Dear Jessica Brennan,
I think that being a stepparent is one of the most challenging callings on the planet. Yes, Jessica, even being a stepparent to you. I say callings because I’m not sure how else to describe it. Stepparents have been asked not only to love a child and possibly a grandchild but to love someone else’s children and grandchildren, and that can be really tough.
I decided to talk to Dad about this blog because technically, although we often forget this fact, he is your stepdad. Just writing that looks weird because Dad has always just been, well, Dad. But in the truest sense of the word, he is your stepdad. When he showed up in our lives, he was told upfront that you and I came as a set and brave guy that he is; he took us on anyway.
When I chatted with him about this, I will admit that he had his headphones on through most of the conversation (something about writing a show of the music of Journey). Still, he did pull one phone off his ear long enough to answer my most fundamental question, which was, “What made you a good stepparent?”
For a genius, he came up with a pretty disappointingly simple answer. He said, “I just decided to be.” Then he put his headphones back on – “Streetlight people, Livin’ just to find emotion….”
Hm. What a great answer. How many times in life, if we just decided to be something, think something, want or not want something, could we have made things so much easier for everyone?
Some people decide they won’t like their stepkids or step-grandkids, and they don’t. So children get to walk around knowing they are unloved — and children always know when they are unloved — with no explanation why. As I said, this calling is difficult, but if you have been called, you’re an adult, so answer the call and be kind. No one likes a wicked stepmother/father, not kids and not anyone else either, so talk to your partner and figure it out. No one can be happy with that kind of tension lurking all the time.
Looking back in our own house, I know we had times when Dad wondered if he was struggling because he was not your biological parent. Once, he told me that he just didn’t get where you were coming from. “Is it because we don’t share DNA?” he wanted to know. “She’s 16,” I said, “At 16, they don’t share anyone’s DNA except perhaps Yosemite Sam’s.”
It wasn’t always easy, and I spent a lot of time feeling like I was running interference, but who said it was going to be perfect? Who gets perfect anyway? Come on.
I guess that if Dad looked back now, he might say that maybe he tried a little too hard. Maybe he shouted at your principal too much and likely shouldn’t have called your music teacher a loser when you didn’t get an A+ on your Clara Schumann project. (He was right, you deserved an A+, sweetie). He might have behaved differently when you dropped out of university to go to Australia, or he might not have. Who knows, but I do know this. He decided to be a good stepparent, and as such, he was a fully engaged parent. That’s why we can’t listen to this song (affectionately known as “that bloody song”) in our house without all being in floods of tears.
With all the bumbles and blunders and stumbles and inevitable missteps, he created a mosaic of a relationship with you that let you know that he was there, he cared, and he wanted you to have the best life you could have. He didn’t mind making you do math at the picnic table on holidays or having a map of the world taped to the dining room wall for a few years.
Dad: No dessert until you show us where Bhutan is.
You: I don’t want dessert.
Dad: We’re waiting, Jessica.
You’re an adult now, and he still cares too much, but wow, think about what life would be like if he didn’t. What if, in that defining moment, he decided not to be a good stepparent?
He decided early on to be your Dad and to, with love, put your needs above his own and when he did, the step dropped away, and the Dad emerged.
Love Mum
xo
PS – Also, it is worth noting that your Dad is nothing like anyone else’s dad you know, which is why we keep him in the basement out of harm’s way.
