Before I really tackle all of the toxicity that we’ve been through, I do want to emphasize that the kids and I had a very close bond. When we met, they were constantly asking Dad if I was coming over. Day after day, I would get a message while I was working saying that the girls were asking when I’d be there. That slowly rolled into the hugs goodnight and them wanting me to tuck them in. That rolled into me helping them learn how to read and do math.
In addition to being the cool new person in their lives, we started to really bond on the step-relationship. They knew they could come to me about anything, and I thought of them as my own, while still respecting that I wasn’t their mother.
When they were younger, the youngest was attached to me and the oldest seemed a little more scared to get close. Although, that only seemed to be the case right when they came home from their mom’s. They would come home and the oldest wouldn’t speak to me or even look at me for the first half hour. Then, it’s like she realized mom wasn’t around and she could be herself. The youngest, well, she never really cared about all of that so she was always right back to her spunky self when she got home.
Throughout the years, the oldest, who I’ll refer to as Natalie in this blog, and I became extremely close. She called me her “partner in crime” and would always choose me over her dad. We had a notebook where we wrote back and forth in, where she told me how much she loves me and how much she wanted to have another “girls day”. Girls days were fun. We would go get our nails done, go clothes shopping, or even just go grocery shopping but she’d come with and get a treat. Not always wild, but always fun bonding time. The youngest and I bonded over things like coloring, animals, or our love of peanut butter.
The oldest they got, the stronger the bond got. I will be honest, my bond with Natalie was stronger, as we could see the resistance starting with the younger, who for the sake of this blog will be called Zoe. Zoe was not maturing at all and we were seeing a lot of dependency towards mom. That did not help our relationships with her grow at all, nor did it help her grow independently either. On the contrary, Natalie and I continued to grow stronger and stronger. I taught dance fitness and she was my right hand man. She would come with, help me get set up, and she’d often stand behind me and join in the dances! During summer of 2023, she was old enough to not go to daycare, while Zoe and (SPOILER ALERT), my and Dad’s 2 daughters we had together went to daycare.
All summer, everywhere I went, Natalie was right next to me. If I had to go to the store, she came with. If I had to run to another town to get something, she was with. If we were bored, we would go get in trouble (with Dad) at Hobby Lobby by buying far too much stuff!
I wanted to make this post so that I can show that although our lives were hell dealing with DB, we also had a long 7 years of happiness. We built a beautiful family together that we truly thought we would have forever…