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My Friend Equates Her Stepmom Experience With My Natural Motherhood and It Drives Me Crazy
Dear Care and Feeding,
I’ve been friends with Nicole since childhood. She’s been married to Joe for the past seven years. He has custody of his 13-year-old son from a previous marriage, and he lives with them full time except for every other weekend. He’s a great kid.
Nicole has really taken to being a stepmom. She never wanted biological kids, and still doesn’t, but her generosity toward Joe’s son is admirable: She reads lots of advice books and supports her stepson in so many ways.
However: I am expecting my first child, and Nicole keeps equating my motherhood with being a stepmom. She keeps trying to give me advice and platitudes about parenthood. Nicole has a lot of experience, but I don’t think our situations are the same. I’m getting ready to bring a baby from my body into the world, which is something she hasn’t experienced. While she stepped up to stepparent, and is doing great at it, I don’t think it is the same as being a birth mother.
She has said things before in front of other friends that frustrated them and made them think she was drawing an equivalency between being a stepmom and a mom. The problem is that Nicole can be really touchy and temperamental, so while I would love to politely tell her to back off with the mom platitudes, I instead just distance myself. I always thought she would be like an extra aunt to my baby. What can I do?
—Just a Regular Mom
Dear JaRM,
There are certain experiences—getting married, having a child—that are so special that we confuse the issues and believe that they make us special. Having a child, however wonderful and magical that experience is, does not make you unique.
I’ve read and reread your letter so many times. I wonder whether or not you have? My advice: You’ve written this letter and gotten something off your chest. Now let the matter go. Don’t confront Nicole about this. Don’t think about this anymore. Maybe most importantly: Don’t think this way anymore.
Maybe someday, after you “bring a baby from your body into the world,” you’ll have the perspective to realize that you’re not being a very generous friend to someone you’ve known for most of your life. Maybe you’ll chuckle at what a know-it-all you were, certain that a mere stepmom would have nothing to teach you about being a mom. Maybe you’ll be sheepish about the irony in asserting that your friend is “touchy and temperamental” when you’ve written this very touchy letter.
For your sake, I hope that’s the case. If none of that comes to pass, for Nicole’s sake, I hope she decides she doesn’t want to be a mere “extra aunt” to your child and finds some more respectful friends.
I’ve been friends with Nicole since childhood. She’s been married to Joe for the past seven years. He has custody of his 13-year-old son from a previous marriage, and he lives with them full time except for every other weekend. He’s a great kid.
Nicole has really taken to being a stepmom. She never wanted biological kids, and still doesn’t, but her generosity toward Joe’s son is admirable: She reads lots of advice books and supports her stepson in so many ways.
However: I am expecting my first child, and Nicole keeps equating my motherhood with being a stepmom. She keeps trying to give me advice and platitudes about parenthood. Nicole has a lot of experience, but I don’t think our situations are the same. I’m getting ready to bring a baby from my body into the world, which is something she hasn’t experienced. While she stepped up to stepparent, and is doing great at it, I don’t think it is the same as being a birth mother.
She has said things before in front of other friends that frustrated them and made them think she was drawing an equivalency between being a stepmom and a mom. The problem is that Nicole can be really touchy and temperamental, so while I would love to politely tell her to back off with the mom platitudes, I instead just distance myself. I always thought she would be like an extra aunt to my baby. What can I do?
—Just a Regular Mom
Dear JaRM,
There are certain experiences—getting married, having a child—that are so special that we confuse the issues and believe that they make us special. Having a child, however wonderful and magical that experience is, does not make you unique.
I’ve read and reread your letter so many times. I wonder whether or not you have? My advice: You’ve written this letter and gotten something off your chest. Now let the matter go. Don’t confront Nicole about this. Don’t think about this anymore. Maybe most importantly: Don’t think this way anymore.
Maybe someday, after you “bring a baby from your body into the world,” you’ll have the perspective to realize that you’re not being a very generous friend to someone you’ve known for most of your life. Maybe you’ll chuckle at what a know-it-all you were, certain that a mere stepmom would have nothing to teach you about being a mom. Maybe you’ll be sheepish about the irony in asserting that your friend is “touchy and temperamental” when you’ve written this very touchy letter.
For your sake, I hope that’s the case. If none of that comes to pass, for Nicole’s sake, I hope she decides she doesn’t want to be a mere “extra aunt” to your child and finds some more respectful friends.
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