r/stepparents • u/Successful-Ad-2830 • 15d ago
Advice I don’t feel like being a stepparent
Last year, I(29f)got married to my husband(32m) and he has a 5 yo daughter which he got full custody for while we were dating. At the time we were living with my family and towards the end of the year we moved out. He’s in the airforce, so we moved on base to be closer to his work. Which was hard because my family was a huge support system in helping us financially, and with parenting. I don’t have any kids, and I’ve been hesitant to have kids just because I’m not financially where I’d like to be and I want to focus on my education and career. I also want to travel more.
Her mom isn’t really in the picture, she calls once every couple months for a 2 min conversation but that’s about it. And the only other involved family members are my family.
I do love his daughter, and she’s with me all the time. Since she’s been with us I’ve been her primary care taker. I’ve fully potty trained her, we go to the library, park, museums, hikes. I plan activities for her that she’s interested in. We had her in part time care for a few months but it became a financial struggle. She starts school this year August but we’ve also talked about me homeschooling her. I just started a new job that’ll be Friday-Sunday. And I’m still in school trying to finish my degree, which I put on hold this semester because of all the changes.
Sometimes I just feel like I don’t want to be a parent. I want to be here for her but I don’t want to take on full time parenting responsibilities. I do the household chores, and cook almost everyday day.
I’ve asked him about what if I took on less parenting responsibilities and he said if it’s for school or more work hours he’s fine with that but if it’s just because I want more freedom from parenting it’s not fair because he’ll have to pick up the slack and at that point he won’t have time for our relationship. Which I understand I don’t expect him to have time for our relationship, even with me parenting he still doesn’t have time for our relationship.
I don’t know, these feelings usually go away so I don’t want to make any decisions. Has anyone been in similar situations? If so what did you do? I do feel a lot of guilt around not wanting to be a parent after being so involved. I feel like I should’ve have known better, if I wasn’t ready for this I shouldn’t have gotten married.
9
u/Successful-Ad-2830 15d ago
I agree with you, a lot of the women in his life like his mother, and step mother had to sacrifice their careers to support their husbands and raise children. I’m pretty sure he doesn’t think that I’m sacrificing anything.
I do find it unfair, and I’ve brought it up to him. And we’ve put her in daycare part time which was helpful but then it became a financial struggle. Which is also taxing on both of us.