Kids calling parent's new love Mom/Dad

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here: I totally understand on the letting the kid choose issue. I would never want to be in the position of forbidding my child to use a name that felt right, or making her keep a secret about the name that she uses. Clearly that is messed up. However, it also has to be confusing for a child to call a series of girlfriends or boyfriends mom or dad. Wouldn't that make the kid feel anxious about being abandoned by the original parents? I know my daughter has strong feelings of abandonment (she's 4) even though the ex and I have a good co-parenting relationship and make things as seamless as we can, and encourage her to be open about her feelings. And all of this is colored for me by knowing that this new person in my ex's and my child's life was a stepmom for 5 years, but left that relationship and chose not to maintain a relationship with those kids.

14:49 here. I think it depends on your child. It sounds like your situation is complicated for a number of reasons. My DH is actually someone I've known for many, many years. I wouldn't say he was a close family friend, but I did not need to spend a lot of time getting to know him before introducing him to DD, the way I would have if he had been entirely new. If you are able to discuss with your ex how important it is that his relationship with your DD stabilize before she has to process a stepparent, that would be ideal, but I can understand if that is not possible.

Most of all, you need to concentrate on being the stablest influence you possibly can for your DD. It sounds like she is going through a lot, and while I understand that you're going through a lot too, you have to project an image of calm to her. My DD asked me, for example, whymy ex's girlfriend had said, "MyName isn't allowed to come in the house anymore." My response to her, in the moment, was that everyone needs their space sometimes and if that's the rule at Daddy's house, then we will respect the rule at Daddy's house. Meanwhile texting my ex that it was completely inappropriate for him to allow his girlfriend to say things like that in front of our child, ever, that there was no reason for it and that I expected him to be a better communicator of details like this (since he'd said nothing about it). DD will never, ever know how I truly feel about her father. All she knows right now is that she has a lot of parents who love each other and can keep themselves together for long enough to go to her ballet recitals and birthday parties a couple times a year.

[Anonymous]

OP, it sounds like you have bigger problems than the Mom title. I would try to let it go and focus on the actual stability.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, it sounds like you have bigger problems than the Mom title. I would try to let it go and focus on the actual stability.

Okay, so if my real question is how do I insulate my child from the potential of my ex's series of short and intense romantic relationships with women who do want a parenting-type role.

In response to my child's questions, I already tell her "I will always be your mom, and you can always live with me if you want to (although when you go to college you might want to live in a fun house will all your friends). We talk about all the people who love her, not just her parents, but other family and close friends, I'm always neutral or positive about the girlfriend ("it sounds like you went on a fun trip, that's great"). I'm trying to build a strong network of local friends for us. So I am giving her a stable life to the best of my ability, but it sucks to see disaster looming and not be able to do anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, it sounds like you have bigger problems than the Mom title. I would try to let it go and focus on the actual stability.

Okay, so if my real question is how do I insulate my child from the potential of my ex's series of short and intense romantic relationships with women who do want a parenting-type role.

In response to my child's questions, I already tell her "I will always be your mom, and you can always live with me if you want to (although when you go to college you might want to live in a fun house will all your friends). We talk about all the people who love her, not just her parents, but other family and close friends, I'm always neutral or positive about the girlfriend ("it sounds like you went on a fun trip, that's great"). I'm trying to build a strong network of local friends for us. So I am giving her a stable life to the best of my ability, but it sucks to see disaster looming and not be able to do anything.

There really isn't much you can do, and sometimes trying just makes it worse. That's divorce. Make your home a stable, comforting place and she will always have that, no matter what.

[Anonymous]

I was 10 when my parents divorced. My mom remarried quickly. I call my stepfather by his first name, after I got over calling him Mr. Lastname.

My dad had several long-term girlfriends before he got remarried. I called them by their first names.

My child calls both my dad, my husband's father, and my stepdad the same thing, but he's two. I don't know things will shake out as he grows up, we're just going with the flow for now.

[Anonymous]

I would have bitten my tongue off had somebody wanted me to call my father's second wife "mom". She was barely 15 years older than I (my parents got divorced when I was 3, do the math...) and she was not my mother. I made that very clear on more than one occasion.

Maybe, if the whole situation had been more amicable... and maybe, had my half-siblings been born earlier and she had been some kind of mom figure in my life... maybe I might have called her something other than her first name. She didn't become a mother until I was 15 so nobody called her mom until after I was far from calling people other than my mom anything like mom.
My aunt and my mom's best friend were much more motherly towards me than my dad's second wife. And I refer to them as my second and third mother (and mention that I love having three moms when they are around) but still call both by their first name.

[Anonymous]

No. It's not OK to have a kid call another person mom or dad, if they already have a mom/dad.

- child of divorce and
divorced myself

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No. It's not OK to have a kid call another person mom or dad, if they already have a mom/dad.

- child of divorce and
divorced myself

This, mom and dad is reserved for parents only. I am a stepmom and I go by first name. Husband's kids call stepdad dad to make mom happy and it really hurts my husband. Our kids call my mom's boyfriend by his first name.