My boyfriend and I are as close as it’s possible to be after six months of dating… except that he still hasn’t let me meet his kids. While I respect his parenting and believe he has nothing but good intentions, I’m starting to get a little impatient.
- I never planned to date a guy with kids, so the least he could do is make me feel comfortable. I’m not a natural with kids; they kind of terrify me. So the fact that I’m still able to love a man who has three of them is a testament to how much I actually care about our relationship. While I would never have expected him to introduce me to them the minute we started dating, six months seems like a long time.
- If we’re in love, we should be talking about the future. Our relationship got serious pretty quickly, and even though I know how difficult it is for him to merge this new relationship with his family, it seems like he wants to. We love each other and spend tons of time together. Clearly he wants me to continue to be a part of his life, so why hasn’t he introduced me to a huge part of it?
- You’d think he’d want to make the transition as easy as possible on his kids. I’m no parenting expert, but it seems pretty obvious that any father would want to make the lives of his kids as smooth as possible, especially if they’ve already gone through their parents’ divorce. They already know I exist, and it seems like dragging out an actual introduction is disrupting their lives more than a quick one would.
- I’ve already met his parents. He introduced me to his parents after only three months, and I’ve seen them several times since. We get along well and he dotes on me when they’re around. But it’s extremely awkward when they bring up the kids and I have nothing to say. If he cares about this relationship enough to introduce me to his parents, why can’t I meet the rest of his family?
- He might be worried I’ll freak out and leave him. Not everyone wants to jump into a relationship with a guy who has kids, and a few months ago, I would’ve included myself in that category. It’s actually pretty reasonable of him to wonder if I might bail on him the second I meet them and realize what I’ve gotten myself into, but I don’t take any of this lightly, and he shouldn’t assume that I’m unprepared.
- He’s setting us up for disaster. The way things are going, it seems pretty likely that he and I will get married someday. But if he introduces me in six months as their new stepmom-to-be, they’re pretty much guaranteed to hate me. The only way to make a difficult transition like this is to ease into it.
- I need to know if I even want to be in a relationship with him. How am I supposed to know if he’s the person I want to spend my life with if I haven’t seen the most important part of his life? Being a parent is a big deal and I know he takes it very seriously. I need to meet them before I can really know if he’s the one for me.
- Kids say a lot about their parents. It’s hard to hide your true self around your kids. They know when their parents are faking it and they have no issues making that known. I need to know what kind of father he is, what their personalities reflect about their upbringing, and what the family dynamic is. How else am I supposed to know what he’s truly like?
- I want a real relationship. If he needs a few rebounds after his divorce, that’s totally fine, but I’m not down to be one of them. I want a serious relationship and it seems like he does too, but he can’t have it both ways. I can’t be the casual other woman in his life who lets him escape his family for a little while. We’re in love with each other. It’s kind of hard to pretend it’s not serious.
- He needs to show me that he’s committed. If he wants me in his life, he needs to take it upon himself to really prove it with his actions. Everything he’s done and said up to this point—apart from not introducing me to his kids, of course—has shown that he really wants this relationship to last. While it’s great to get every other form of confirmation, I also need him to prove that he wants me to be a part of his family too.
