My parents met when they were both in the Air Force. They married when I was four and my older sister was seven. Looking at the wedding pictures, I remember being there, but for the longest time, I thought my dad was mine biologically. It wasn’t until I was older that I was told he was not. You see my dad adopted me and my sister after he married my mom, so I didn’t get a chance to experience a step-dad, just a dad.
I don’t remember being treated differently when my younger sister was born two years later. I was just happy to have her. We had a great family life; we traveled because their jobs moved us every three to four years. We ate dinner together, played games together, enjoyed each other. My dad even escorted me to my father-daughter dance when I was in Brownies. My dad was a hero to me because to me he knew how to do everything, fix everything and even showed me how to ride my bike. He was just Daddy, never my step-dad.
When my parents divorced some years later, I was devastated. I just knew I would never see him again, even though they both assured me I would. Of course I did see him, even though we never lived in the same state due to where the Air Force assigned them. Now that I am forty, nothing has changed with my dad. I can call him whenever I need anything, and he calls just to check in. He has re-married but never had any more kids. Just like the family of Christ, I have all the rights and privileges of a natural born child because I was adopted into his family. That is an awesome feeling.
I have heard people say that women eventually marry men like their fathers. In my case this is true. Some of my husband’s mannerisms mimic my dad’s. My husband also took on the role of raising a child not biologically his. So he too was a father before he became a daddy. You can read our adventures of a blended family in my article How My Husband Became a Father to My Child.
BMWK – We’ve been talking about how blessed kids are to have stepmoms, but we also have to give credit to all of the wonderful men that “stepup” to being fathers. If you know of a great stepdad, give him a shout out in the comments below.