Many stepmothers’ top complaint is understanding their role in the blended family scenario. It is a source of great frustration. They are often robbed of their joy because of their fear of doing it wrong, or they fear that someone else thinks they are doing it wrong. I have struggled with expectation management for years myself. There definitely are strong and established societal expectation for stepmothers; plus, each family may already have their own unrealized, non-vocalized sets of expectations as well. Truthfully, though, is there a universal set of expectations for all stepmoms? How are stepmoms viewed in society? Most importantly, is there a way to avoid negative connotations and reduce conflict? Here is a little bit of what I have found in my personal research and experience.

What term that is used to introduce or explain your relationship to your role as step parent can be a point of confusion and frustration. The word “stepmother” evokes an expectation right off the bat.  You are “stepping up to or toward” something. Unfortunately it can also be interpreted as stepping into the place of another thus stepping over or pushing the biological mother out of the picture. It has also been associated with being evil and the embodiment of an unwanted end to a previous marriage or family unit. I have been introduced by one of my step kid’s as the wife of their dad, which to me was hurtful because it ignored my role as their stepmother completely, a role I take a lot of pride in and one that I deserve to be viewed as holding. For someone who does not embrace the role, they probably would not find the introduction as wife offensive. I also find it dismissive and distant in describing my close relationship to my step kids. Mothers hold a very significant power in our society, and it is understood how difficult and praise-worthy the role is.  If you have tried hard to be a good stepmother, I believe you are worthy of honor and status as a “mother.” Unfortunately, I have found the only term that is widely understood is stepmom or bonus mom. The term “bonus mom” arose in an effort to invoke a more co-parenting connotation with the biological mother and stepmother role; it implies a positive “plus one” for the kids and less of a negative invasion of a stepping in or over someone else. I personally have come to embrace the term stepmom as it is most used in American society and causes less confusion than bonus mom because many people do not know what bonus mom means. It seems that you can only pick your poison here, and many prefer the “wife of” as opposed to stepmom or bonus mom. Regardless, I find them all lacking to some extent, but we live in an imperfect world.

I found it fascinating that in 1940, if a woman was a soldier in the US Army Women’s Auxiliary Corps (WAC) and she decided to marry a man with children, she would be involuntarily released from service. A possible explanation for this was the expectation that she was marrying a widower with children who would need her attention as their sole caretaker. The Army today does not expect a stepmother to end her service when she simply marries a man with kids, though they do acknowledge the role as significant and monetarily compensate her by allowing her to transfer health benefits and college funding to her step kids.

Apart from the fact that the US Army elevates the role of stepmoms as important, I do not think anyone would argue against the fact that a stepmom is expected to “take care” of the stepchildren in civilian society as well; she can’t just simply ignore them all together.  The degree to which they are expected do so is the question and is unique to each family and community. A biological mother looks out for the general safety of the children, feeds them, clothes them, gives them rides and disciplines them. She will be judged by a more well-established set of expectations, but still ambiguous none-the-less. But for a stepmother, how she performs a task can be harshly criticized or she can be perceived as overstepping or under performing. If a stepmother over-does it, she could be damaging her own happiness in a vain attempt to please others or strive for an unattainable personal goal, blend in with a family which could at anytime reject her, or she truly could damage the step kids by not providing for their needs while they stay under her roof. How much should she do as opposed to the father of the children? What if she has children of the her own to take care of? Can she truly serve all children equally? It can get complicated quickly! She could be compared to other women, the in-laws, or against the biological mother, but none of these are truly fair nor definitive, yet none-the-less, unwritten expectations can abound.

Is it fair to measure a stepmother by how many tasks she completes for the kids, or is the scale based on how much she appears to love the children? All of these scales to measure stepmothers are highly subjective, and if a stepmother is looking to be accepted in her new family, she will strive to please everyone and maybe even strive so much that she is practically a martyr herself in the process. And how can anyone measure love? Sometimes biological mothers say they don’t even like their own kids, so how could we even begin to judge a stepmom’s feelings toward her non-biological kids? Everyone wants to be accepted and respected as families reform anew. Stepmoms are no different, yet they are the adult and have more burden of responsibility; if they don’t blend well and find the balance in the everyday chaos, the knew family unit may not last. Simply knowing that there is a different measuring stick for each person in the family is critical for a stepmother to understand. Basically, understanding that you may never be clear about your role as a stepmom, may be an important revelation to stepmoms so they can mentally prepare themselves for the inevitable conflict and to go easy on themselves, because there really is no way to know.

The key to expectation management is to realize that you do don’t know what you don’t know you don’t know. Take it easy on yourself.

Reflecting back on when you got married, I’m sure you did not realize that you were tacitly agreeing to the role that you probably understand much better now. Knowing that there are family and societal expectations weighing in on your life is important. More stepmoms than not, say that after going through stepmotherhood and knowing what they know now, they would not do it again according to one study. A Boston University psychologist researcher reported that of the career women who earned over $100.000 and had married men with children, over 75% said that, “if they had to do it again they would NOT marry a man with children. Since I have not provided precise guidance on how to overcome expectations, I hope you walk away from this blog post knowing that this is my very point; there is no universally clear-cut rule for being a “good” stepmom. The point is that expectations are subjective, ever-changing and thus I hope you cut yourself a break because it is truly absurd to believe you can have it all together. Most biological moms admit this – and this is true even more so for the stepmom! The fact that you may think regularly about throwing in the towel is actually pretty “normal,” statistically speaking.

My personal conclusion on how to be a “good” stepmom is simply to be yourself and set your own expectations and goals; if your goal is just to survive and you think that is all you can do, well, good for you! You did it! People and society will always have expectations set for you with or without your consent. Striving to be the best you can be will make your stepfamily successful by default. If you practice expectation management regularly by reviewing things you have already overcome, you will feel much better about your gains, and it will assist you in setting your pace and future expectations. Everyday that you survive, makes you one step closer to success. If you push yourself too hard, you will be miserable, resentful and angry. Equally so if you do not try at all, you will be miserable. Stepfamily life is all about finding your personal balance. Note: What works for me, may not work for you, so do not negatively compare yourself to my practices. Set your own pace and remember when you discover a new expectation that you didn’t know was out there, remember you could not have anticipated it, and you are striving to balance it into an ever evolving formula.

What are some of the things that you have done to manage your family’s expectations? Have you discovered any ways to overcome difficulties and conflict? How have you assisted your step kids, in-laws and your parents and family members on what they can expect? Please comment below! I would love to hear tips from you!

Thanks,

Lesley