Quote Originally Posted by redrhodie View Post
I love my step mother, but it took a long time to get there.
That's a really good point, and I think it's easy for those of us who didn't grow up in blended families to miss. My grandmother remarried when my mom was 15, and my mom resented her stepfather for literally decades. Happily for both of them, in middle age she came to understanding, and dearly loved her stepfather before he died. Now, her biological father was very absent and easy for her to idealize for a lot of reasons, but still. As hurtful as it is for Dogmama (and as it must have been for my Opa), there is almost certainly unresolved pain on the other side, too.