The holidays are not my favorite anymore. They used to be. Now, I’m dodging blows. Last Christmas, I swore I’d never celebrate again. It almost broke me. So, I’m looking back now, so I can look forward this year.

Let me fill you in.

I put my heart into holidays. I love them. I love family and friends being together. I love traditional food and pretty tables, and I love being so full you need to unbutton your pants. This, for me, is what the holidays are about. They are about togetherness.

Let me start by saying that this was only my 4th or 5th time celebrating Christmas. I’m Jewish so Christmas has always been fun for me. It’s no pressure, pretty things, getting together with friends, and food. Lots of food. It’s joyful.

Last Christmas, started out magically. It snowed!

It rarely snows in the Seattle area, but we were in for a white Christmas. I was giddy. I got up at the crack of dawn to start cooking. I had Christmas music blasting. The Captain left to pick up the kids and grandpa, because of the snow. When they got home, girl child came in and didn’t acknowledge me (not a new scenario), the boy child gave me a big hug, as did grandpa. They all got settled and hung out while I was happily cooking away in the kitchen.

We gathered in the living room, and presents and stockings were exchanged. The Captain and I weren’t giving gifts to each other since our anniversary was days away, and we didn’t expect grandpa to give us gifts, those are for the kids. Presents started getting exchanged and I slowly realized that everyone was opening gifts, except for me. The kids didn’t give me a card, say Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays. Nothing. Even the boy child, who I have such a good relationship with, was like a different person. It seemed as if he and the girl child had decided not to acknowledge me. They showered their dad and grandpa with gifts, but nothing for me. I was invisible. It was like I wasn’t even there.

I shouldn’t have been surprised because they’ve never really acknowledged my birthday, or anything else. And in years past, they typically would give me a candy bar for Christmas. #thankyouhersheys.

So I got breakfast ready, and the Captain came into the kitchen knowing how hurt I was. He saw it on my face. I kept thinking to myself, “How am I here again?” I could barely hold back my tears. He knew. He kept apologizing, and I said I just need to make it through breakfast.

Everyone sat down, and I tried to make it through the meal, but I couldn’t. I was hurt beyond hurt, again. So I excused myself in the middle of the meal, and went upstairs.

How did I become the bad guy in all of this? I thought I did everything right. We dated for a year before they knew about me, so the Captain and I were sure we were serious about each other before they met me. And, that was two years after their parents divorced. The Captain and I dated several more years so they could truly get to know me. I moved from the city to the suburbs, and along with their father, we found a house that would work best for them, I paid for their events, without them knowing, I supported them at every turn. I loved them. Now, here I was, crying alone in the bedroom on what should have been an amazingly beautiful and snowy Christmas morning.

And, that was all before 10:00am…

Batten down the hatches, the holidays are coming.

More soon.

Stand strong. Trust yourself. Be brave. Put on lip gloss, it will make you feel better.

I was thinking the other day that there are certain expectations we have of ourselves when we become stepmoms. There are also certain expectations that others have of us.

For me, I thought that it would be easier than it was. I knew it wasn’t going to be a walk in the park when we blended our families, and by blended, let me be clear, I brought a dog into the mix. I did however, have no idea what was in store for me. I’m not sure there was any way to know.

There are emotions and feelings. Lots of feelings. The kids had plenty (and still do all these years later), I had plenty (and still do all these years later), and I’m sure the Captain also had plenty (and still does all these years later). Mostly it was all of the uncertainty of what was the unknown.

It sort of reminds me of that first day of elementary school when you have no idea what to expect. I actually do remember kindergarten. I remember my teacher, I remember the fear, and I remember what would become the fun. I also remember the day we learned to fall in line. We had to line up to get lunch, line up to go to the bathroom, the library, and recess, all of it. I remember how what felt chaotic suddenly felt orderly and clear. I remember that there was an expectation, and if that expectation was met, then things moved forward. If it wasn’t met, well, we had to figure it out chaotically, until it was resolved.

Being a stepmom is like that. It’s the fear of the unknown, the expectations that most likely will never be met by me, or by others who want certain things for me or for themselves.

If only it was as easy as falling in line.

I have a Stepmom Spirit Guide. She’s the one who has been there, done that. For real. My friend, the Guide, as I’ll call her, is a stepmom, too. Our stories are similar. My experience mirrors hers. The relationship I have with the girl child is so similar to hers, that it’s eerie. Our husbands are similar. They parent similarly. The exes are similar, too. The only difference is she’s about eight years ahead of me on her journey. She’s my shining light at the end of the tunnel, my disco ball, my Sherpa.

When I started dating the Captain I remember long conversations usually over a hot bowl of Paneer Tikka Masala and Chai Tea or Korean BBQ (yes, I probably stuff all the feels down with food). She would share her stories, and I’d take a deep breath and think, “That’s not going to happen to me!” Well, if I would have put a dollar on everything she said coming true I’d have a nice table from HomeGoods by now.

The most important thing, through all of this, is that I have a friend, a dear friend, who I trust implicitly. A sister who has helped guide me, listened to me cry hysterically, hugged me, made me laugh, told me what will come next, or when I’m full of shit or too sensitive, and most importantly, told me that my feelings are valid and important. If it wasn’t for her, I don’t know where I’d be.

I think when I start a stepmom support group (yes, I think there needs to be one), she should be our fearless leader. There will be drinks, food – lots of food, and tissues. Oh and I think we should have badges, like the Girl Scouts. For every milestone we make it through, as unscathed as possible, we get a badge. And, one-by-one, we’ll learn from our Stepmom Spirit Guide, on our journey as stepmoms.

Last year, I decided to backup the photos on my phone and computer to an external hard drive. I’d been thinking about doing it for a while, but of course there are a million other things I’d rather be doing than moving over photos and categorizing them. Like, watching paint dry, or watching anything on Bravo (don’t judge, it’s my thing). So, one day, I finally sat down to do it.

I realized after I started looking at the photos that the only family photos that I was in were from our wedding. I wasn’t in any others! I was always the one taking the photos of the Captain and the kids. So, when I looked back at all of the holidays, get togethers, parties and memories, there was no actual photographic evidence of me in the family.

From the moment we moved in together (that’s a story for another blog), I wanted the kids to feel like they still had their one-on-one time with their dad, and the fact I was with their dad, and we were living together, wasn’t going to change everything. Who the hell was I kidding? Of course it was going to change everything. And, you know what, that’s okay. We can’t freeze a moment and make it something that it isn’t. I was with them and I was a part of those memories.

I went so far the other direction of wanting them to have quality time, and solid memories with their dad, that I took myself out of the mix (and the photos). It didn’t even occur to me to be in the photos.

Instead of looking at a bunch of photos of my family (yes, MY family), while I saved and categorized the photos, I found a bunch of photos like these (that’s Lucille Ball the Tortie cat and Aggie McDougall the Westie dog), oh and some cheese platter I made:

 

Sometimes it takes something unexpected to show you the way. For me, it was moving photos to an external hard drive.

So, now I take more selfies, so we can all be in the photos, as a family. It took a long time for me to realize that I oughta be in pictures, too.

Saw this on a friend’s feed this morning. Something to aspire to. Until then, there’s coffee, lists, and lipgloss.

Here’s the thing, the first time you meet your significant other’s kids feels like, well, like you’re cranking one of those Jack-in-the-Box toys with the scary clown that pops up and scares the shit out of you. Clowns scare me, but that’s a whole other story. It’s like you’ve been cranking this toy for a year and at any minute something is going to pop up and jump out at you. It can either punch you in the face or hug you. You have no idea until it jumps out.

In my case I had some warning that I could get figuratively punched. The Captain told me that the girl child wanted nothing to do with me, that she didn’t want to meet me for dinner, and that she was going to bring a book with her so she wouldn’t have to talk to me.

Now, I like a good challenge. Plus, I think, and I’ve been told by those who like to spend time with me, that I’m a good person. They, the people who I mentioned above, say I’m nice, kind and funny. They say I’m easy to be around. How could she not like me? Ah, such a novice. What I have learned, after years of therapy to help me maneuver through these unchartered stepmother waters, is that it actually doesn’t have anything to do with me. She doesn’t like the idea of me. So, how do I move through that?

Okay, back to the first meeting. The Captain and the kids met me for pizza (neutral territory). I can’t even put into words how nervous I was. I kept thinking if the kids don’t like me, I’m sunk. Why would the Captain stay with someone who his kids didn’t want to be around? My future, the future with my person, was riding on this meeting…or so I thought.

I got there early (to locate all of the exits in case of an emergency), took some Imodium, and sat and waited. They came in. I was introduced, the boy child was nervous, but we had met briefly once before. The girl child didn’t look up, sat down, and I think she said, “Hey.” I didn’t blame her. I wasn’t her mother, her family unit was torn apart, she was sad and angry, and the idea of her dad having a significant other meant that the chances of her parents getting back together were getting slimmer by the day.

I nervously tried to make conversation. She would respond back, eyes down, with, “Uh huh.” I saw she was reading the book The Hunger Games. I thought to myself, “Oh, you got this.” Being an avid People magazine reader for decades (don’t judge, it’s my thing), I knew all about this movie. Being a daily Seattle Times reader, I also knew the stars of the movie were doing an appearance at a local shopping mall that week. So, I started talking about the stars, who was dating who, surprises I heard about the movie, and that they were going to in Seattle that week. She responded, looked up, and we chatted about the movie. We didn’t talk about anything deep. I didn’t ask her about school, her hobbies, the usual questions adults bombard kids with. My Imodium kicked in, my stomach settled, and the girl child and I talked for about ten minutes.

I think we all stayed there at the restaurant for maybe 40 minutes, but it was enough. I had made some sort of contact. With that meeting, we had set the groundwork for whatever would come next.

Looking back at it now, all these years later, I think she probably looked at me as the unknown Jack-in-the-Box, just as I had looked at her.

I’m a planner. I plan out events in my personal life, and I plan projects in my work life. Knowing and preparing for what will come in the next week, month, six months, year, brings me calm. I’m one of those people. I have lists, charts, spreadsheets, and my iPhone calendar looks like a rainbow.

Here’s the thing, you can’t help who you fall in love with. You can’t plan for that or for what’s next.

A little background…I met the love of my life at work. He worked in IT, and I worked in marketing. I’m a Mac person, and he’s a PC guy. So, needless to say, if I had a computer issue (which I never did, because I work on a Mac), he would be the person who would fix it. I think in the year that we worked for the same company we had maybe two or three short conversations, since I never had a computer issue. We talked briefly about music, The Who, specifically, my favorite band and one of his. I think at one point he mentioned he was divorced with kids.

Fast forward to my last day at the company, and my phone rang. He said, “I just heard it’s your last day. I can’t believe today is your last day and we never hung out.” I said, “I’m changing jobs, not dying.” He said, “What are you doing Sunday?” That was the start of a beautiful friendship that slowly blossomed into love. I fell in love with an amazingly kind, funny, tenderhearted man.

My husband, who I call, the Captain, has two kids. At the time, the girl child was 12 and the boy child was nine. He went through a very difficult and contentious divorce, and his kids had been through the ringer, too.

We started dating a year-and-a-half after the Captain’s divorce. We knew, after about five or six months of dating (which was about eight months of hanging out) that we wanted to wait a year before he told the kids about me. Everything we heard from experts, and read, said that it was important to know the relationship was serious before the parent introduced a significant other into their lives. So that year, we saw each other every other weekend, and in the summer, we would go several weeks without setting eyes on each other. Although this was difficult, you know, when you’re in love and happy, you want to see your person, we both knew this was the right thing to do for the kids.

Finally, a year had gone by, and it was time for the Captain to tell the kids. I couldn’t have predicted what would happen next. I think I’m still feeling the effects from that.

After he told the kids (which he did without me, thank God), the first thing the girl child said (or yelled) was something to the effect of, “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me, you lied to me. I never want to meet her, I’ll never talk to her, I’ll never like her. I’ll never, ever have anything to do with her.” Probably not totally out of the ordinary. My guess is divorced parents who have had similar conversations with their kids hear something similar. The difference is, she meant it. She really meant it.

So even after our thoughtful approach to waiting, and after waiting a year, we were screwed right out of the starting gate.

And, there you have it, that my friends is the shit you can’t plan for.

 

 

Welcome to “The Unofficial Stepmom: All of Things They Didn’t Tell You When You Said, “I Do.” 

I remember the year I discovered lipgloss. Back in the 70s, they introduced flavored lipgloss that rolled on. I, of course, had several flavors, that tasted so good, I used to take the roller off to get more on my lips. I think it was probably around 3rd or 4th grade when it was time for school pictures and my mom made it very clear that there would be no lipgloss in the school photos. Well, I snuck it in my pocket, and rolled it all over my mouth, right before the picture was taken. I remember thinking, “Lipgloss makes me feel better.” It did, until we got the pictures back, and the jig was up. I had lipgloss smeared all around my mouth. My smile was huge, I felt so confident, and the shine was, well…everywhere.

Lipgloss still makes me feel better. It can’t make a miracle happen, but it does make me feel better, when even though I feel beat up and spit out, a little shine on the outside helps me shine on the inside.

Remember the book, “What to Expect When You’re Expecting?” As my friends with kids will attest, that book didn’t tell you the half of it. It didn’t tell the whole truth about what happens to your body, during and after pregnancy. Well, the same is true with becoming a stepmom. I heard lots of stories from people, read books, etc., but nothing prepared me for the journey I was about to go on, and that I’m still on.

Through this blog, I’ll share what I’ve figured out along the way, and what I’m still figuring out. Now, several years into this not-so-new to-me life, each day remains a lesson in patience, deep breathing, and lipgloss.