stepparent burnout & recovery

Becoming a stepmom has been the loneliest journey of my life.

I thought I approached blending a family with reasonable expectations, especially since I was already a single parent myself. I absolutely expected an adjustment period when I met my future stepdaughter and was fully prepared to take things slowly.

What I did not expect was that stepparenting would get harder before it got better. Nor did I expect the endless drama between my husband Dan and his ex, or have any clue that the conflict between houses would consume an entire decade of my life, seriously jacking up my mental health along the way.

The stepparenting struggle is real. Yet, unlike every other major life transition, no one acknowledges that becoming a stepparent is a long, transformative process. Even when there's low conflict, even if your stepkids adore you, even if you and the ex are BFFs (and really, how often does any of that happen), stepfamily life is such a steep and uphill climb that we stepparents think we must be screwing the whole thing up.

"At some point, we'll get over this hump," we tell ourselves. "This'll get easier,  and then we'll be blended. Then we'll feel like a real family."

So we keep forging ahead, searching for whatever magical formula we think will finally make us a cohesive whole. What is it?? Stepparent more? Try harder? Spend more time together? Less time together? Cut the brakes on the ex's car? (Just kidding, folks.)

In pushing ourselves harder and harder and harder, we end up burning ourselves out.

Stepparent burnout results from multiple factors, and recovery from burnout requires a multi-faceted approach. We need to adjust our own expectations about stepfam life and learn how to let go of what we can't control. This is known as disengaging. And we also need to be honest with ourselves and our stepfamily about what we need as stepparents to succeed in our role… and commit to meeting those needs.

It’s like we get locked into this trap of our own expectations and other people's expectations and tell ourselves this teeny tiny sliver where those two things overlap is the only place where we can function properly as a good stepparent.

But we're wrong.

The way to be the best version of ourselves — including the best stepparenting version of ourselves — is to live authentically.

PS - Recovering from burnout is only one element needed for stepfamily success. For help with the whole enchilada, start here.