Dear Mrs. Bluth,
My situation is dire and so I am turning to you for any advice that you can give me before I am forced to do something I really don’t wish to do. I am sure I am not the only stepmother who has undergone so much heartache in her endeavor to integrate into an established family. My story may well speak for many older women who marry widowers with adult children and grandchildren, and encounter opposition and even great disdain as they try to create a home.
A number of years ago I lost my husband of thirty-five years. We had gotten married when I was eighteen and he twenty-two and he was the love of my life. Baruch Hashem we were gifted with five wonderful children. Unfortunately, he was diagnosed with late-stage pancreatic cancer and we lost him after just a three-week battle.
When the week of shiva ended, my children begged me to stay with them, but I refused. I needed to be home, where I could still feel his presence, be near both our parents and mourn alone. It took many months, but a day did come when I found myself ready to reenter the world of the living.
My children were a source of great comfort for me, my grandchildren gave me back the ability to laugh and feel joy and friends included me in many simchas and outings. I felt fulfilled and busy, but as the years passed, I felt lonely. One day, a friend called about a shidduch. I was totally taken aback when she said I should consider it as no one should live alone. After speaking to my children, who seemed to agree, I agreed to see the gentleman, a recent widower. He was very respectful on our first meeting, recognizing my nervousness and tried to put me at ease by telling me stories about himself that made me laugh. On ensuing dates, I learned that he, too, had five married children, two sons and three daughters, who, he felt, were getting tired of having him underfoot and were happy he was looking to get on with his life. We came to enjoy each other’s company and spent much time getting to know each other.
My children were overjoyed when I told them that we were getting married; they liked him very much. However, his children were not as happy. Two of his daughters were very aloof and standoffish at our meeting, while the other three children were pleasant enough. And so, we got married and life was good for a few months.
Problems arose before our first Pesach together. We had decided that rather than choose which children could come to us, we would go to a hotel. Two of his daughters wanted to come to us with their families, as they had done when their mother was alive. When they heard that we were gong away, they accused me of trying to come between them and their father. They tried very hard to guilt him into staying home, causing him great stress and aggravation and disagreements between the two of us. This pattern continued every time we went away.
No matter how much I tried to build a friendship with them – babysitting for their children, buying gifts on special occasions (which they got more than my own children) – what I got instead of gratitude and happiness that their father was happy and well taken care of was anger and disdain. No matter how much I tried, nothing was ever good enough for them. What they feared, I later learned, was that I was going to somehow steal their inheritance or become their father’s beneficiary in their place! Sadly, I also learned that they had forced my husband to include a codicil in his will that would leave me with nothing, not even a percentage of his life insurance. When I confronted my husband, he wept and asked me for forgiveness but he was afraid of losing his children, so he was forced to do it.