For those who already had children when they married and moved...

I'm eager to hear stories about others' experiences with new stepfamily life. What has gone well or better than expected? What have you struggled with?

My husband never wanted to have children and was very open about that before we started dating. Then it was, "Well, I don't mind dating someone with children... or marrying someone with children... oh, hell, let's have kids of our own."

In some ways it's pretty obvious he's not used to being a parental figure. Since he was thrown into the deep end of family life, it's not intuitive to him to take over and let me have a break (and I need them so often!), and discipline is still just way over his head. But then there are all of the amazing moments... the way he can distract my daughter from an imminent tantrum, or the way he's just much more fun than I am (boo), how he reads her stories at night or teaches her things about science and reading and... ah, well.

I love all of these things about him. But I do have a problem: how do you reconcile different parenting styles? I'm loathe to compare my husband to my ex (L's father), but my ex was such a pushover and I never even realized it! If I didn't like the way he did something, parenting-wise, I would say so and he would just adapt to how I wanted things done.  This shocks me now - but I don't really know how to deal with my husband, who is definitely not a pushover. At all.

How do you guys deal with parenting compromises, especially in a stepfamily?

My daughter was 8 when I married my husband (she's now 11).  Her father is definitely passive and hasn't spent a huge amount of time parenting her throughout her life.  Having a new step-father was a huge adjustment for all of us, especially because it seemed like "me and her against the world" for so long.  One of the biggest problems we seem to have is that her and my husband both demand my time and attention and sometimes I feel stretched between them.  They interrupt each other and both try and talk to me at once, and then my husband wants me to tell her off for interrupting and I feel like telling him off too sometimes.  I have let her have her own way for a long time, and she is a lot better behaved since having a stepfather, but sometimes I am worried she thinks I am taking sides against her.  I try to be as fair as possible to both of them and if I have a problem with what my DH suggests discipline wise I try and wait until my daughter is not with us to discuss it with him, to present a united front and all. 

It can be very hard to adjust to it and the tendency to feel guilty for your children and then let them get away with things is really hard sometimes.  I have seen a lot of blended families who let the children talk very rude and mouthy to the stepfather though and I will never allow that to go undisciplined.  But I will not allow my DH to be unfair or unkind to my daughter either.  It is important to try and strike a balance if you can, and always try and find time to spend alone with your children and your husband separately so they know you are still there for them.

It *is* hard to strike a balance! My husband and I have similar approaches toward life, and we sat down and discussed general parenting philosophies before we decided to get married. I knew we'd have moments of disagreement, but there are areas where our approaches are so wildly different that we frequently have to discuss what we each think is going on and how to handle it.

In particular, I'm much more lax than my husband. I was raised with the idea of nurturing your child's innate creativity and fostering their self-esteem (perhaps because I'm more sensitive?), whereas my husband, being more certain of his own self-worth, doesn't feel that this is necessary and places more emphasis on obedience and self-discipline. Until we were married, I didn't even realize that "obedience" is a dirty word amongst parents of my corner of the US. We say things like, "you're not listening", not, "you're not obeying me".

I'm lucky in that we've made a routine out of regular check-ins with how the blended family is going. He's also willing to defer to me, since I know my child better and have more experience parenting her, but he also feels free to speak up about what he thinks needs improvement. My problem comes when I don't want to disagree with his approach while it's happening - i.e., he thinks she shouldn't be allowed to do something and tells her so, but I think it's ok and/or have allowed her to do it in the past. I don't know how to intervene without making my daughter think I'm in opposition to my husband.

Overall, I'm really happy with how the adjustment is going. I think a lot of it was just getting used to each other - and for my husband, seeing how to parent on a daily basis. (Remember how we all knew how to parent perfectly before actually having children? He thought he did, too.) But the best part of all is that his actual parenting strengths are in areas that he totally didn't expect... as I imagine the rewards are, as well. And when we decide to have more children, well, then he can see parenting from every stage, and every angle. I'm looking forward to it.