Are You Caught In the Assumption and Expectation Game?

Jul 13, 2010 by Peggy Nolan

In The Four Agreements, Don Miguel Ruiz writes, “Just being ourself is the biggest fear of humans. WE have learned to live our life trying to satisfy other people’s demands. We have learned to live by other people’s points of view because of the fear of not being accepted and of not being good enough for someone else.”

Are you caught in the trap of living your life based on the assumptions and expectations of others? Do you have a hard time accepting yourself just as you are?Are you feeling lost and frustrated as a stepmom? Are you wondering where the old fun-loving you went? Do you find yourself asking yourself questions such as:

• Who am I?
• What do I want?
• How did I get here?
• Where am I going?
• Why am I so angry and resentful?
• When did I become tired of my role as stepmom?

Are you ready to look inward to find you again? In the famous words of Captain Kirk, buckle up. This is going to be a wild ride with twists and turns you may not expect. In the reclamation process of self-assessment, Geneen Roth, author of Women, Food, and God, states, “you are taking who you think you are apart.”

In assessing yourself, inquiring within is about getting to the root cause of the circumstances you find yourself in. It’s about tackling each issue until you get to the source. It’s about discovering all the side issues you’ve created because the main issue may have become too difficult, painful, or uncomfortable.

According to Roth, inquiry is a confrontation with unmet feelings “because unmet feelings obscure our ability to know ourselves.” As I traveled my own path of self-assessment and inquiry as a stepmom, I’ve discovered that most of my stepmom issues have root causes in my own messed up and wonderful childhood.

I was eight when I met my stepmother. I liked her right away because she wasn’t afraid to do cartwheels in the living room with me. My dad married her right before my ninth birthday and they blended her three kids and his four kids in a mix master at warp speed. I’m pretty sure my dad accidentally hit puree because at any given point in time, one of us was getting creamed.

In my family of origin, I was the oldest and only girl. When dad remarried, I acquired two older sisters and another younger brother. My world turned upside down as I was neither the oldest nor the only girl. I felt displaced.

My father’s first wife, my “real” mother was declared unfit to raise children. In 1971, the state of California awarded my father sole legal and physical custody of me and my three brothers. I never saw my real mother again. I felt rejected and abandoned.

To me and my siblings, our parents were “mom and dad.” When I was twelve, my mom adopted me and my brothers and my dad adopted my youngest brother. My sisters chose not to have my dad adopt them.

I was not an easy teenager. Just ask my mom. I lied and manipulated to get my way. I walked through life feeling displaced, rejected, and abandoned. Looking back, these feelings became recurring themes throughout my twenties and thirties and manifested in my quest for perfection and my type A Over-Achieving personality. My first marriage ended in divorce which only magnified my feelings of not being good enough.

I started my ever-present and ever-evolving journey of self-assessment and inquiry when I turned forty. When I was forty-three I remarried the love of my life and became a stepmom to a troubled teenage boy (and three adult children). My husband had full legal and physical custody of Junior.

I went through many of the same things stepmoms go through – the need to be a super stellar custodial stepmom, to outdo, be more, be better than, and never, ever, ever make a mistake. I created my own recipe for stepmom burnout. Like you, I found myself angry, resentful, and hostile. I overlaid my own issues with my real mother abandoning me onto Junior’s mother. I couldn’t understand why she stepped out of the picture. I resented her and I felt bad for Junior.

Junior began acting out. Property damage in my home, lying, passive aggressive behavior, and lying…did I mention lying? His ADHD didn’t help things either.

I woke up one day and realized that I oozed hostility. And it was hurting my marriage and my relationship with Junior. I began to connect my lying child self with Junior and I remembered what it’s like to be a child of divorce.

Before I could dive into self-inquiry, I had to accept what is so first. What I believed should be, such as Junior’s mom being mom, was in direct conflict with reality. I let go of the false beliefs I was holding onto. I disengaged (maybe a bit too much at first!) from full on parenting of Junior and I got to work on me…because I was the only variable that I could change.

As I worked on reclaiming me, I realized a few things:

• I am a mom, but I’m not Junior’s mom.
• My husband is more than capable of being Junior’s parent.
• Junior’s mom was the best mom she could be at the time.
• I stopped taking what Junior was saying or doing personally. This is often easier said than done, but mastering this skill will create peace and poise of mind.
• Once I realized that Junior’s mom’s life was upside down, I remembered what it felt like to have my own life upside down. While I did not excuse her behavior, I felt compassion for her.
• My mom did the best she could raising seven kids…four of them not her own. Doing my best as a stepmom is more important than being the best stepmom or being seen as a better stepmom than Junior’s mom is a mom.

It was Junior’s therapist who gave me the permission I thought I needed to completely let go and just be who I authentically am. He told me, “you did not break Junior; you cannot fix him, you cannot change him. Your only job is to love him.”

My job and your job is the same. To love. Reclaiming who you really are, your essence, and the seat of your soul is through love. All I had to do was love Junior. And to love Junior meant finding the little girl in me who felt abandoned after her parents divorced and give her the love she never received from her birth mother. To love Junior meant finding the mixed up teenage girl who manipulated and lied to get her way and forgive her.

In the process of learning to love Junior, I found a more balanced me. I found my peace and poise of mind. I made peace with Junior’s mom in my heart. I nurtured my relationships with those around me and myself.

And my husband? He got his happy wife back.

We learn to find ourselves the same way the great mystic poet Rumi wrote on how birds learn to fly.

“How do they learn it?
They fall; and falling they are given wings.“

I dare you to journey inward and find your real wings.

Tune into the next episode of Wise Advice on The Stepmom’s Toolbox Radio Show and learn more about The Four Agreements