Ep 41: The Stepparent Gap and How to Close It

If you're a parent looking for sound, solid advice on how to raise your child in an ever-increasing dangerous world, then this podcast is for you. So here's your host, Richard Ramos.

I read the story of a young woman reaching out for help on an internet forum for stepparents and blended families. She shares how she is full of regret, resentment, and anger with herself. She shares how she can't sleep due to her unhappiness with the circumstances she got herself into against her better judgment. In her early 20s, she met a young man with whom she fell madly in love. However, there was one seemingly small issue. He had a 2-year-old daughter. At first, they weren't living together, and even though he made it clear to her that his daughter would always come first, she felt she understood and figured it would all work out. Wanting to move forward in their relationship and eventually move in together, they worked hard to save money so they could buy a home. A few years later, they reached their goal and bought the home of her dreams, except for one thing. She didn't want his daughter to live with them. However, she never said it out loud. Knowing this, she moved forward anyway. As time went on, as one might expect, she resented her decision, grew in her resentment towards the stepdaughter and her boyfriend to the point where she wrote that becoming a stepparent had ruined her life. It was sad to read her story. Here she was reaching out seeking advice about what to do since she was now stuck with a mortgage she couldn't afford to pay by herself, but no longer wanted to be in the stepparent relationship. In hindsight, it's easy to ask the question, If you knew you didn't want to live with his daughter and were already feeling resentment towards her because of always having to take a back seat to her, why did you make this choice? Paraphrasing her words, she said, "I was so in love with this guy that I was willing to try and be a family." Hey everybody, it's Richard Ramos, and you are listening to the Parent Whisperer podcast. Thank you for joining me. Today, I want to talk about the stepparent gap, what I call the stepparent gap, what it is and how we can close it. This story, unfortunately, can be very common when you start a relationship with somebody that has A child. And when you start the relationship, you may not have known that, or you do know that, as in this case, but you kind of overlook it, you know, especially when they're little. You overlook that aspect because you have fallen in love with an individual. But what we forget is that the individual comes with more than just themselves. And that can grow into A lot of issues, a lot of regret, as in this case. And that's why I call it the stepparent gap, meaning that there's a strain in the relationship. There's this unspoken but felt, very much felt, lack of intimacy, lack of harmony, lack of communication. And the relationship between stepdad or stepmom and the stepkids, it's just not there. It's not close. Now, in my case, it was a little different. And in my book, I have a chapter called The Stepdad Gap. And I talk about how one day I Was recognizing that my older three children were resenting the way I was treating their two younger siblings, because at that point I was more patient, more understanding, more tolerant. You know, just a better dad because of the experience that I had with my three older ones. So I saw that they were resenting that, and so I had a meeting with them. And I just began to apologize to them, and, you know, asking them to forgive me for being a little more harsh, a little more harder, you know, less tolerant, because I wanted them to know that I was recognizing that about myself. So when I turned to my stepson, and he who was the oldest, and apologized to him, he just broke down and started crying. And you know, to that point, we had a good relationship. But you know, obviously, I was overly hard on him. I'm sure that there were times I was, you know, less tolerant. And I always tried not to show any favoritism. But obviously, he was crying for a reason. So I'll pick up the story here. I'm going to read a little bit from my book on the step. Dad gap. I wasn't abusive, but I had been overly strict and intolerant in ways that I knew might have hurt him emotionally. And to my surprise, when he broke down and began to cry, until that moment I hadn't realized how deeply I had hurt him, nor how long he had been carrying this pain in his heart. It was a humbling moment. I could feel and see that healing was taking place between us. All that was left to do was to embrace him, cry together, and sincerely apologize. Up to that point, we had a good relationship, but from that moment on, it deepened in ways I hadn't expected. Our bond grew stronger, and it remains so to this day. But what I want to address here is the question of why. Why did I discipline him too harshly in the first place? Why had I acted that way? The honest answer is simply he wasn't my biological son. It wasn't that I didn't care for him or have a love for him. I did. But at that point in my life, I had to confront the reality that I wasn't being the best version of myself as a dad or a stepdad. Recognizing this harshness and favoritism towards biological children, Or however else this imbalance might manifest, is an essential step if we want to change it and close what I call the stepdad gap. The growth into a more equal, loving, and healthy relationship with our stepchildren requires self-awareness and emotional maturity. This kind of growth doesn't happen automatically. It takes intentional internal work. So that's part of my story, and I'm happy to say that we've— that was a long time ago, and we have a wonderful relationship, and on and on. But what I want to get to is, with a lot of you listening to this podcast on this subject of the stepparent gap or the stepdad gap, stepmom gap, It's there. And you may be like me, you're past that. Or you may not be past that. Or you may be just realizing that this is just not a happy situation, like the first story I read where the woman grew resentful. And I hope that that won't happen with you. And that's why I'm addressing this topic. topic because it can be overcome. But what I first want to say is don't beat yourself up. It's normal. It's normal for you to feel that awkwardness, especially in the beginning. And of course, if you have— the children are a little bit older, it could be even harder. When they're little, it's easier. But you still might have that gap. Where there's just that awkwardness and that lack of closeness. But what I want to tell you is that it can be closed. You can close that gap. And the way you do that is to acknowledge it, because not to acknowledge it is what causes the gap to widen. And the wider that gap gets, Then that leads to decisions to withdraw from my parent responsibilities. For example, my wife may want me to discipline the kids, my kids and her kids, which is a whole other subject in itself. But if I take the attitude, you know what, I don't want to deal with your kids, you deal with your kids, and Part of that is because there's that lack of intimacy. There's that lack of relationship. There's that lack of harmony, or what I'm calling that gap. And so, if we don't acknowledge it, if we ignore it, and then we start to withdraw from our roles as a stepparent, that just makes the gap wider and wider and worse. We are stepping into this role as also a provider. And how's that going to work if I have this attitude that I'm working hard, or, you know, doing whatever I do to earn the money? And probably, you know, these days my wife probably works too, and we're both trying to, you know, pay the bills, make ends meet, you know, grow and prosper. But if I have that feeling of, you know, why am I doing all this, you know, providing for these kids that are not even mine? And those things begin to happen. And that's the story that I first read where this woman is saying, oh, now I'm stuck with a mortgage and I resent this, my stepdaughter. I resent my boyfriend. I resent getting in this situation. But she saw no way out. But she was a provider. But she was resentful, and then she said becoming a stepparent had ruined her life. We don't want that. We don't need that. Doesn't need to happen. And the other thing that a lot of times as a stepparent building blended families is that we have a role of a peacemaker because our siblings, you know, the siblings, my kids, her kids might get into it, or there might be some, you know, arguments there, or some, you know. You know, feelings of you're favoring her kids, or she's saying you're favoring your kids. You know, you're kind of— the kids pit you against each other. Hey, Dad, you know, why does she treat her children that way, but she doesn't treat me this way? If you're in a blended family situation, you know what I'm talking about. And so sometimes you have to be the peacemaker, or it could be causing hardship in your marriage. You know, because again, taking sides. You're disciplining her kids the way you think they should, and she doesn't want that, and they're arguing about it. You know, or vice versa. She's disciplining your children the way you don't want her to, and you're arguing about it. Well, again, that's not abnormal. But my point is, what are you going to do about it? That's why I call the title of my book The Art of Stepparenting, because it is an art to blend families. How to blend families without tearing them apart. You know, if there's blended families out there that when they came together, you know, Everything was just great. Some of you might may remember those of us who are a little older, the Brady Bunch, which was a TV sitcom. You know, these two blended families came together, and you know there were times in those episodes where the kids didn't get along. But for the most part, you know it was a show that showed a lot of humor and you know fun times and. The kids growing up together and getting along, which is great. But the reality is it isn't as easy as the TV family Brady Bunch made it look. It's not easy. And this role of peacemaking is so important. The issue of humility and Apologizing and asking for forgiveness and those kinds of things and being a role model of that, demonstrating that, and then helping children come together and make peace. So making peace as a peacemaker between you and your stepchildren or you and your biological children too, between you and your wife, between the siblings, all of that. Somebody has to take that role, that leadership role. And when we accept these roles, we are going to bring the harmony and the reconciliation, and we're going to be able to close that stepparent gap because we're acknowledging it. We're accepting and embracing our responsibility and the different roles that we have as a stepparent. And my experience has been, because I've been through this, I've been through the hard times, I've been through the valleys and the mountaintops, but my experience has been that harmony does come, happiness does come, and the stepparent gap closes in relationships. That are peaceful, happy, and intimate. You've been listening to the Parent Whisperer Podcast. I'm Richard Ramos. Thank you for listening. I know this is a difficult topic, talking about the stepparent gap. But something that I believe parents can work through this in blending families. And I hope that some of the things I shared will be an encouragement to you. Don't beat yourself up. You can make it through this through dealing with yourself, working on yourself, acknowledging the issue, accepting your roles, and keep doing the work. Thank you for listening. Subscribe, send me an email, leave a review, share this with other blended families that you may know that are struggling with this issue. And always remember, Parents on a Mission is not for bad parents, not for bad stepparents. It is for good parents, good stepparents who want to get better. See you next time.

So that's it for today's episode of the Parent Whisperer podcast. Head on over to Spotify, Apple, wherever you listen and subscribe to the show. One lucky listener every single week that posts a review on Apple Podcasts will win a chance in the grand prize drawing. To win a $10,000 private VIP day with Richard himself, be sure to head on over to parentwhispererpodcast.com and pick up a free copy of Richard's gift and join us on the next episode.