I'm about to become a stepmother. And no, I was not involved in the divorce. But it is possible that I will be involved in the biterness, anyway.

What do-I think about all this? Well, I dream of having a great relationship with my step children. They are kids, what happened in their parents' lives is not their fault, they have certainly more or less suffered from the divorce, and they have the right to their opinion (although I guess that their opinion is influenced by their parents' opinions while they are kids, so if their mother is not happy with our marriage, maybe the kids will follow). So they may give me a chance, or not. If they do, then I would like to be at all the big events of their lives nexto to their dad. But if this is not possible, or if there is real tension between me and their mother, I think I will skip the events and find a way to congratulate them when their mom will not be around.

I think this is fair for the kids, who deserve to have both their parents around every major event of their lives. This also a fair and not that big price for their parents to pay for claiming their independence from a marriage that did not work. As for me, well, I am not their mother. i could be a very good friend, and a very good friend ought to understand that she should keep out of the way to avoid the tension. Not to forget that I am not interested in the least in a catfight...

Were-I Prudie, I would advise the LW to try to have a talk with her father and explain to him that she would be glad to have a separate celebration with him and her stepmother, but that for the ceremony it would be better if she skipped it. I think it is more reasonable for the new wife to skip it (after all, she was involved in this story and has her part of responsibility) than for the mother, however wrongly distressed, not to attend.

However I agree that the daughter should not take blackmails. But this for me is another story, independent from the fact that adults should keep balance when the interest of a kid is in play.

LiaP, I think you hit it on the head in your last paragraph "adults should keep balance..." Sounds like, in the LW's situation, one of the "adults" isn't behaving like one, even though you're right, she certainly should. :-)

As for your situation, I hope for you that there's no bitterness! Good luck! :-)

You're wrong. The father has remarried, and his daughter owes him the courtesy of involving his wife in any affair that he's invited to. HE is not the problem, and neither is his wife. The problem is the LWs mother, who seems to think that throwing tantrums like a toddler is the way to get through life. If anyone should be left off the guest list, it should be the mother - until she grows up and acts like an adult.

Most graduations are pretty big events, even for smallish classes. You and he could sit on the other side of the auditorium from the wife if she's that way. Odds are she'd just as soon he not show up, either!

I think it's noble that you are willing to consider a separate celebration. That's fine for a graduation, but for a wedding or baptism or many other events, it's simply not possible. You aren't putting the kids in the middle if their mother raises a fuss; she is. You can graciously ask the kid if it would be better that you stayed away from the event, but it isn't fair to make the kid have to make such a choice. Especially if their father was married to the first one for say 10 years, and by the time of these events, you've been married 15. By then, any grandkids are (almost) as much yours as hers.

LiaP, your step-kids are going to love you.

LiaP, I agree with Prudie's advice, having grown up with a grandmother who refused to be involved in family events when my grandfather (her ex-husband) was pregnant. I was very close to her, but I hated that she forced everyone to take sides.

That said, your future step-kids will be lucky to have you. While I don't think you should have to excuse yourself from family events to make everyone happy, I think it's incredibly gracious of you to offer to do so.

Wow, I can't type today. That should be when my grandfather was *present*, not *pregnant." A pregnant grandfather would be something to see though.

LiaP, that is wonderful and gracious of you, but having known a couple of women like the LW's mom, it would be setting the LW up for more grief in the future. Trust me. Woman like that will continue to blackmail the child for the rest of their lives if she gets away with it now.

She can either stop it now, or she'll be dealing with it later. She needs to tell mom go grow up and get over it, it is HER graduation, and not her mom's. Now, if MOM goes back to school and has a graduation, she can then decide who gets the tickets to come, but not for the daughter.

LiaP:

So they may give me a chance, or not. If they do, then I would like to be at all the big events of their lives nexto to their dad. But if this is not possible, or if there is real tension between me and their mother, I think I will skip the events and find a way to congratulate them when their mom will not be around.

I think this is fair for the kids, who deserve to have both their parents around every major event of their lives.

You are a lot more generous than many stepparents seem to be - at least, judging by many of the letters the advice columnists receive.

MessyONE:

You're wrong. The father has remarried, and his daughter owes him the courtesy of involving his wife in any affair that he's invited to. HE is not the problem, and neither is his wife. The problem is the LWs mother, who seems to think that throwing tantrums like a toddler is the way to get through life. If anyone should be left off the guest list, it should be the mother - until she grows up and acts like an adult.

Really (and you may actually be saying this) the people on the guest list should be those people the "host" (in this case, the graduate) wants. Any problems the putative guests have amongst themselves are theirs, not the graduate's, and as you say, they should grow up and deal with them.

kansasgirl:

Wow, I can't type today. That should be when my grandfather was *present*, not *pregnant." A pregnant grandfather would be something to see though.

Whew. You had me going for a bit. I was inclined to be on your grandma's side - imagine trying to explain your pregnant husband!

I wonder, though, whether this mom will find something else to bitch about anyway. She seems fairly set on ruining the day somehow.

My bil's kids refused to let him see the kids if my sister was there. She had less trouble with his having (apparently) cheated in the marriage (he met my sister after the divorce) than with his remarriage. She was Catholic and seemed to believe she owned him for life. One time she agreed to let him take the kids to a family function on my side, but at the last minute insisted she had to go, too, and then kept the kids physically away from all of us. I never even got to introduce myself to them.

She poisoned one of the kids against my sister, though my sister had never met any of them. The other pretended to agree with his mother to keep the peace, but as an adult established and maintained a relationship with his father and his family. If the mother knew, she'd probably have disowned him.

This is the sick shit that happens when people fail to mature emotionally and force everyone else to live their adolescent drama. Sorry for those kids.

I AM a step-mother, but you'd never know it. One is grown and in the military and since my second pregnancy we have progressively seen less and less of my sweet step-daughter. She lives 5 miles away, and the last time we saw her was on stage in December for a community theater play. She did come to our house one afternoon in October too. I remember, we took pictures of her helping us make our Halloween dummies.

The point here is (besides the obvious fact that I intensely resent her selfish excuse for a mother) that once my husband started letting her mother get away with cancelling week-end visits for specious reasons, no make-up visits, cutting visits short so she could get her hair done or go see the opening of a new movie he started to allow her mother to control the relationship between him and his daughter.

He didn't want to fight with the mother, or insist his child be allowed to participate in our family life, and now she is so estranged that she actually doesn't remember how old our children are, her own brother and sister.

Definitely, the mother cannot be allowed to dictate the terms under which the graduate gets to spend time with her parents. It will be a life-long battle. I wouldn't say don't invite mom. Invite her. Buy into no drama. Perhaps confronting this situation will help the mother to move on. It is not the child's job, however grown, to negotiate the truce between the parents.

MessyONE:

You're wrong. The father has remarried, and his daughter owes him the courtesy of involving his wife in any affair that he's invited to. HE is not the problem, and neither is his wife. The problem is the LWs mother, who seems to think that throwing tantrums like a toddler is the way to get through life. If anyone should be left off the guest list, it should be the mother - until she grows up and acts like an adult.

Are you the mistress?