I had initially intended to write and publish this post for Mother’s Day, but it wasn’t fully formed and I didn’t fully understand what I wanted it to say. A random Monday is a better place for it, anyway.
Back when I became a stepmother (1997) I thought I would (should) feel a certain way based on everything I knew about stepmothering, which, until that point, was informed by having a stepmother and by cultural norms at the time.
And in the first few years of my marriage, my thoughts about how to be a stepmother were also influenced by an online forum I discovered called “The Second Wives Club.” There you could find women just like me…and women completely the opposite. Women who were bitter and angry, young and naive, women with good intentions, and women who seemed to embody the “evil stepmother” stereotype. There were women with children of their own, as well as stepchildren; and women who had stepchildren and desperately wanted their own.
When I look back at myself in those years, I see a woman who was secure in, and sure about her choice not to have children, and who was seriously relieved when she met and fell in love with a man who already had children, didn’t want more, and had a vasectomy to ensure it never happened again.
What I wasn’t sure about was my role as a stepmother (oh, and there was a whole slew of other things I wasn’t sure about, but that’s another story for another day). Society, acquaintances, friends, and family were all ready to help define it for me and it was easy to go with convention. It was easy to feel what I felt because it’s what I thought I was supposed to feel.
I heard all the platitudes – how being a stepmother is about growing a child in your heart and not your womb. I got reassurances that I was “playing an important role,” and that “everyone mothers in some way shape or form.”
I also got the message that, unless you’d never had kids of your own, you’d never have a “mother’s heart,” that being a stepmother is harder than being a mother because the bonds aren’t automatic, and that I should never expect to be anything other than “Dad’s wife.” For the record, my stepchildren never said these things
The worst mistakes I made as a stepmother were the result of me not being sure of what I felt…or, perhaps it’s more precise to say they were the result of me thinking I should act a certain way based on me thinking I should feel a certain way.
When Mother’s Day would come around I’d hope for recognition because that’s what I thought I should want, even though I didn’t expect it. Sometimes I’d get it and sometimes I wouldn’t. Sometimes I’d be disappointed, and sometimes I wouldn’t.
I liked it (was very touched) when I got it, but in the moment, it didn’t feel…right. I’m not saying that I didn’t deserve it, or that it wasn’t given in an authentic and heart-felt manner, but there inside me there was a disconnect.
I was buying into what I thought I should feel (like a mother?), even though, deep down inside, I didn’t really feel it (because I am not, and that’s okay). I don’t relate to children the way most women do. It’s not an insult, even though when I say this out loud it seems to make people uncomfortable and they want to refute it. Maybe it’s because most women view mothering as the highest, most noble undertaking and that all women need to be reassured that they are, in some way, noble mothers?
And now, more than a year after my stepdaughter had her first child, I realize that I have stepped (no pun intended) into the role of step-grandmother with very much the same uncertainty, under pressure (both self-imposed and by cultural norms) to feel a certain way.
Everyone is so eager to call me Grandma, or Nana, or Gigi, or whatever, and I’ve been playing into it, even though it’s uncomfortable. Perhaps it is because I haven’t been sure of it myself.
It’s not that I don’t want to be part of my stepkids’ lives, or the lives of their kids (there’s only one right now), but I don’t need or want the label. When I follow my instincts in terms of being me, without the labels, for the kids in my life, everything works out the way it supposed to. That’s what “I” “Love” “You” means.
This is just a very long way of saying that when I am sure and confident about a choice, there is never any need to defend it and all actions that come from it equal love.
Have you ever considered that what you feel is influenced by what you think you should feel?
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Although I can’t comment from the step-parent situation, I can say that I was just thinking yesterday about how trying to feel the way I think I should just exacerbates everything that’s wrong. I’m entering a period of blatant, unapologetic honesty with myself and struggling to have a little tact when I’m blatantly honest with others. Sometimes, tact is overrated. Things are what they are. My feelings are what they are. And when other people act like a**holes and get defensive, that’s a pretty good sign they have something to be defensive about. I gave someone the benefit of the doubt recently, and it’s been nothing but increasing trouble since. One of the most inconvenient, annoying weeks of my life!
No more operating on how I should think or feel… just on how it is.
Great points Michele…and I have another blog post brewing about being defensive and what it means and the role it has played in my life.
Oh my goodness, Karen, this has touched my core. I grew up feeling what I think I should feel based on not wanting to disappoint anyone and wanting to please everyone; so, I played the game….with everyone. Played it with my family and friends and acquaintances. I squashed what I really felt as I considered it the wrong feeling because it wouldn’t please those around me.
Thank goodness I have mostly grown out of that. Most young adults go through their rebellion period during their early adulthood, but my husband will tell you that I went through it in my late thirties/early forties, and he was the guinea pig. Thank God for his patience and understanding (most of the time). There are times I still fall into the pit, but for the most part, I’m happy to say that I can feel what I feel. It doesn’t mean I have to always verbalize it, but I can own it. Thanks for sharing this.
I love what you said about not always having to verbalize it, but always owning it. That’s powerful!
Absolutely! (Although I never really thought about it before.)
Hmmmm… almost everything I know about stepmothering was formed by Disney movies. What I’ve learned is that you guys are really evil. Get back!!!!
;-)
Karen, are you sure you’re writing your own story and not mine? I started raising my step-children when they were just 2 and 5 years old. They are 11 and 13 now and I have been the only mother in their life since they were very little. I’ve since adopted them. “Mom” came naturally to them when they were little and at the time, they were still connected to their birth mother, who took offense that they called her by her first name and called me, “Mom.”. My older daughter does not have the same bond with me that the younger one does, probably because the younger one doesn’t remember that much of her birth mother and was pretty much raised by me and had little contact with the “other mother”. And you know what? I get that. I’m a smart girl and I know that it has been rough on her and that I should not expect the bond to be any stronger than it is. We both work at it, but are realistic.
Like you, I don’t relate to children the way most mothers do. I don’t let it bother me. It’s just a fact. I don’t have the same “ooh ahh” mentality when it comes to “being a mom.” I never had the desire to have my own children (a brief thought here or there, but nothing serious) and I was totally okay with that. When the time came, I was ready for my step-kids and it was perfect. I got kids without the stretchmarks and poopy diapers.
Here is what I think, Karen. Whatever feels natural is what you should feel. Don’t force anything. Let your grandbabies tell you what they want to call you. Don’t dwell on it either. The name is not important. Just enjoy them. I used to live a life full of living up to others’ expectations and will be writing my first book on that very subject, but like commenter, Ellen, I’ve grown past that stage of life (Ellen, I did it later in life too). If they want to call you Nana, consider it an honor and a compliment by the child. If they call you Karen, I suspect you would be okay with that too. I’ve always called my step-father by his first name and neither of us ever felt it was strange. Or perhaps you could compromise and the grandchild could call you “Nana Karen.”
In this life, if we dwell too long on anything, something special will pass us by in the meantime. Don’t overthink it. Just be yourself. They will appreciate that more than anything.
Thanks for getting my point Cindy…I’m not overthinking it now, not worrying about what he’s going to call me, etc. I know how it feels to force it and I know it feels when I don’t. And now that I know the difference, I can make a confident choice based on how I know I feel, rather than on how I think I should feel :-)
Well Karen after quite a parade of step-fathers in my life and a mother who was in name only I understand what you’re talking about completely. I did not want children. However, I immediately got pregnant when I got married. I knew how to mother, in the technical sense. I had raised my brothers from the time I was 10. What I didn’t know was if I had the ability and capacity to truly love a child as I had always wanted to feel loved.
I’ve never stopped second guessing myself and now have 3 grandsons. I love my kids with all my heart and the grandsons, too. I was never the typical June Cleaver kind of mom. I was usually the youngest mom in my kids circle of friends. Sometimes they didn’t like that, especially when they entered the teen years.
Today I count my kids among my very best friends. We’ve never had the traditional parent/child relationship and I like it that way. It doesn’t mean I love them less, I just love them my way. I don’t believe it would be any different with step-children. You find your own way. So do they. I say let go and let it be.
b
Exactly…I am finding that when I just am, it works out just fine. And finding my own way allows them to do the same.
The answer to that question is yes all the time. In my formative years I was surrounded by people that were not very truthful and told me that most of my feelings and preceptions about this world were wrong. They lied and mislead me so that even now I have a hard time knowing if what I am feeling about a feeling is real or imagined. I am removed by years and miles from those people but the impact of being told I was not right in my feelings make my default setting to look around me and copy what others are feeling just to blend in and not rock the boat. I am really working on this issue currently because I have found when I act just as the people around me and not just be who I honestly am. It is passive aggresive people pleasing that I never knew was part of my charactor.
I get that all too well.
Yes, “supposed to” never works out for me. “Supposed to” being the same as “should.” Confident and sure equals listening to my intuition and it always seems to be right when I listen!!
I also find that confident and sure equals does not invite judgment from others and thus eliminates a need for defensiveness.
Another one who doesn’t relate to kids the way people say I should. I don’t eat them for breakfast, I just don’t react to them with that gooshy mommy stuff. My own mom does — she wanted kids, had them, and did a bang-up job raising us, up to and including not giving me grief when it became evident that I didn’t want any.
People used to refute it when I said that, too. They’ve since stopped now that I’m in my mid-upper 40s, and I suppose they think they are avoiding a Terribly Painful Subject or something, but as long as they’re quiet about it. :-)
LOLing over Terribly Painful Subject…well put!
Not sure of the role….that is what I get from all of this….
Not being sure how to fit in…that is what I hear reading this..
Those are my immediate thoughts for me and how I have felt. But here is the deal…it isn’t just step-moms it is for moms too. There is no instruction manual or rules for parenting. It is about sharing your heart, your love, and who you are with them WHILE honoring their own individual traits too.
Having been a parent, a single parent for most of it, having made a strong vow within myself to parent differently than I was parented after being told I couldn’t have kids and having not one but two…I realized early on they were both a gift not a possession.
Then after raising both of them to the best of my ability, thinking I was done, I fell in love with an eventually married a man that has full custody of a beautiful little girl. we went back and forth with what to call me and I always told her she could call me whatever she wanted as long as it was nice. She nick named me ju-ju-be.
She tells me she refers to me as Mom at school because, as she puts it, its easier…not all the questions. What that taught me…yes we learn so much from kids..
…it is only the labels we put on ourselves that have an impact and expectation…what others label us should make no difference and be embraced…that’s what THEY might need. (my opinion)
I completely agree with the idea that someone might label me because it’s what he/she needs…and I am very much okay with that. By the way, I think JuJuBe is a great name for you :-)
Oh yes! I think I grew up holding a mirror to the world where I reflected everything others wanted or expected of me. How exhausting, when I think back now. I only recently let go of that mirror and it’s been… interesting to see what I really want and feel. So many of the things I’d thought all my life I wanted simply no longer apply. I don’t even feel the need to defend my choices, because I know they are MY choices.
A good example is the difference between what I call my current in-laws and what I called my previous in-laws. For the first set, I was told to call them Mom and Dad (it may be a cultural thing over here). It just never felt authentic to me. They were not my parents. I call Craig’s parents by their names and I’m much more comfortable that way. They have never suggested otherwise and we have a great relationship.
There are people who call their inlaws Mom and Dad here, too…it doesn’t feel right to me either.
Labels are a funny thing aren’t they?! Whether we’re talking about food, people, feelings etc.
I can’t relate to the ‘step’ thing (and know some people who are closer to step parents than their real parents – particularly some older friends!) but can certainly relate to the ‘how am I supposed to be feeling’ thing. Most recently for me it’s been to do with my father’s passing. My mother and I have talked a lot about it. How are we coping? How are we supposed to cope? etc. Are we sad enough? Are we inappropriately sad? I try not to think of him being ‘gone’? Is that normal or okay?!
I’ve been thinking about comparisons recently and decided it would be easy if we could live our lives in a vacuum, not comparing ourselves to others and I suspect this would help here too, not influenced on how others might think / judge us or expect us to act.
But then I guess life would be very lonely wouldn’t it. (Perhaps a metaphorical vacuum… or something. Will have to ponder on that some more!)
Oops… sorry, got off-track there a bit!
Deb
Wow…great comment re your Dad’s passing. It’s got me thinking about some of my own relationships and how I think I should feel about them.
WOW! Yes to your question BTW!
I am a stepmother of 3 girls & between 2 of them, there are 7 grandkids that call me Nana. I was not a great stepmom. I was young & never really wanted kids but loved my hubby. It was hard & I did not do it well. As I got much older, I was better at it all but younger, I really never expected anything cause I knew I was not the best stepmom AND I felt their mom was their mom. Now, I understand it all but I can’t redo anything… I just do the best I can now & that is all I can do….
Yes, age definitely brings perspective, doesn’t it?
I’ve never been a mother or a step-mother, but I’d probably be better at the latter. I adore other people’s kids (pets, too, for that matter), but maybe that’s because I didn’t have a role to figure out. I’m just the crazy lady who will get down in the dirt with them. :)
I think you’re a perfect example of someone who’s secure in her choice and so you have no problem just being who you are when it comes to kids!
First, I have missed you and your thoughts.
OK.
Now I remember back when you said something to the effect of loving is being loved for all of you and not for you plus any changes made to you to suit. Only you said it more eloquently. I think that is also the essence of the second to the last paragraph of your post.
When you stop being someone else or an amalgam of supposedly superior selves, things work out. Why? Because it is less contrived? You and your associates are relaxed and get what they can rely on? Because it is true? It is sort of like the lie we tell when we think we are not good enough. it leaves you not feeling better or superior or more interesting… just less.
You tell your kids what you want to be called. Love the children and grands in your own way, be thankful that it is all possible. Those are three things you are really good at. I know this to be true.
Did I say I have missed you? Ah yes. Well, it does not hurt to repeat it. That is MY way.
I have missed you too!! Thanks for your wise words…as for my stepkids, they call me Karen and that’s just fine with me. Because that’s who I am. And when grand is able to call me something, I am sure it will be just fine with me :-)
hey Karen….. i am realyy touched by ur post… i am 22 and has been raised by my step mom. but i love her like nething……….. she takes care of the family at her best and has nevr let us felt that we are not from her womb…….though i collect from memories that she used to have several advices on our upbringing from others but she knew how to do that already and not bothered about others.. i love her
What a wonderful story…thank you.
The answer to your question is a definite ‘yes’. I also do not have children of my own and have in the past felt as though I should act a certain way just because I am a woman. It has only been with age that I have stepped away from feeling as though I have to explain myself to others. I am exactly who I am supposed to be; some days I may not feel it wholeheartedly, but overall I feel as though I have made the right choice.
I abhor labels, btw. I thank you for writing this with such honesty and clarity. I have missed you :)
When I am influenced by what I think I should feel, overcompensation, embarrassing overcompensation is almost always the result. And when this is triggered by the same people, they never know the real me. They think they do and often they don’t like what they see, but it isn’t actually me.
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