I knew this time would come, but now it is here I don't know how to handle it.
13 year old Rose has hit puberty and has started battling with her mother (as we all did). Both of them are strong personalities with very low tolerance levels and extremely short-tempers so the battles are often and nastily fought. Rose speaks to her mother (the Banshee) as she is spoken to and her mother doesn't cope well will this. The Banshee seems to think that the winner of the argument is the one who comes up with the most hurtful comment, and the Banshee hates to lose.
So... she came to stay with us for a week. She did well to last that long with the Banshee calling every night to ask when she would be home, and her older brother conscripted to continue the guilt trip at school. She has gone back now but I think she has achieved some of what she wanted. Both she and the Banshee now know that she is stronger than her brothers and that if it gets too bad at home she will come to us. The power balance has shifted a little, which I suspect will only escalate the battle.
I know I sound cynical but I was a teenage girl once and lots of split families I know deal with these same issues. DH thinks that he is offering a 'safe haven' for the kids to come to because their home life is so difficult, but it is also a great tool for a teenage girl to get her way. The whole time she was here she was on the internet finding horses for her father to buy her, because "I would definitely live here all the time if I had a horse".
Naturally DH wants to buy the horse. Naturally I am not so sure.
The relationship between mother and daughter is a curious one - the ties are deceptively strong. Not to mention the force that is mother guilt. What happens to DH when she chooses her mother over the horse (and him)? What happens to DH and I if she does come here to live and starts battling with me?
Showing posts with label step-parenting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label step-parenting. Show all posts
Wednesday, 9 May 2007
Friday, 9 March 2007
Q. Is it bad form for a stepmother trying-desperately-to-be-a-real-mother to hide in her bedroom all weekend?
I am currently mid-IVF cycle - we had an Egg Pick-Up last Saturday morning and Embyro Transfer on Tuesday. I have been trying to keep calm so that everything is soft and loving and quiet and our little embryos will want to stick around for another 39 weeks.
Darling Husband has named them Hope and Happiness, I know, what a gorgeous and sensitive man I have. Na-a. I was just a little upset because we had been hoping to grow our bubs to 5-day-old Blastocycts but I didn't produce enough eggs, because they made me go to pick-up too damn early - on day 11 instead of day 14. I know, what the...? Anyway, they only collected 6 eggs of which 3 fertilised and 2 survived 48 hours. So we were booked in for transfer with a 2-cell and a 4-cell, which sounded very sad indeed. So DH decided that I needed an attitude adjustment and he didn't want twins named Frustration and Bitterness, especially if they were girls - OMG could you image the teenage years?!
But DH obviously took exception to my tranquil sloth-like state and saw fit to cancel his plans to take the kids away this weekend. I can't tell you how much I was looking forward to that - me and SuperCat and ScaredyCat, the couch, movies, chocolate, pizza, copious cups of de-caffeinated tea (well I'd have to do something good!). No kids, no husband, no cooking, no mess - ahhh bliss....
Instead, I now have to look forward to the kids for about the 6th weekend in a row and for 3 nights!! One has been away on a school camp, so will be hoarse, tired and cranky - join the queue kid. And the other two will be at each others throats as usual. So my vision of lying on the couch watching movies and growing embryos is now punctuated by f-off no you f-off (such lovely manners they will pass on to my babies).
One false move kids - one iota of stress you cause me and my dividing embryos, one fight, one tantrum, one overly-demanding request, one jack-ass stunt in my lounge room that goes wrong and breaks something - then thats it! All hell will break loose and evil stepmonster will open a can of whoopass on your butt.
Either that or I might just slink over to my mother's house without anyone noticing....
I am currently mid-IVF cycle - we had an Egg Pick-Up last Saturday morning and Embyro Transfer on Tuesday. I have been trying to keep calm so that everything is soft and loving and quiet and our little embryos will want to stick around for another 39 weeks.
Darling Husband has named them Hope and Happiness, I know, what a gorgeous and sensitive man I have. Na-a. I was just a little upset because we had been hoping to grow our bubs to 5-day-old Blastocycts but I didn't produce enough eggs, because they made me go to pick-up too damn early - on day 11 instead of day 14. I know, what the...? Anyway, they only collected 6 eggs of which 3 fertilised and 2 survived 48 hours. So we were booked in for transfer with a 2-cell and a 4-cell, which sounded very sad indeed. So DH decided that I needed an attitude adjustment and he didn't want twins named Frustration and Bitterness, especially if they were girls - OMG could you image the teenage years?!
But DH obviously took exception to my tranquil sloth-like state and saw fit to cancel his plans to take the kids away this weekend. I can't tell you how much I was looking forward to that - me and SuperCat and ScaredyCat, the couch, movies, chocolate, pizza, copious cups of de-caffeinated tea (well I'd have to do something good!). No kids, no husband, no cooking, no mess - ahhh bliss....
Instead, I now have to look forward to the kids for about the 6th weekend in a row and for 3 nights!! One has been away on a school camp, so will be hoarse, tired and cranky - join the queue kid. And the other two will be at each others throats as usual. So my vision of lying on the couch watching movies and growing embryos is now punctuated by f-off no you f-off (such lovely manners they will pass on to my babies).
One false move kids - one iota of stress you cause me and my dividing embryos, one fight, one tantrum, one overly-demanding request, one jack-ass stunt in my lounge room that goes wrong and breaks something - then thats it! All hell will break loose and evil stepmonster will open a can of whoopass on your butt.
Either that or I might just slink over to my mother's house without anyone noticing....
Tuesday, 13 February 2007
Introduction to the evil stepmonster
I think that my step-children are joking when they call me evil. But then people have called me deluded before.
Most of the time I am really very nice to them. I just shrug when they won't eat my food because "it's not the same as Mum's", and I very politely suggest they wait until the time comes when they tell me "Mum says I can finish school at the end of Year 9" (aged 15 for non-aussies). I bite my tongue when the evil stepmonster wants to yell obscenities about what an un-medicated psychopathic banshee of questionable intelligence their mother is, and if they don't eat their dinner it will be forced into them during the night!
At night I dream of all the things the evil stepmonster would do and say if she could only get away with it. My husband [a kind-hearted soul whom I adore and could not live without] loves those little buggers to death and doesn't like to rock the boat with the ex-wife [because she is a PSYCHO and takes it out on the kids!]. So if I was evil all the time, despite what he says, I would lose the battle. But evil will not be completely silenced.
Someone once told me that if you are thinking of opening a Bed & Breakfast, you should first invite your most annoying and demanding relative to stay for a month and try waiting on them hand and foot whilst smiling sweetly and pointing out the areas many tourist attractions. One might also wish to try a test like this before embarking on the role of step-parent. It would go something like this; find an angry child who shows an obvious dislike to you [teenagers would be especially good for this purpose] and lock yourself in a confined space with them for a week.
But seriously, I adore them, I do, but I could wring their scrawny necks and most of the time I like that they don't live with us full time. On the other hand the less time they are with us the more time they have to spend with the screaming banshee that is biologically their mother [and as thus far more superior in species to that of their father in the eyes of the Australian Family Court - but lets not go there just yet].
Most of the time I am really very nice to them. I just shrug when they won't eat my food because "it's not the same as Mum's", and I very politely suggest they wait until the time comes when they tell me "Mum says I can finish school at the end of Year 9" (aged 15 for non-aussies). I bite my tongue when the evil stepmonster wants to yell obscenities about what an un-medicated psychopathic banshee of questionable intelligence their mother is, and if they don't eat their dinner it will be forced into them during the night!
At night I dream of all the things the evil stepmonster would do and say if she could only get away with it. My husband [a kind-hearted soul whom I adore and could not live without] loves those little buggers to death and doesn't like to rock the boat with the ex-wife [because she is a PSYCHO and takes it out on the kids!]. So if I was evil all the time, despite what he says, I would lose the battle. But evil will not be completely silenced.
Someone once told me that if you are thinking of opening a Bed & Breakfast, you should first invite your most annoying and demanding relative to stay for a month and try waiting on them hand and foot whilst smiling sweetly and pointing out the areas many tourist attractions. One might also wish to try a test like this before embarking on the role of step-parent. It would go something like this; find an angry child who shows an obvious dislike to you [teenagers would be especially good for this purpose] and lock yourself in a confined space with them for a week.
But seriously, I adore them, I do, but I could wring their scrawny necks and most of the time I like that they don't live with us full time. On the other hand the less time they are with us the more time they have to spend with the screaming banshee that is biologically their mother [and as thus far more superior in species to that of their father in the eyes of the Australian Family Court - but lets not go there just yet].
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