Is this a fake letter? I hope this is a fake letter! It almost has to be - right?

[conuly]

Dear Care and Feeding,

I’m a stepmom in a blended family. My husband has a 5-year-old son, “Corey,” from his first marriage, and together we have a 5-year-old daughter and a 3-year-old son. We used to have Corey on Sunday afternoons, but his mom took a new job when he started kindergarten and pushed for custody changes. Parenting two kids all week is exhausting, and now we have Corey Friday through Sunday every week too. Corey has a lot of trouble every time he switches over from his mom’s house to ours, and tattles that his stepsister “isn’t following the rules”—but it’s because his mom is a helicopter parent, while our house is about independence-building. He’s clingy and needs help with everything, and the weekend is miserable for everyone.

Corey’s aunt takes him after school four days a week, but not on Fridays. This means we have to arrange once-a-week afterschool care for him, which is expensive and inconvenient, and I usually end up having to be the one who leaves work early for pickup because that care ends at 4:45 p.m. I’m exhausted by this and the full weekend of managing our two kids plus Corey that comes afterward, including driving him to activities, like soccer games, that his mom is happy to sign him up for and then leave to us to deal with. I need Corey’s aunt, at the very least, to take him on Fridays to make it fair, but she refuses because she blames me for her sister’s divorce. When I asked my husband to talk to his ex and her sister about making the childcare arrangement fairer, he said he’d do it but then made excuses and never did. I know the divorce was unfriendly, but it’s been nearly five years and I’m tired of dealing with this. Corey would benefit from more predictability with his aunt, I know. I also think if he wasn’t scheduled for weekend activities he’d become more independent. I can’t get any support for any of this! How do I get my calm weekends back?

—Overworked Stepmom

Dear Stepmom,

I am trying, really trying, to be sympathetic. But it’s hard for me to cheer you on, particularly since that cheerleading would come at Corey’s expense.

This is a 5-year-old whose father left him and his mother. For Corey’s entire life, his dad has had another family, including children he seems to be more devoted to; Corey “gets to” spend limited time with his dad—one afternoon a week, for years!—and his dad’s second wife makes it very clear that having him around more than those few hours once a week is a burden. Why wouldn’t he act out?

When you married your husband, you became a stepmother, however reluctantly. Your having two kids with Corey’s dad doesn’t negate his—or your—responsibility for his other child. What did you think or hope would happen to Corey?

A change in custody arrangements because Corey’s mom has a new job could have been a boon for this child: whole weekends with his other parent, whom he saw so little of before. And this could have been an opportunity for you to step up and be a real stepmom—to really get to know him, to love him, to include him in the full life of the family you’ve made with his dad. Instead, you’re focused on the inconvenience and expense of finding childcare for him on the one weekday afternoon his aunt can’t (or maybe even just won’t—but it isn’t her responsibility, it’s his parents’—as in all three of his parents) and the misery of having to look after all three kids on weekends. You even begrudge the poor kid any scheduled weekend activities, because getting him to them is another inconvenience to you.

Of course Corey is “clingy.” Of course these transitions are hard for him. I’m relieved your husband didn’t do as you asked. (Though he is not at all blameless in this situation.) He should have said no when you proposed he tell his ex-wife and ex-sister-in-law they weren’t being “fair” about parenting duties, instead of pretending to agree with you, making excuses, and then not doing as you instructed.

If you can’t get it together to care for this child in the way he deserves—the way every child deserves—you’re not only harming Corey, you’re showing your two biological children how to be unloving, withholding, and cruel. As to your calm weekends: You’ll get them back someday, but now is not that someday.

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Comments

[conuly]

So, where to start, assuming LW is sincere but apparently totally lacking in self-awareness:

1. LW, your husband broke up his own marriage... but if you knew he was married at the time, you were absolutely part of that; and on a related note, if you think he won't cheat on you just like he cheated on her, you're only fooling yourself.

2. Either the older child is the husband's stepdaughter or, and I do think this is more likely, Corey is her half-brother - not her stepbrother.

3. What a shocker that this dude, who agreed for five years to only see his son one afternoon a week, and then had to be forced to something resembling equitable responsibility, is shirking his responsibility to all three of his kids. LW, sign your same-age daughter up for the same soccer team Corey is on and then make your husband take both of them to their practices and games. Corey is his job, not yours, and it'll be more efficient overall to bring two kids there instead of just one.

4. What rules is LW's daughter breaking?

5. Your husband's ex-wife's sister doesn't have to do shit for you, LW, and you darn well ought to know that.

6. I know the divorce was unfriendly, but it’s been nearly five years and I’m tired of dealing with this.

Well, this is what you signed up for, LW.

[watersword]

Put together, "5-year-old son, “Corey,” from his first marriage, and together we have a 5-year-old daughter..." and "I know the divorce was unfriendly, but it’s been nearly five years" are pretty damning for the LW and her husband and the timeline of their relationship. (Also the aunt "blames me for her sister’s divorce", hmm, I wonder why.)

This poor child.

[melannen]

OK I think we can all agree that LW is terrible here and I am now unsure why she and Husband have any kids at all, but I am curious about the "signing up for weekend activities" thing. I don't have any experience with custody things - how reasonable is this as a complaint? The kid just started kindergarten, it's probably not like these are things he's deeply committed to at this point.

If the letter had instead been "After fighting my terrible ex to have more than one afternoon a month with my kid, I finally got them to agree to giving me custody every weekend, but they have signed him up for activities all day every weekend - I hardly have more time than I did before, other than when I'm driving him places!" would that be a reasonable complaint?

[zana16]

LW, you complain about it being exhausting to parents two children all week and then imply that somehow your weekends will be “calm” without Corey. You have young children. You don’t get calm weekends.

Also, there is actually a really easy solution to the extracurriculars. You can choose not to take him. Clearly you don’t care about what Corey and his mom think of that plan, but I’m betting that the reason you haven’t chosen to blow this off is that your husband would object. You have a husband problem, not a stepson problem. Put your efforts there.