32-year-old stepdad ends marriage with his widow wife when she and her 12 and 13-year-old kids continually give him the cold shoulder: 'Her priority was spending time with her late husband's parents and siblings'

Author image for Emmy Pratt
Emmy Pratt • Writer and Editor
Apr 10, 2025 8:00 PM EDT

You literally never know how a marriage will shake out. Many singles are advised to be extremely careful about whom they marry because that is the most important choice they'll ever make in their life. But marrying someone upstanding, attractive, hard working, and happy doesn't guarantee that it's all going to work out for both of you in the end. The dynamics of a relationship come to a full 180 once you wake up one day and are bound together by law. Your partnership might have been fun and fancy free when it was merely a relationship, but once the excrement hits the fan, it's all gloom and doom. 

The relationship doesn't even really have to change for things to go completely awry. Every monogamous relationship comprises two people with their own interiority and emotional state that can't be fixed by merely jumping the broom and running off into the sunset. 

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  • The stepdad in this story didn't do anything wrong. He was simply in the right place at the wrong time regarding marrying his young widow wife. Although the relationship seemed hopeful, his marriage to his ex consisted of him continually getting the brush from all directions and competing with a ghost for attention.

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    Cheezburger Image 10492304896
    via Jonas Kakaroto

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

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    AITA for ending my marriage because I couldn't handle the reality of marriage to a widow with kids?

    1 (32m) got married almost 3 years ago. Right now I'm going through a divorce from my wife (31f). My wife was a very young widow with two kids when I met her. We dated for almost two years before getting engaged and we were engaged for 5 months
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    before we got married. My wife's kids are 12 and 13 as I'm writing this and I walked away a little over 6 months ago now. My wife's late husband did suddenly about a year and a half before we met.
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    So looking back I can see how fast it could all be for the kids. I can see why maybe it was too fast. But I have known people who remarried even faster and were happy in their second marriages and the kids did fine. So I was running on the belief that this would be the same for us.
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    Cheezburger Image 10492307712
    via Nathan Dumlao

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

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    www
    via 🇸🇮 Janko Ferlič

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

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    During the dating period things went well. I got along well with my wife's kids. They accepted me being around and we were building up a solid relationship. My wife and I enjoyed our time together during that time and I felt like she was truly committed to me. Even when we began living together it was good.
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    Only after the wedding the kids withdrew from me. They were no longer okay with me driving them around, they would reject my offers to help with homework or take them someplace and would instead say they wanted their mom to do it. Anytime we talked they would share less about their day with me. If I asked them if
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    they would share less about their day with me. If I asked them if they were okay I got a shrug or a yeah. Before the wedding they didn't mind saying the good and the bad. They also looked at photos of their dad more and I noticed some of his stuff appearing around the living area of the house more. My wife's
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    parents commented that the kids hadn't really looked at the photos so frequently or scattered their dad's things around the house like that since he'd been newly gone (for the first six months to be more accurate).
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    I never minded having the photos out or even their dad's stuff. When we started living together and moved into the house I explained they could have photos and his things around the place. They chose to keep them in their rooms at the time. And I could be a little sensitive to what was happening. Maybe I was just
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    never cut out for it. But at times I felt like they were trying to mark the house as their dad's house. One time I really felt this was when their dad's mug suddenly appeared at the spot at the table I would sit at every time. I'd been sitting there for months and suddenly his mug was there and it remained there and whenever we would eat together they
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    would stare at me to see if I'd sit there or somewhere else. I talked to my wife about it and she told me I did the right thing taking another seat. They also started putting photos of when their dad was alive in more prominent positions and would hide ones that included me behind them. I asked one day if they had moved the photos and they said yeah,
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    that they wanted the photos of their family to be seen. Going alongside this my wife was acting differently. She made less time for us. When we were together she wasn't as affectionate and I caught her playing with her first wedding ring, which she wore around her neck, more. She called her latte
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    husband's family her in-laws again but didn't call my family her in-laws. Her priority was spending time with her late husband's parents and siblings and she would choose to spend time with them over mine even if the kids were not going to be joining us.
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    Often she would "forget" when we had plans with my family. She really made zero effort with my family and my family tried to get close to her and the kids. Plans we had discussed before marriage were also changed. We had discussed having kids together and agreed we wanted one or two but then she said she didn't know after we were
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    married. She was not the same with other people. She was just as open and affectionate as before with everyone else. She enjoyed herself. But it was like being reminded of me was a bucket of ice water over her head.
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    I tried to discuss it with her but she was "busy" or she'd say she had no idea she was doing it and promised to be more conscious but she wasn't. And then she started talking about her late husband more. I would try to engage with her about him but she'd carry on without me and almost seemed to dislike me talking about him.
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    In the end I couldn't do it. I know there are ways to try and make it work but I didn't feel like anyone else would want to. So I told my wife I couldn't do it anymore and said I wanted a divorce. She looked startled at first and then asked me why and we talked briefly about it before I left the house. We did go to a couple of
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    therapy sessions together after the separation but she closed down certain topics which made me more secure in my decision. And her kids did not miss me at all. Apparently once I was gone the kids told their aunt that the house felt like a home at last. They didn't say it as in now that he's gone but it was implied. My
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    wife's parents don't understand why I didn't stay and fight for us all to come together and be a family. They said I gave up too fast and I knew what I was getting into when I married their daughter. My wife has asked for us to work it out. But I don't see a future for us. Does all of this make me TA?
    via u/Short_Astronomer8582
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    WhiteKnightPrimal NTA. You can't fix these issues unless everybody is willing to try, and neither your wife nor her kids are willing. This isn't what you signed up for, nor what you were expecting. You signed up for and expected a loving and affectionate wife and kids who accepted you as part of their lives, even if not necessarily as a father figure.
    via u/WhiteKnightPrimal
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    It sounds like this was all too fast. The kids were fine while it was just dating, but marriage made it real to them in a way dating didn't, and they pulled away and started trying to push you out. It sounds like your wife wanted a father figure for the kids and someone to help and financially contribute and be a companion, but she wasn't actually ready for what that really meant. Once things were final and you were married, she started comparing you to her late-partner and pulling away, especia
    via u/WhiteKnightPrimal
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    Your wife can say she wants to work this out all she wants, but she's had chances to do just that. You talked to her and she refused to engage. You told her you wanted to divorce, and she refused to engage. You went to therapy and she shut down topics, ones I'm assuming are the ones you needed to fix to make this work, once more refusing to engage. You give at least three instances where she completely shut down any and all attempts to fix the relationship. If she can't engage, nothing will chan
    via u/WhiteKnightPrimal
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    This isn't not being able to handle being a step-parent, this is not being able to handle being part of a 'family' where literally no one wants you around, not even your wife. It's not just the kids who have made it clear you're not part of their family, your wife has been doing exactly the same thing. You're being dismissed and disrespected over and over by all of them. There's only so much of that a person can handle, and if no one else is willing to try and fix the issue, the only healthy opt
    via u/WhiteKnightPrimal

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parents of teens long term relationship teens marriage kids mother teenagers relationships raising teens widow dad stepdad mom toxic relationship Father
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