Stepkids are a completely different animal than one's own biological kids. Like any (I would hope) potential stepdad, I did some reading before I got married to see how other men approached step-fathering, what to expect, and what the basic rules were. Literature on stepdadding is sparse at best, and what is available didn't really apply to me. A lot of the things I read had a lot to say about opening your heart to the kids and things like that, but really, I'd already decided to bring them into my home, under my protection, and into my heart. What I needed to know was what it would be like, what challenges I would be faced with, and some basic advice on how to relate to them and to their father.
Most of the writing had more to do with emotional factors or common-sense things like not treating your stepkids like unwelcome baggage. In short, things that any emotionally mature person had already thought of. Besides, I knew and liked the kids. I'd known them for years.
I'd like to save other potential stepdads some trouble here, and cover a few things I found out as a stepdad. Some things I simply hadn't considered, and some that are external factors, things a stepdad simply has no control over but that none-the-less effect a stepdad.
No matter how hard you try, no matter what you tell the kids, the biological father is going to think that you are trying to subvert him. Even when the kids told me that they wished I was their "real" dad, even when they said that didn't like their real dad, I made it clear to the kids that I was their stepdad: not a parent but an authority figure, more like an extra person they could rely on and be protected by. They tried to understand as best they could. The biological dad will no doubt try to confront you, or more likely, your spouse, about your behavior. Do the right thing so that you can confidently tell him that no, you haven't tried to tell his kids to call you "Dad". He won't believe you. Fuck 'im. It pissed me off when this happened (and happened again. And again.) I thought about what an ungrateful fucker he was and how he ought to get on his knees and thank me for spending so much of my time, so much of my money on his kids. He'll never see it that way. Let it go. Just know that you're in the right and let it go.
You'll be geographically tied to your wife's ex-husband. You can't follow a promising job lead across country. You can't move an hour or two away to find cheaper land with a bigger house. You're stuck to where you and the biological father live right now. Until the kids are old enough to drive themselves to and from school or wherever else, you're stuck. I hadn't considered this. If I had I think I could have better prepared myself psychologically so that it was my decision to stay and not something that suddenly occurred to me, which made it feel forced on me by my wife's ex-husband. I got over it of course, but still, it's better to prepare yourself in advance.
Your house will be infected with another man's presence. You aren't the master of your castle. The biological father will be talked about, fought with, and accommodated. It gets tiresome. He only has as much power over your house as you allow, and when it gets to be too much, you can ask your wife to not bring him up for a while. Your kids on the other hand, well, you can't really tell them not to talk about their father. Grin and bare it. I knew that the biological father would be talked about, but I didn't realize how often he would come up and how many of my family's plans would be altered to accommodate him. It's infuriating, but part of the deal. Prepare yourself mentally for this one.
You're wife and her ex-husband got divorced for a reason. They probably don't like each other. If there was any sort of domestic abuse going on, you'll hate him even more. You'll want to kick his ass (to put it mildly) every time you see him, but you have to smile and nod, make smalltalk and pretend that you don't want to throttle him for the benefit of the kids. Do it for the kids. Don't kill him.
If the ex-husband is a deadbeat, you'll probably be supporting the kids. They're not cuckoo's eggs: they're innocent children and deserve as much as you can give them. That doesn't mean that you take away from your own kids to support them. It means you run your household fairly and competently so that none of the kids lacks for anything they need, including attention.
And finally, you may be under the delusion that you have some control over the stepkids. Your only real power is in immediate discipline, not long-term planning. You have to respect the wishes of your wife and her ex-husband in the way that they choose to raise the stepkids. They're yours to love, protect, and care for, not to raise.
I'm certainly not trying to discourage anyone from becoming a stepdad. I do think that a man needs to go into stepdadding with his eyes open, prepare himself for the challenges and enlist the help of his wife to do the best he can.
One last thing: it's tempting to try to control the communication between your wife and her ex-husband. I hate to think that my wife's ex-husband still has the ability to intimidate her. The only time you should get between them is when you feel that the ex-husband's behavior is inappropriate toward her. Then you have an obligation to protect your wife. That's one of the things you promised her when you got married. Other than that, let her handle the ex-husband and details of the child-rearing. You'll only make things worse when you get in the middle.
