Did you grow up with half or step siblings? Or are your kids?

[Anonymous]

I have a family with very few divorces, my spouse comes from a family with many.

My spouse's parents are divorced and both remarried. He had a grandparent and a couple uncles and aunts married 3-5 times.

It is very complicated. Spouse sees step-siblings occasionally but not close and I don't see that relationship continuing when step-parent dies.

I feel he and sibling were neglected a lot as children as parents divorced when they were young and one parent was not very involved, and the other parent was so busy trying to hold down the fort and finding next spouse.

When his grandparent died, who was married multiple times, left nothing to the children and everything to their long-term partner (not married).

I see a lot of selfishness and neglect and untreated personality disorders among his family and the divorces seem to reflect the instability.

[Anonymous]

We successfully did this and the kids are older and they have great relationships. It’s all about the parents working together. All parents should meet regularly and talk about the never ending parenting challenges. All adults must genuinely get along and have the best interest of all the kids as a goal.
It’s hard and it’s rare but it’s doable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We successfully did this and the kids are older and they have great relationships. It’s all about the parents working together. All parents should meet regularly and talk about the never ending parenting challenges. All adults must genuinely get along and have the best interest of all the kids as a goal.
It’s hard and it’s rare but it’s doable.

Well, it's a mistake to think anyone can control whether all the adults get along and work together. OP already talked about how awful her ex is, so that doesn't bode well. And sometimes people start out getting along but then a new and problematic person marries in, or something else changes (like one of the kids' behaviors) and that makes it hard to get along even though it wasn't before. If it works, great, but you can't predict whether it will or not. It's a big risk to take with your daughters' quality of life, OP. Especially after they've been through so much in such a short time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We successfully did this and the kids are older and they have great relationships. It’s all about the parents working together. All parents should meet regularly and talk about the never ending parenting challenges. All adults must genuinely get along and have the best interest of all the kids as a goal.
It’s hard and it’s rare but it’s doable.

Well, it's a mistake to think anyone can control whether all the adults get along and work together. OP already talked about how awful her ex is, so that doesn't bode well. And sometimes people start out getting along but then a new and problematic person marries in, or something else changes (like one of the kids' behaviors) and that makes it hard to get along even though it wasn't before. If it works, great, but you can't predict whether it will or not. It's a big risk to take with your daughters' quality of life, OP. Especially after they've been through so much in such a short time.

When adults can’t be adults everyone will suffer for the rest of all their lives.
Except for that one sociopath that everyone thinks is the other guy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My half sister is 21 years younger than me. My dad told my step mom that they could have a baby but both of his had to be out of the house first. He never wanted us to have to share resources or attention. My brother, half sister, and I are all very close even though she is significantly younger than us.

My kids are the 2nd set of kids for my exDH. His kids were 2 (g) and 5 (b) when we started dating. The girls are 10 years apart and the boys are 13 years apart. All 4 kids are incredibly close. My now 18yr old spends significant time with her older sister and brother. If the big kids are attending a function or activity, the younger kids will happily attend just to spend time with the older kids.

When my kids were little and exDH had them for the weekend, we often did a lot of divide and conquer. exDH would spend Sat with the big kids and all 6 of us would do something on Sunday.

exDH was in his mid 30 when we had the younger kids. The agreement we made was that most of the financial support for the house and younger kids would be on me as he was still obligated to the older kids. We both continued to progress in our careers and now that we're in our 50s there is plenty of money to go around.

Lots of divorce in your family. Wow.

Thank you for your comment. May I ask what the purpose of it is? It sounds rather judgey. I am sure you did not mean it that way so I do want to ask what value you feel it added to the conversation?

It’s just a lot is all. I didn’t mean to sound judgy. I guess when you’re the child of divorce you don’t think all that much before getting divorced yourself. I mean, your parents were divorced, your ex-husband was divorced twice, and you yourself are divorce. And you also say you have these great careers that make plenty of money. Do you think there’s any correlation between all of that? Not judgey just curious. We just don’t have a lot of that going on in our family so I find it interesting.

Actually it sounds like dysfunctional crazy train.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My half sister is 21 years younger than me. My dad told my step mom that they could have a baby but both of his had to be out of the house first. He never wanted us to have to share resources or attention. My brother, half sister, and I are all very close even though she is significantly younger than us.

My kids are the 2nd set of kids for my exDH. His kids were 2 (g) and 5 (b) when we started dating. The girls are 10 years apart and the boys are 13 years apart. All 4 kids are incredibly close. My now 18yr old spends significant time with her older sister and brother. If the big kids are attending a function or activity, the younger kids will happily attend just to spend time with the older kids.

When my kids were little and exDH had them for the weekend, we often did a lot of divide and conquer. exDH would spend Sat with the big kids and all 6 of us would do something on Sunday.

exDH was in his mid 30 when we had the younger kids. The agreement we made was that most of the financial support for the house and younger kids would be on me as he was still obligated to the older kids. We both continued to progress in our careers and now that we're in our 50s there is plenty of money to go around.

Lots of divorce in your family. Wow.

Thank you for your comment. May I ask what the purpose of it is? It sounds rather judgey. I am sure you did not mean it that way so I do want to ask what value you feel it added to the conversation?

It’s just a lot is all. I didn’t mean to sound judgy. I guess when you’re the child of divorce you don’t think all that much before getting divorced yourself. I mean, your parents were divorced, your ex-husband was divorced twice, and you yourself are divorce. And you also say you have these great careers that make plenty of money. Do you think there’s any correlation between all of that? Not judgey just curious. We just don’t have a lot of that going on in our family so I find it interesting.

Actually it sounds like dysfunctional crazy train.

Many siblings grow up and never talk to each other again even if parents never divorced. Divorce doesn’t have to be the reason for crazy train families. Divorce may be the reason some children and parents are saved from the crazy.