"I’ve been trying to make my blended family work. But this family doesn't work at all."

I thought I was over all of the blended family bullshit issues but I’m not. Sometimes it seems like I’m never going to out from under it and almost twenty years later it’s starting to wear a little bloody thin.

As the “new wife” I have forever been cast into the role of “interloper” when it comes to my husband’s first family, not by his mother or his beautiful boys, but by his children’s mother and all of her posse. This is despite the fact I have always done whatever I could to be respectful of her in thought and deed.

I needn’t have bothered

I may as well have told her how I really felt about her which is that I think she is crazy and delusional and so intent on playing the victim that she can’t even bring herself to do what is right by her own children, like attending their engagement parties and weddings.

So far she hasn’t turned up to several family events just because I might be there.

Families can be so complicated. As part of our Mamamia Confessions series we asked, “What’s the worst thing your in laws have ever done? Article continues after this video.

Last time I checked I wasn’t some sort of deranged mistress. I simply fell in love with a man who had been separated from his wife for four years. Each of them had different partners at the time. He eventually broke up with his to date me.

I didn’t bust in on a happy family and steal the man using my feminine wiles. I just started dating a work colleague, fell in love, we got married and now we have kids of our own.

When we first got together the blended family bullshit was kept well-hidden. Everyone was on their best behaviour. Then two years in, seemingly out of nowhere and with little warning, it started to flare up. Everyone started telling some cold, hard truths. The boys struggled with their feelings for me because they felt disloyal to their mother. She did nothing to discourage that and I became used to feeling like a stranger in my own home.

She refused to meet me. Aside from a couple of phone calls during which she yelled at me for offences such as feeding her children chocolate every other weekend and telling my boyfriend at the time that she had plans to run off with his kids, there wasn’t much she could hold against me.

Now, almost twenty years later we still haven't met. It just became too big and too awkward.

I thought for sure I'd meet her at an engagement party but she refused to turn up because I would be there. What the fuck? Seriously?

It's just annoying now because our first meeting is probably going to be at my stepson's wedding. I told my stepson I understand if he'd prefer I didn't attend so his mum feels more comfortable but his exact words were, "No way!" His fiance then explained that his family was messed and so was hers so they were just going to invite everyone and whomever wants to come can come.

Anyone who doesn't want to come or wants to cause a problem can stay the hell home.

I love those two so damn much.

What has made it even more awkward is the fact my daughter is going to be a flower girl which means not only am I attending the wedding but I am going to be front and centre with my daughter, flaunting my family in front of her face.

Because I care that much about taunting someone who gave birth to my two beloved stepchildren. Because I'm that freaking shallow.

I just want to live my life and stop feeling like I have done something wrong, like my love is wrong, like my marriage is wrong and my children are wrong.

All because it upset her at the time.

It started twenty years ago. Can't we move the hell on?

Being in a blended family sucks. Sometimes it's okay. I get nice, long breaks from all of the bullshit but now when shit happens it seems to be big shit, not little shit.

Like we are making up for lost time.

This wedding of two people whom I love to death is filling me with such extreme anxiety I am thinking of having a minor car accident just to legitimately avoid going, which is ridiculous, of course I'm going.

Part of me hopes she doesn't turn up so I can relax and enjoy myself, so that nobody is there to stare daggers and me and my beautiful children but for my stepson, I want her to come. Every child deserves their parents to be at their wedding.

I'll be devastated for him if she's not.