This hits close to home. I've been in similar situations and am building a blended family too. After making efforts to build a relationship with her, I also would have felt sad when a new group chat was started without me.
Your partner's response makes me sad too. Taking blame is something I do, a coping mechanism that helps me feel more in control of what's happening. Blaming, even ourselves, isn't helpful. Identifying responsibility and processing emotions are helpful.
I'm curious about the intent behind starting a new group chat with her, her new partner, and your partner. Any thoughts on the intent behind this?
Thanks so much for your reply!
The whole thing made me sad. And usually I am the one to take the blame for most things so I found it strange when he did it too. But ultimately, yes, it’s not helpful either way. I forgot this in my original post but when he was feeling the blame, he also said that he “should be in the care of professionals”. Again, it was all very strange. Maybe I’ll try to talk about it today when I see him later and see if alcohol was the culprit but I don’t want to have another circular conversation like last night.
As for the intent, I honestly have NO idea. Right before all of this isolation business, her and I were going out to dinner together and having coffee and running errands. I was thrilled to have been forming such a close friendship with her.
My partners been working out of province for the last 7 months and I made a lot of effort to take his son out for many fun “dates”, to give her a break and also to show him how special and loved he is. Her and I had been texting a lot last week and not so much this week but I didn’t think anything of it.
According to my partner, it is not out of the norm for her to decide she’s angry about something or other and do something like this, but it’s still upsetting. I could understand if the group chat was used to discuss something like finances or other personal matters that really only involve “true” parents, but so far she has just sent videos of the child playing with his brothers. It’s the same things she would post of Instagram- nothing I shouldn’t be seeing...
I know I’m not the child’s parent- I accepted that when me and my partner got together. I’ll never replace their bond but I feel like I have tried so, so hard to fit into and be a part of this family. Situations like this just remind me that no matter what I do, I’ll always be the odd one out or the “replaceable” one in the scenario.
I guess I’m just dumbfounded about the whole thing