The Career Girl’s Guide to Becoming a Stepmom — https://www.amazon.com/dp/0060846836
When you’re a successful, independent woman dating a dad, this book is legit. Read it, do the journaling exercises and the discussions with your partner. Being in love isn’t enough to solve the ridiculously tough problems that come with being a stepparent. You need a guide and this one is a good one.
I would recommend the book “A Career Girl’s Guide to Becoming a Stepmom.” It’s particularly good for someone like you who is childless and independent and considering entering this life. It was one of the first stepparenting books I read and it was eye-opening and made me do some soul-searching. It has great journaling prompts that really dig into the feelings and assumptions that come with stepparenting and dating a guy with kids.
The Career Girl’s Guide to Becoming a Stepmom — https://www.amazon.com/dp/0060846836
It also hits on the financial parts of being a stepparent who makes more money than her partner because of their child support responsibilities. This is a place where you need to tread VERY carefully because you don’t want to enter into a situation where you are the financial caretakers of your stepkids. They need to be supported by your partner, not by you.
You are right to really stop and think about yourself and your needs before committing to this relationship. It needs to be something you ENTHUSIASTICALLY know will work because of how good of a parent your partner is, and how good of a team you are. Being a stepparent is choosing to live life in hard-mode.
It definitely gets easier once you can hang out during his custody time, but the feelings of jealousy are feelings you absolutely have to work through and dig into. I would recommend this book to help prepare you for the MANY complicated feelings that come with dating a father: https://www.amazon.com/Career-Girls-Guide-Becoming-Stepmom/dp/0060846836
If you stick with this guy, this girl is going to be the center of BOTH your lives. Sure you aren’t going to be responsible for her, but her existence has a lot of impact on your life, and that’s something you need to be prepared for. It’s not something you can think “I’ll just wing it and hope things work out!”
It was either The Career Girl’s Guide to Becoming a Stepmom — https://www.amazon.com/dp/0060846836 or Dating the Divorced Man — https://www.amazon.com/dp/0984826270
A Career Girl’s Guide to Becoming a Stepmom https://www.amazon.com/dp/0060846836/
This one is good for helping you mourn the things you lose by becoming a stepmom. The loss of having a nuclear family of your own. The loss of becoming a parent together with your partner. The inherent imbalances that come with a relationship with a parent. Also it’s good for recognizing things you need to know before committing. Seeing the court order for custody, understanding the child support and spousal support. Understanding what kind of parent he is. Because of these things you may end up earning a lot more than your partner and this book talks a lot about how to help split your money up.
Stepmonster https://www.amazon.com/Stepmonster-Look-Real-Stepmothers-Think-ebook/dp/B003WJQ64K
This one is common for troubleshooting stepparenting relationships. Being a stepparent is hard with lots of boundaries needed to protect your own sanity. Lots of stepparents do too much at the beginning and overcommit and burn out.
Saving Your Second Marriage Before it Starts https://www.amazon.com/dp/0310346304/
You will be someone’s second wife. Your SO has gotten divorced in the past which statistically means they’re more likely to get a second one. At the root of this experience is your relationship with each other. If that foundation isnt strong then your role as a stepparent will be nearly impossible.
Building Love Together in Blended Families https://www.amazon.com/dp/0802419054/
Having the right expectations in relationships is huge. You won’t be these kids’ mom, but mom might get jealous of your presence in their lives. You might get jealous of how your partner is so attached to and attentive to his kids. The kids might get jealous that you get to spend more time with their dad than they do. Building love and making the right connections is important.
How to Talk so Little Kids Will Listen https://www.amazon.com/dp/150113163X/
Not a stepparenting book but a parenting book. If you’re not familiar with how little kids minds work, you’re going to think your SO’s kids are sociopathic, lazy, lying, ungrateful, illogical, manipulative creatures and that there’s something wrong with his parenting. But the honest truth is that 99 times out of 100, that kid is acting completely normal and expected for their age and you just haven’t experienced it before.
It’s a lot but that’s what stepparenting is: a lot!