The comment is that maybe it’s not in a woman’s DNA to love someone else’s kids, and that maybe it’s like the bear cubs who get eaten by the other mothers in the den when their own mothers die. (Actually, it seems that even mother bears will refuse to care for their own offspring so personally I’m shying away from trying to emulate ursine mothering strategies.)

Over the past six months I’ve been in a relationship with a man who has a son about 3 years older than my oldest boy, Chris. As the relationship has developed, I’ve become closer to this young man, who is about to go away to college. Now, granted, I’m not being asked to wipe the dribble off his face or take him to playdates. And yet, if I were, I would do it completely joyously and enthusiastically.

I LOVE this kid. I have felt a strong protective instinct towards him from the first time I met him. This transcends the relationship I have with his father, or the friendship I have with his mother (who is an amazing woman and I adore her). Protective is the only word that really describes it — along with admiration, pride, gratitude that he’s on the planet, and a joy that my life has been graced with the ability to intersect his. The only other people I feel like that about are my own two kids. It’s instinctive, it’s true, it’s deep, and it’s real.

I do understand that there are many situations out there where the step-mother/children chemistries don’t work, and it’s tragic and it’s painful and sometimes it’s just downright impossible to work through. The issues at work seem to be bigger, however. A family is a constellation of people, all of whom are bringing their fears and hopes and projections into the home.

I AM capable of loving another person’s child. Jill loves my kids. And I know many other examples where it is possible to love other people’s children. If a family dynamic doesn’t seem to be working, I totally get that it is is tempting (and a lot more safe) to assign the blame on a genetic imperative. But maybe it just means the dynamic doesn’t seem to be working. Which is good, because that means maybe there’s a way to get in under the hood and do some tinkering.

I just had to say that out loud. I know what it’s like to be a step-mom these days, too.

I get it. It’s just not a situation most people are prepared for. You’re on the spot. You’ve got to do some fancy social footwork on the fly and without a safe script. There are so many ways to put your foot in your mouth or to verbally poke someone in an under the surface gaping wound. So, to help all the stepmoms mingling in kid-centered situations, and to help all the lovely people who meet them, I thought I’d start a list of things to say to keep the conversation going when meeting a stepmom in your wider community circle (not in your family) for the first time.

The easy stuff:

1. “How many kids or stepkids do you have?”
2. “How old are they?” [Then talk about that age in general for kids. "That's a great age. They're so much fun at that age." "Wow! That's a challenging age! How's it going?"]
3. Say something complimentary about her stepkids, if you know them. ["Joe is a great team player." "Jane was so articulate during her presentation on what it takes to become a veterinarian. She's so confident. That's really wonderful. It was a great presentation."]
4. Say something pleasant or appreciative about your kid’s relationship with her stepkid, if they have one. ["Robert loves playing soccer/Monopoly/Rock Band with Joe." "Marissa tells me she and Julie spend a lot of time at school drawing together."]
5. Talk about the event. ["The music this year is great/funny/interesting/so strange!" "The other team is really strong -- they're giving us run for our money."]
6. Talk about the community group. ["What do you think of the new coach?" "How does Christine like her class this year?"]

Bonus points:

1. If she’s new to the school/community group, introduce her to a few other people.
2. If there’s a sitting down portion of the event, invite her to sit with you, or if you see her — or her and her husband — sitting alone, ask if you can join her or them.
3. If there’s an organized activity part of the event, ask her if she would like to join your group.
4. Next time you run into her, smile and say hi.

A little bit trickier, but potentially good stuff (use your judgement):

1. Jokingly say, “Stepmom! So, you get all the responsibility that comes with parenting and none of the recognition!” This gives her a chance to laugh and tell you that it’s not really like that — how much she loves the kids and how great the kids’ mom and dad both are, but yeah, at events like this stepmoms sometimes feel kind of invisible or awkward — or it gives her a chance to say, “Yeah, it feels kind of like that sometimes!” Either way she feels seen, visible, understood and appreciated. The elephant in the room — the thing that makes people smile blankly while trying to think of things to say — gets touched on in a light way. But it also opens up the door for her to talk about potentially painful stuff in her experience. You might move from small talk to serious talk. One problem with this is that you might alienate the mom a little, if she’s in the community group, too, and she’s sensitive to this kind of joking. If you think that’s a possibility, I wouldn’t recommend going with this one.
2. Ask her how long she’s been a stepmom. If she seems grateful or pleased at the chance to tell you, ask her how it’s going or what it’s like. Don’t stick too long on this if you’ve just met her, though. If she doesn’t seem too into answering the “how long” question, move back to saying something nice about her stepkid and then just talk about the event or group or venue.
3. If you had a stepmom who you loved, or you know someone who does, or if you have any similar warm, fuzzy stepmom validation nugget — tell her. ["My friend Joy had a stepmom when she was growing up. She says it was really great to have that extra love in her life." "My cousin had a stepmom. When I was a kid, I'd go over and play and she'd play Chutes and Ladders with us. It was cool. I have good memories of that."]

For the easy small talk, focus on the kids and the venue. For the trickier stuff, gently provide a little bit of conversational space for her to talk in a casual way about being a stepmom, or say nice things about stepmoms in general.

The other day we stumbled on something interesting. I’ve noticed — and I could be wrong — that the preponderance of internet blogging and commenting about this whole step-moms/bio mom issue is being conducted by the step-moms of the world. The bio moms simply don’t seem as caught up about it.

It came up when I was talking with Jill and saw how visibly and profoundly upset she was about how step-moms are generally perceived at first glance. She’s been to school functions where she introduces herself and people immediately shut down or voices drop in a tone of commiseration. It’s like it’s a disease that she caught and everyone is trying to be kind about it. Gently moving away from “it” and talking about other things.

And I got what she was saying and thought, man, if people treated me like that I’d definitely be vocal about my outrage too. I got it. That SUCKS.

Now, it’s true, over time that initial reaction has changed as people in our circle have gotten to know Jill as a person. Being a great human being helps a lot in that regard. But what is it about this thing we have, collectively, about step mothers?

I have a theory. And this comes from what I’ve been dealing with in my other relationship a lot over the past two months. I think this collective thing about step moms is a manifestation of shadow, that ugly scary part of us that we can rarely see in ourselves, except as reflected in others.

Usually shadow is discussed in terms of romantic relationships, and I’ve been working out all sorts of interesting things with this guy I’ve been seeing as we continue to explore the dance we dance with each other. Shadow in romantic partners is usually manifested in weird anger, sarcasm, the maddening and mesmerizing push/pull of attraction and repulsion, fear and dependency, anger and jealousy. My shadow will cause me to project all sorts of ugly characteristics upon him, thus enabling me to either detach, or find fault, or express anger that I’m too scared to approach directly.

The thing about shadow work is that you almost never get to confront your own directly. Shadow is a tricky, peripheral character, which is really only captured by reflecting on someone else. Shadow appears in personal relationships, in the relationships between countries, in politics (don’t get me started), in our culture. And I think that, for eons, we have collectively thrown a lot of shadow onto the archetype of the step-mother.

Think of how the step-mother is portrayed in literature and film. Sorry this is getting rough, but let’s open this up a bit. What’s the word that almost always precedes “step-mother”? Right: wicked. It’s true. Or evil. You have Snow White, Cinderella, the amazing Susan Sarandon in Enchanted with her twitching tongue and hideous cackle. It’s very noteworthy when a step-mother is seen as a whole person, as she is in Juno. Otherwise, she’s a shadow character — manipulative, sneaky, undermining, catty, jealous and self-centered.

Where does this come from? It’s so pervasive we don’t even think about it too much. But when you suddenly become that character, it must be just unbearably enraging to have that entire collective stereotype painted all over you, like a big red letter S.

I think it’s because we as a society, can’t bear to attribute many of these shadow qualities to another group of women who also share in them equally: mothers. I mean — can’t mothers also be manipulative and sneaky and undermining? You freaking betcha they can. In spades. Can’t mothers be jealous and self-centered? Ah… duh. These are not qualities that are only owned by step-mothers. These are shadow feminine qualities. And for some reason it’s easier to dump them on the minority (not so minor a minority any more) than to own them, as all women, ourselves.

The painfully fascinating thing about shadow, is that the shadow qualities that annoy the heck out of us in the Other are usually the qualities that are most prevalent in ourselves. Yup. You heard me. And this goes both ways, whether you’re a biological or step mom or in any way dealing with another woman in the raising of some children. Take a look at the things that annoy you the most in the other, and then — if you’re feeling very brave and have a cold margarita nearby just in case — turn the mirror around. See if you’ve got a little bit of that yourself.

Yikes.

This is not for the faint-hearted, my friends. The work is to take responsibility for our own shadow and quit projecting it on others and getting all wrought up about it.  This is tough tough work.  A lifetime of work.  And it takes a huge amount of humility and grace to get through. I can recommend books that are amazing in opening this world of the psyche up and that explain it all far more eloquently than I just have. But it’s important, I think, to add this to this discussion and to this blog.

We’re all in this together. We’re all human. We are all women who share many of the same characteristics — both good and bad. Let’s all shoulder our share of the responsibility for the bad, and celebrate the good that also exists.

We are, collectively, engaged in the most important job on the planet: creating the future in the shape of our children.  The history of how we got to where we are doesn’t matter.  The past cannot be allowed to unconsciously script the future. The fact that we look upon the step-mothers of the world like they’ve caught a disease is shameful for all of us.  Let’s take responsibility, keeping that margarita handy, and see what we can do to change that.

If you’re going and would like to meet up, email me at jilldoughtie@gmail.com.

If it helps for folks planning to be there in person, here’s what I look like…

…when I’m wearing a helmet. But I won’t have a bike helmet on. I’m mostly posting this because it’s got a picture of my shoulder bag. It might be easy to recognize me by it.

And here’s what I look like…

…when my hair is longer than it is now and I’m laughing. Now my hair is a little above shoulder length.

And here’s what I look like…

…when I’m being silly with Kathy (who, alas, will not be there this year, so I will most likely be a little more serious than this).

I also look quite a lot like the picture of me in the blog header, minus the flowers.