonder about enforcing different rules for my child than we have enforced for SS.

[Deleted]

DH and I are newlyweds (October) and I have a 7 and 2.5 year old (1 late loss as well) from my previous marriage. H is military and has no children. We are planning to have a child together and will be TTC this year. The transition has been really easy but not without bumps along the way. My ex was very active in their lives until Sept when he suddenly quit his job and went back on the road.

[kcones88]

Jan 18, 2015 20:00:22 GMT -5 malelz said:

Hello!

DH and I have been married nearly 3 years. Baby #1 is due in August. He has an 8 year old son from a previous marriage that lives an hour away. He comes to our place every other weekend and most of his vacations. We used to split 50/50 when we lived closer together, one week on/one week off.

My SS calls me 'mommy' and his stepdad 'daddy'. The title was something DH pushed, probably because he had been calling his stepdad that since he was 2. The ex insisted. He's been calling me mom for years now, and I have grown to love it. I have always adored him.

The relationship with the ex is very rough at times. We don't agree with her parenting styles and she is generally very difficult to deal with and demanding, no matter the situation. We make do though.

There is one blended family issue I worry about in the future. DH has some methods with SS I don't agree with at all. Such as, letting him fall asleep to TV since he was 2. I wonder about enforcing different rules for my child than we have enforced for SS.

There are some rules my husband enforces with my daughter that I do not 100% agree with, but he is my husband and her parent, and I think it's important for him to have just as much say in how she's raised as I have. There's also times that I convince him to try things my way. I think it's important to be consistent and present a united front to your kids. Definitely speak up to your husband, especially now that you're going to be raising a baby together!

[jb]

*Please Don't Quote*

Hi there.

I am JB, married to my H for 6 years. Together, we have an 11 year old son, and a 4 year old daughter. I also have an almost 15 year old daughter from a previous relationship.

*Poof goes the personal info due to pending legal issues*

[chefbonez]

Hiya!

I have a four year old son from a previous relationship that fell through, Now my fiancée and I are 15 weeks into our own little bundle of joy. My son absolutely loves my fiancée and vise versa, but the mother of my son tries to tell me son that having a relationship with my fiancée is bad and it confuses him a little. Unfortunately I don't get to see my son as much as I would like but I'm working on partial custody (full would be nice) and he makes a habit to tell me everytime he comes over that he would rather be with me, which makes sending him home so much harder. Anywho, this was supposed to be an introduction but I got a little carried away.

[CurlieWhirlie]

@malelz you definitely need to start a conversation with your husband about how you would like to parent your child. It may be easy to let him take the lead with your SS even if you don't agree, but when it's your child you will end up resenting him, or undercutting each other if you can't get on the same page. Even if you disagree, at least discussing it and agreeing to disagree is better than not talking about it. Parents can have different styles and that's ok, kids get to know that Dad does it one way and Mom does it another! But I am with you, I would not allow that falling asleep in front of the TV shit. Hopefully the age difference will work in your favor, though — if your SS is that much older, it will be easy to pin different rules on different ages. And by the time your baby is the same age, the older boy will be a teenager and he won't care.

chefbonez do we have a DAD on the board? Cool! Not a lot of dads around, very excited to meet you! It's good to get the dad perspective every once in a while. Maybe I can convince my husband to join, too. He loves The Internets.

[chefbonez]

CurlieWhirlie Glad I could join a board with so much insight! My SO is always on this board, always talking about it, and convinced me to join. I love reading some of the posts on here, some are them are very helpful while other are pure comedy. I'm looking forward to meeting people in the community and learning things that might even help with my 4 yr old menace.

[motherfkr]

Hello, Blended Families.

I was never on TB, but DW has been for ages, and she's been a part of Blended Families ever since we began blending ours.

She's suggested I join (or at least lurk) for a while now, and then I saw that chefbonez had arrived, so I guess there's precedence for boys here now.

DW's gotten a lot of advice and perspective from this community and shared it with me, all of which I've appreciated; I guess it's time I joined.

Besides, I've been looking for a chance to try out this username, and what better excuse than a forum about dads and moms fornicating? (And, I guess, making more babies and all that goes with that...)

[junebug627]

Hi ladies! I have decided I'd like to spread myself out a little over here! I came from TB and have been most active in TTGP.

I am 25 and SO is 28 and we've been together almost a year and a half.

I have a 3.5 year old daughter from my first marriage that ended 2 years ago. SO has a 5 year old daughter that lives in Japan with her mother so I have not met her in person yet! Just Facetime lol

I am HOPING this summer she will be able to come stay with us for the summer and we can begin blending!

SO and I are currently TTC our first together.

[kcones88]

@allybells welcome, and congratulations on your recent marriage!!