At the end of last year, I became a step-dad. I’m the kind of person that has an intense curiosity about anything new I do. Being a modern, web-savvy kind of guy (read: “geek”) I set out to do some reading up on stepdadding on the Web. Alas, there’s not much out there. Stepdad.org would seem like the place to start, but it’s not very active — the last news update is from last summer — and the forums are filled mainly with men telling horror stories about their stepkids or their partners. I was looking for something a bit more upbeat and positive than that.

Other sites explicitly for stepfathers proved hard to find, though. There’s usually a step-parenting page on sites about parenting and families, but nothing seemed to really dig into the experience of being a stepdad, the unique joys and challenges that make up our lives. So, geek that I am, I decided to start this site.

Actually, it didn’t happen quite like that — I skipped a step. See, I’m a contributing editor at lifehack.org, so while I was thinking about all this I decided to write up some of my experiences there, to offer what random scraps of wisdom I’d accumulated as advice to our many readers. The post that resulted, Becoming a Great Step-Dad, wasn’t my most popular post or the one that got the most comments, but I really enjoyed writing it. What’s more, the comments I did get were incredibly positive and even life-affirming. There is a need for people to talk about this stuff, I realized.

And for good reason. Some one-third of America’s children live with a step-parent, most of them step-fathers. And yet the image of step-parents in our society is still dominated by the evil step-mother and ugly step-sisters in Cinderella. And about the only notice step-children get in popular culture is in the phrase “beat you like a red-headed stepchild”.

Well, I have a red-headed step-child, and for his sake, I think it’s time to broaden the discussion a little. Considering how much lip service the idea of “family values” is given, those of us doing yeoman’s work trying to bring up decent, creative, and valuable members of society — many of whom carry deep scars left by their parent’s separation and the often bitter conflicts that follow — deserve a little attention. We face challenges that other parents don’t face (not that they don’t have issues of their own to deal with, of course) with little or no guidance — and a lot of us do a pretty damn good job of it!

But all of us could use a little support, which is the goal of this site. For now, it’s just me, a lone stepfather in the wilderness of the Interwebs, stepdadding as fast as I can. Later, I hope to add forums, maybe a newsletter, who knows — whatever I can come up with to make this site useful for stepdads like me. In the meantime, I’ll be posting about my own experiences, along with whatever information I come across the I think might be useful for stepdads to know: book reviews, product reviews, tips and tricks. If there’s something you’d like to see here, let me know — you can email me from the contact page.

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One Response to “Welcome to StepDadding.com”

1. Chris Says:
   March 25th, 2008 at 4:15 pm

   It’s encouraging to find this site on the web. I’ve been looking for a site where I can find support, especially with the difficulties of being a step dad. I guess I need an outlet to talk about my problems or concerns etc and your site looks like it could do that.

   Regards.

   Chris.

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