Hi friends. I was very direct in my last post about how divorce, remarriage and stepparents contradict God's plan and the very nature of things. I meant to be. Kids have been so gaslit, damaged and disabled by this notion of do-over families that I can't afford not to be. I don't even use the term stepparent, stepchildren or half-siblings because the terms have been so weaponized against children. I explained how in my last post but I'll elaborate in this one. This post is written to anyone with children, who is considering divorce, getting into a relationship with someone with children or is in one. I'll be addressing Christian parents because divorce and remarriage particularly contradict their dogma but the tips apply to anyone.
If you've been following this blog, you can skip the bits in brackets, just backstory that you've heard before. {A quick backstory. My parents moved to Alaska to be missionaries in 1969, a task they were not equipped for, not supported in and did not understand. They had no jobs, plan for housing and knew no one. They thought it would be a holiday in which the grateful missioned-to would care for, feed, clothe and house them, while they "preached" (told others what to do while not doing it). And that's exactly what happened. They talked. Others, strangers, cared for me. My mom divorced my dad after carrying on a series of affairs. He spent his time wandering in Alaska, purportedly ministering to youth but really just having an extended gap year.
When they got back to Michigan, they set about finding new partners and starting new families. This was almost unheard of in our family, friends or community at large. I knew of no other kid with whose mom had a boyfriend or dad, a girlfriend. And it was even creepier because he always went for girls half his age and she went for guys 2x hers. At one point she moved her boyfriend into our house while she was running a foster care home (which subsequently got shut down due to their combined abuse of the kids. It never occurred to me that I had been abused in that too).
Throughout my life, I've been shunted back and forth to their respective homes. It was always their homes, never mine. I was made to be servant, surrogate spouse and parent and scapegoat to their new families. I was never wanted by any of them, except as a worker bee. I was kept in submission, given cast off stuff made to earn my keep. I never managed to do that to their standards and was eventually put out on the street at 16. It was a real-life Cinderella story only I wasn't blonde and beautiful. I was fat and dumpy. Which added to constant sense of shame. And, I think, to my parents ability to get away with it all.
I cannot describe the confusion, emotional pain and shame I lived with. I'm scared of my own shadow. I can't make decisions with getting a second opinion because I'm so used to being told I'm wrong. Life with my father and his wife was one endless stream of criticism and shame. They took their other kids' parts against me every single time. The Bible was used as a weapon to keep me in ashamed servitude. If I showed hurt, I was too sensitive. If I rose above, I was told I was proud. It will haunt me till the day I pass on. My dreams torment me at night. It brain damaged me in ways I will spend my life unraveling.
So, you're asking, what can we do differently as a blended family, so what happened to you doesn't happen to our kids? Well, the fact that you're asking is a good sign that you're off on the right foot. Here are some things you need to think about if you're going to get remarried or enter into a new relationship when you have children from a previous one. For the purpose of discussion, "child" refers to the one from your earlier relationship. And I'm going to be very direct here. And every single one comes from personal experience.
1) It's not about you. I guarantee you, whatever you suffered in your old relationship, your child is suffering just as much. She is confused, she feels you are divorcing her. She has been cast out with the old relationships like floor sweepings. You don't get to make up words and families as you go along. You cannot present new people into your child's life and expect the child to accept them as mom or dad and certainly not authority figures. These adults are your partner or spouse. They are nothing to the child. Their children are nothing to the child. Your new family is nothing. You blew apart the family that the child knew. To the child, you're foisting new faces on them as if the other family never existed. Help the child process. Admit that you have done hurtful things by breaking up the family. Get the child a supportive therapist or friend. Let healthy, extended family reach out to support the child. You got your way with this new family. Your child has nothing. Give the child time and space to come to terms with this. If she doesn't, don't force it.
2) Focus on how the new adult in your life will treat the child, not the other way around. It's is already the most unmitigated gall to present the child with a "new mom" when the child already has one. And that's when the new adult actually treats the child with respect as a parent would. All to often, the new adult is jealous of the child or even wants to keep the child out of his or her new family. And the child's parent goes along with it and lets the new partner call all the shots. And worst of all is when the new partner behaves not all like a caring person but is abusive, demanding, controlling, shaming, exploitative, manipulative, neglectful, invalidating and hurtful to the child. And the parent goes right along with it.
3) It's the child's house too. She was there first. My mother moved a boyfriend in who hit the ground running ordering me around. He never worked and it was my mother's and my house. But after he moved in, I never had a home again. It was always his. If you start a new relationship and you're the homeowner, make sure they understand that this is your child's home.
4) Adults shows respect first and hopefully earns the child's respect. Am I saying allow the child to be disrespectful to the new person? Eh, maybe for awhile. The child is always the child while you are the adults. And understand what is meant be respect. How are you expecting the child to treat the adult? Is it respect or servitude? Are you expecting the child to put up with bullying behavior and not say anything? Are you turning a blind eye to, even encouraging the new adult's poor treatment of the child? Mine did. So much emphasis was put on me being respectful, by people who were being incredibly disrespectful, just for shits and giggles. And there was little fear of me being disrespectful with the very dangerous and inappropriate consequences from four extremely dysfunctional people.
5) Learn your Bible. The old "honor your mom and dad" maxim was thrown in my face constantly when I was a model of obedience and respect. Not because I'm so great. It was dangerous not to be. But then they overlooked all the things the Bible told them they were supposed to do for me and didn't. Don't provoke your kid to anger by forcing strange and unhealthy expectations. Love them. Care for them. Don't kick them to the curb. And parents, you are the example. Be more concerned about what you are teaching them.
5) You don't have a choice. You have a responsibility to your progeny, not the other way around. Your child and what you owe them, predates the new partner. There are no do-overs. The child exists. The child is the original family, extant. You can't erase your debt to your child just because you don't want it anymore or because your new partner doesn't. You divorced your spouse, not your child. Although to hear some people, you'd think they believed they could. Neither of the new ones wanted me around. Except for the heavy lifting. And they were allowed, by my parents to think they had a choice in the matter.
I was allowed to live (note the word allowed, as I was optional and they were magnanimously giving me a home) with my parents and their new families only under very specific, transactional circumstances. Transactions in which I did my part and they didn't. Never once was my part ever taken against the shitty, lying accusation the new people leveled at me. I was made responsible for their work, taking care of their kids and waiting on them and their new spouses. If anything went wrong, it was my fault. If I wasn't making enough mistakes they made shit to guilt me with And this is part of the horrible gaslighting that made me the mess I am now.
6) And therein lies the rub. Parents who neglect their kids in favor of new families are very delusional indeed. But it went beyond fantasy with my parents. It was calculated. They didn't accidentally hurt me. They had to go out of their way to do the weird things they were doing. And they lied and gaslit me at every turn. And then cried on my shoulder. And then turned on me with venomous anger. And then blamed me for causing it. It was intentional to get me to a point where I was grateful for anything. Where I'd grovel and beg just for basic necessities. Which they would deny. And then blame and shame. Lather rinse repeat.
Do you have any idea how difficult it is for a child to process the dissolution of their family? It was for me an existential crisis. I could not grasp, in fact I never have, what happened. Oh I accepted it alright. I had to. My mom told me she was leaving my dad, let me cry a few minutes and boom, done. No mercy. No counseling. No one to talk to. She was done with him and on to the next, with no concern about how that would affect me. Her only issue was that she couldn't just poof me away too. And my dad had essentially abandoned. He never really came back.
But then, as I think of it, that was how they'd always been. The world revolves around them. Other people existed only as supporting characters in the Jack or Nancy show. They both lacked any empathy for others. This allowed them to be incredibly hurtful, to go thru life causing chaos and pain, and to be completely unphased. They were totally self-absorbed. I just had the extreme misfortune to be the only child of two narcissists who then married other narcissists.
So back to my tips. If you care for your child, you'll do what's right. If you don't, you won't. It really doesn't matter how you configure your family, whether married, single, divorced or living together, so long as you keep your priorities straight. I really mean that. When I was a kid, very few people divorced. Now it's common. But the pitfalls still remain. If you put ALL your kids first, if you live Ohana where no one gets left out or forgotten, you can make anything work.
My mother's fault was only in part moving her boyfriend in because it was so weird and hypocritically immoral back then. It was in kicking me to the curb in favor of him, of forcing me to be subject to him and in not honoring me as the an OG member of the family. Same with my dad. It was all in the order of operations.
Break up marriage. Double down on care and protection for kid. Meet new person. Make priorities clear. Kid was there first. Kid will always be there. Adaptations and sacrifices are made by adults, for child, not other way around. If they can handle that, proceed with caution. If it changes and you start seeing nastiness toward and jealousy of child, door works both ways. Better to cut the new person than neglect your duty to your child. Oh, and, child is not responsible if relationship fails. It didn't end because kid got in way. New partner is selfish person. Keep that clear in your head. More on that later.
No comments:
Post a Comment