# wife feels like a secondary parent



## marriagehelp12 (Apr 8, 2009)

okay. Married to my second wife for thre years now and during this time my kids have drove her nuts as kids do. However, every little thing sets her off. Counter is dirty with crumbs, too many knives were used during the day, too much milk in a glass, they leave a book downstairs instead of bring it to their room whene they are done reading.....things like this are pissing her off. My bio kids are 15 girl and 16 boy. Her daughter is going to be leaving to college in three weeks. The five of us have been together for 3 years. I would LOVE for her to be more active in my kids lives more and all three kids are considered OUR kids. That is not the problem. Now, I have full custody of my bio kids and have for 8 years total so subconciously I am used to taking care of things as they come up but I am used to it after 8 years. Their mother picks them up alternate weekends. I my wife to do more with raising them but 9 out of 10 times when they do the many things that piss her off she wigs out! What do I do here? Suggestions??


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## Sandy55 (Jun 3, 2009)

Has the "_every little thing_" p-ing her off been more _recently_, OR an undertone of the past three years and seems to be increasing?


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## marriagehelp12 (Apr 8, 2009)

undertone of the past three years. Specifically when she gets upset which is over every little thing from anyone in our immediate family her mood is shot we end up bickering about it or worse for the rest of the day. Every day I come home lately she finds something that in her mind is not cool about any of the kids and here we go again....as a result we are fighting now all the time at the drop of a hat. Since I have known her sh ehas held on to her anger for far too long in my opinion and that just ends up frustrating me after hours on end. I am the type to let things go and move on. I understand woman are more emotional then men and respect that but this holding on to her moods is slowly tearing us apart. Sorry to get off track but yes when any of the 3 kids have done something over the three years her mood is immediately shot for hours..............


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## jane. (Jul 10, 2009)

How much parenting of your kids does she do? Do you two have different parenting styles (e.g. One is strict, the other is lax)? Does she react differently when her child does something wrong as opposed to your two?


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## marriagehelp12 (Apr 8, 2009)

She is strict, I am lax. When her kid something wrong she is much calmer about addressing it than when my kids do something. I am not sure how to allow her to parent more, I am confused on that note. I value her opinions, if something needs to be picked up or cleaned up she tells them, if they are chewing with their mouth open she tells them.....so what am I preventing her from doing is my question?


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## jane. (Jul 10, 2009)

Do you do any disciplining at all? Perhaps she is resentful that she has to do it?

When my husband and I got together his daughter was 4. We had her on the weekends. I started spending more time with her and my husband left a lot of the parenting during these weekends up to me. I started growing resentful. Examples:

We all went to the park. Here I was trying to get his daughter to make friends with the other kids at the park while husband was off playing basketball.

At home, I would read books to her and try to encourage her interests while my husband would go watch sports in the other room.

To gain back my peace of mind, I just disengaged. I told my husband this, and he told me that the child would be the loser in this. I told him well, he better step up and be a parent to his child then. My disengaging resulted in my being less resentful and forcing my husband to actually do more with his kid.

You two should sit down one night when you're both calm and discuss what is and isn't acceptable in the house regarding the kids' behaviors. You should also discuss how involved you want her to be in parenting them.

When you say that she "wigs out" can you give me an example of her behavior? (e.g. yelling, leaving, etc.)


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## marriagehelp12 (Apr 8, 2009)

I do discipline them and don't let them get away with things. I would never tolerate anyone being ugly to my kids and she has never been this way or me with the kids. I will talk to her calmly sometime and try to come to an arrangement. Sorry for the long messages and by wigging out I mean makes a big deal of everything they do, we start to bicker about it, it turns into a fight...sometimes yelling is involved and now and then her and I will leave the house to take a break from the fight.


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