Anyone think this is odd?

[DammitJanet]

I talked to my dad today. I have been a bad daughter and havent called him since June. Guess he has been a bad dad too since he hasnt called me either...lol.

Anyway, during our conversation in which I proudly told him his great-granddaughter was starting school (pre-school), he announces to me that my step-mom just became a new grandmother! Now they have been married for 25 years and dated for 2 years before that so by now one would think that ALL the grandkids would be OUR grandkids not hers and his right? Just like maybe they could combined all us kids by now instead of her kids and his kid. Nope. Its her grandkids and his grandkids. I dont know if she is going to live long enough to see her great grandkids.

See...her kids waited much longer to have kids than I did. Her dtrs kids are mid teens and 7. She is 4 years older than I am! This son who just adopted this baby boy...is 2 years younger than me! LOL.

Now I dont know if Pat (stepmom) considers my grands her great-grands or not. I thought she did but who knows. Seems awful funny to me that no one called to tell me that my parents just got a new grandchild.

I think it is hiliarious that they get a grandchild and a great grandchild in the same summer. All I know is I am eternally grateful I am not taking care of either one!

One other really funny thing. My step brother Chris is the one who adopted this baby because his is bipolar. He has been under control completely for many many years but he was terrified to have his own child because he didnt want to pass on the genes because his father was also bipolar. I tried to tell him it didnt always pass, his sister a nurse tried to tell him. Heck it didnt pass in her or her kids. But now he adopts a baby and will have no clue what he is getting....sigh...what can you do? LOL.

 

[Fran]

Janet, we have several instances of two generations being close in age. My mom grew up with her aunt who was a few years older.
Because my siblings are spread over 18 or 19 yrs and baby brother got married late his daughter and his great nephew are less than 1 yr apart. My mom's great grandchild and grandchild are very close. It just works that way in some families. Some women want children at 18 and some want them at mid 30's. Just depends on life goals I guess. So I don't think it's funny.

I have been thinking about steps and in laws lately. There seems to always be a bit of a barrier. Probably because of different shared memories and different visions of family. We(me) try hard to keep all extended family somewhat connected. I have one that is a bit odd and seems to always be a taker and not much in the contributing to the family.
I can see that if I don't have a lot of contact with mother's hypothetical's husband's family that I wouldn't feel strongly that their children were my sibs. Not that I wouldn't respect them as a family member but only having seen them occasionally over years would not provide that bond that my sibs and I have.

I think family isn't always about just who is married to who but how we feel about each other. As long as each child is loved by their parents it doesn't matter if they are a big deal to extended families.

 

[trinityroyal]

Janet, my family is like this as well...
My kids have a very broad range of ages, with the oldest being 24 years older than the youngest. Once the twins are born, the age gap will grow to 32 years.

At 32, Step D is old enough to be Little easy child's mom. difficult child is old enough to be the twins' dad. Technically, I'm NOT old enough to be Step D's mom, but she seems to regard me as a combination mom/older sister, depending on the situation.

Although difficult child and Little easy child consider each other brothers, without any "step" or "half" getting in the mix, Step D seems somewhat removed from Little easy child. This could be more to do with the difference in age than anything else. I can't imagine a 32 year old having a terribly close relationship with her 7 year old brother, regardless of whether they're full blood siblings or not.

Now...it would get very interesting if Step D ever decided to have children. However, she doesn't seem to want them...

 

[AnnieO]

You know... I always thought the "step-grandchild" thing was kinda strange.

I'm stepmom, sometimes mom, or mommy, and a lot of times myself. It doesn't matter to me, as long as it's nice. However, my parents are "Grandma S" and "Grandpa T". BM's parents were "Grandma A" and "Papaw T (last name)"... husband's are "Papaw" and "Grandma M", and husband's grandmother was "Grandma W (last name)".

It gets better. The other day my Dad picked up the kids to paint the fence (last painting was 20 years ago... Sigh) to earn $$. When I got home from work, I was informed that "Mamaw and Grampaw" were the best grandparents and they got new names because of that. It seems Mom made homemade blueberry muffins. AND... Onyxx earned $20, Jett earned $10. WOW.

 

[mstang67chic]

Every family is different but maybe your step-mom decided long ago that since her own kids were still young, she didn't want to be a grandma just yet?

Not that it works all the time! LOL My step-mom and I are only 10 years apart in age. She always told me that I needed to wait to have kids until SHE was done. I did but she never said how old mine had to be when I "had" them! LOL We adopted difficult child when he was 10. At the time, my oldest sister was 12 1/2, my brother was 9 and my youngest sister was 6. Step mom has a younger brother who, as my uncle, is only 4 years older than me. Actually, we are almost EXACTLY 4 years apart as his birthday is a few days after mine as his his fathers.

As for the spread out generations? LOL Got that covered too. My mom is the youngest of 9 kids. She has a niece a year OLDER than she is and her youngest niece/nephew is a few years younger than me. As a result, I have AND second cousins (first cousins once removed???) who are my age. And a couple of first cousins who are the same age as my aunts/uncles. In fact, my aunt (Mom's oldest sister) is only about 5 years younger than my grandmother on my bio dad's side.

Now that I think about it....remember the descriptions of who was who in Esther's pics from her grandaughter's wedding? If they weren't Jewish and didn't live in Isreal....that could be my family! LOL

It's not just my mom's side either. Bio dad's side is similar. Grandma married her first husband and had my uncle K, my dad and my aunt A. K is two years older than Dad, and Dad is about 4 years older than A. When A was maybe 4-6 weeks old, my bio grandfather was killed in an accident. Eight years later Grandma remarried to the only Grandpa I knew. They had my uncle B in Dec. of '60 and my uncle (feels more like a brother) J in '65. (I came along in '70) Uncle B has 3 kids in their mid to late twenties and 3 grandkids under the age of 6 with one on the way. Earlier this year though, B re-married to a woman with 4 kids. The oldest is still in high school and the youngest are a 4 year old set of twins.

So yeah....I'm familiar with the age spread! LOL As for the his/her grandkids....I've seen that too. An uncle on my mom's side (now divorced) married his second wife in the late 60's and didn't divorce until the late 1990's or early 2000's. They kind of did the his and her thing too although it was kind of weird. While the grandkid situation was kind of seperate....my uncle was very close to "his" grandaughter.....who was actually HER grandaughter. *shrugs* It happens. I don't get it either but it happens.

 

[DammitJanet]

Oh...the age spread on my step siblings isnt spread out from me. My dad and stepmom got married the same year Jamie was born. But me and step-siblings actually knew each other growing up. They are all within 5 years age of me. T is 51, S is 48, I am 47, and C is 45.

See...My step-mom was my mom's best friend since I was in middle school. I knew my steps for as long as I can remember before they became my steps! I actually dated S for a very short time. Talk about awkward...lol. The thing that is bad is that Step-mom keeps "her" kids and me and my kids completely seperate. Its very rare that we actually meet up together at the house. I would have loved it. I wanted that sister/brother thing. When Dad and Pat married I was tickled as hell to be getting a new mom and a sister and brothers. It didnt happen. I wanted the nephews. They dont think of me that way and T,S and C dont think of my kids as nephews. Sad. In my heart I see pics of T's boys and think of them as my nephews though. They cant take that from me no matter what they do. And I still think of T as my step-sister. When I see her I call her my step-sister. Also funny, her husband went to school with me. He was in my grade. LOL.

 

[trinityroyal]

Oh Janet, that really IS odd. It's a shame that your step-mom wants to maintain that division. I agree with your approach. Regardless of what she says, they ARE your step brothers and step sisters.

 

[DammitJanet]

I think it has something to do with the fact that not only was she my mothers ex best friend (even though my mom is now dead) but the fact that I dated my now step brother way long time ago. I even slept with him one time. Now he and I are long past that. We laugh about it when we see each other. LOL...his name is Scott! Actually his middle name is Scott and my middle name is Scott but he goes by Scott so we always thought it was hilarious that we had the same middle names.

 

[susiestar]

Both of my parents have siblings either much older or much younger. My mom is hte yougest of 3, but her sisters were aready in high school when she was born. My dad is the oldest but his siblings are 5 and 10 years younger. So my cousins on my moms side are 11 years older than I am. I am older than my cousin on dad's side by 11 years. That cousinis 11 yrs older than Jessie.

My aunt on dad's side had her first child 6mos before Wiz was born. Her daughter is just a couple years oler than jess.

And noone told us that one of Dad's first cousins's kids (who is 1 day less than a year older than Wiz, just got married and has his first baby!

Mostly the couple I know don't do our kids. husband's Dad and his wife have been married since Nov 12, the first day I went into labor. I kicked husband out of the hospital room after labor stopped (went to a 4 and stayed there until they gave me pitocin on the 21st, so I remember it. We are referred to ahs "his" kids and stepmom's kids are "her" kids. We are not even invited to gatherings of "her" kids. We even have to juggle Christmas and Easter as mostly his kids are not interested.

 

[eekysign]

Lord, I just about had a heart attack. I have an aunt about your age in NC (who is from VA), and my Grandmother is a Pat and is that aunt's stepmom........

Janet, if it wasn't for the ages of your kids, and the reasons they are difficult children (my cousins are a handful, for VERY different reasons), I might have passed out right then.

 

[DammitJanet]

LOL Eeky...lmao! No...no way. I am an only kid and Pat's grand kids arent old enough to be you. Also none are female...lol. My granddaughters are the only females in the whole crew. Now Pat has a dtr who is a nurse but I dont think that is your profession. Plus Pats dtr is older than me so.....

 

[lmf64]

I am one of those in between generation kids. My mom is the oldest of her generation and I am the oldest of my generation. Mom was 17 when I was born and she has an uncle 6 months older than her and cousins younger than I am. I have always called all of them (both generations) my cousins. We are a very close family, both in relationships and location. There are 500 of us in this county. Grandma (my great, but we all call her Grandma) had 13 sons and they all stayed right here.
It gets even weirder. Like I said my mom has an uncle 6 months older than she is. Her grandma (her mom's mom) passed away when he was not quite 5. My mom's dad died in an accident when she was 4, or about the same time. My great grandpa had 6 kids still at home and worked on the railroad. Well, for my grandma to be able to take her younger brothers and sisters in she had to be married, so she married the man I've always called my grandpa. He was my 'real' grandpa's brother. So my grandpa is really my great uncle. It gets confusing for some people when I'm talking about my cousins (1st, 2nd, 1st once removed etc). Last week we went to one of my cousins wedding (her dad is my mom's 1st cousin) and difficult child asked who was who. I was trying to explain the relationships to him. He finally said 'we're all blood right' I said yes and he said well than that's all I need to know. lol

 

[donna723]

All families are so different about things like that. But I don't see either to differentiate between "his" kids and "her" kids, especially after they've been married all that time.

Our family is so spread out in age ... my dad was the oldest of six and was seventeen years older than his youngest brother. There ended up being 19 grandchildren with a 25-year age span between the oldest and youngest. Some of the older ones already had their own kids before their younger cousins were born, so the generations have blurred a lot. It's funny though. My mom was an only child but was raised practically like sisters with some of her girl cousins. I grew up very close to the daughters of some of those cousins, even though we're only second (third?) cousins, much closer then some of my first cousins on my dad's side. And the second and third cousins on my dad's side, the same relationship? Don't even know them! Never met them and probably never will!

 

[Marguerite]

Janet, it's just how they are. Even within a family you can have different attitudes on this. Have you told Pat how you feel about her being the real grandma to your kids? Even after all these years she may feel awkward about accepting them as her grandkids, for fear of encoraching on your mother's memory.

As for the "his" and "hers" - I think my eldest sister's new husband is a bit like this. He and my sister have only been married about six years (if that). He is so good for her, always jolly, always happy. She needed that after years of emotional abuse with her first husband. He loves her kids, spends a lot of time with them (especially her now very dysfunctional oldest son) but they still talk about his grandchildren vs her grandchildren, almost like it's a competition between them, keeping score in a lighthearted way. "I've got five - how many have you got?"

On the other side of the coin - my sister's oldest son (the one now dysfunctional - he has major PTSD, he never leaves home because of it) was a very young father. At the time he and his then girlfriend had their first baby, bio-dad got married (to one of the women he left my sister for). My exBIL's new wife went around town telling everyone about her new grandson (courtesy of her new husband). My nephew went to his dad and said, "Tell her to stop saying that - she may be married to you and may be your wife, but she is NEVER going to be my son's grandmother. I am an adult so she is not even my stepmother. I have one mother who did a fine job with me, despite all the damage you inflicted on us all. And that mother of mine is my son's grandmother. Not your new wife."

I'm not sure, but I don't even think he ever visited his father or communicated with him after that. Very little love lost there, although bio-dad would have loved to have a better relationsship with him, he idolised his oldest son. perhaps that was part of the problem - he put all his emotional eggs into that basket and did even more damage to his other sons by his neglect and abuse. Always comparing them to his favourite, the eldest. And then at the marriage split, eldest son turned on him and would have nothing more to do with him. (come to think of it, bio-dad was not at son's wedding - my nephew finally married the mother of his little boy and they've gone on to have a football team of boys and finally one precious daughter).

It's funny how it works. Now my nephew has a closer relationship to his stepfather than he ever had with his father. My nephew used to claim that his grandfather (my father) was a better father to him.

So it really depends on families, and individual's past experience in their own famiies.

Marg

 

[Hound dog]

Janet, it's pretty obvious I don't have the stereotypical view that many step parents have. That's because I grew up with an awesome step dad who raised us 5 kids as if we were born into his already 7 kid family (grown I might add). This was Mom's 2nd husband, not this last one who passed away. He and my mother divorced when I was 6 or 7 and we still saw him every day and he was still very much our Dad. He even was the man who walked me down the isle on my wedding day. Not my bio dad. He was an excellent example of how to step parent.

I don't get the whole yours and mine thing and I never have. When you marry someone you become a family whether there are children involved or not. In a family there is no Yours and Mine, only Ours.

When K took off with the grands I grieved for her no differently than I would had I given birth to her myself. I grieved for those children. As you all know so well.

In these modern times it is even more important than it ever has been for a child to feel an important part of a family unit as well as an extended family unit.

I dunno. Technically, K is my kid's half sister. I have never used the term. I have never allowed them to refer to her that way. She is as much their sister as their other sibs are.

If you marry someone who has a child, in my opinion it's your obligation to work hard to accept and love that child as you would your own, this includes grandkids.

Never has been a Yours and Mine around here. Just Ours. Just more love to spread around.

Hugs