Two Years In: We Didn’t Blend. We Wove.
Tomorrow, Kristen and I will celebrate our second wedding anniversary.
It’s not a big number. Not by the world’s standards, anyway. But for us? It marks the longest stretch of steady ground either of us has had in years. We didn’t just get married. We built a new life from the rubble of two old ones. And we did it with a combined total of eight children, a whole lot of laundry, and a fridge that never stays full for more than a day.
Some days I still wake up surprised. Not because I doubt the love, but because it continues so strongly through all of the external chaos. Through court dates and taekwondo schedules. Through hard conversations and harder silences. Through the mess of blending not just households, but histories.
We’re two years in. And what I’ve learned more than anything is this:
You don’t marry a person. You marry their people. You marry their history.
And in my case, I married a woman with three little boys who are wild, sweet, stubborn, and loyal. And she married me, a man with four kids, who carried their own trauma, rhythms, and routines. We each had a backpack full of old pain and some grief and shame and other emotions.
But Kristen didn’t flinch.
She moved toward all of it.
And I want to talk about that.
What Stepmotherhood Really Looks Like
There are no Hallmark cards for stepmoms that say, “Thanks for remembering which kid hates crust on their sandwich and which one needs melatonin to sleep.”
There should be.
Because Kristen knows.
She knows who likes what foods and who wants what snacks. She listens when they talk about Minecraft or Roblox or some video game mechanic I still don’t understand. She shows up for the boring parts: the sock hunts even if you can’t find the matching pair, the homework checks, the repeated requests to stop pestering your brother at the dinner table.
She doesn’t force love. She earns it. She lets it grow like moss - quiet, slow, and steady.
And the truth is, her step-parenting doesn't look like some kind of savior complex. It looks like finding whatever mismatch of socks you can find in the laundry bin to get everyone out the door in the morning. It looks like sitting on those very uncomfortable bleachers at taekwondo for 45 minutes two-three times a week. It looks like making sure her boys talk to their bio dad, while also wiping snot off of one of her step-kids face.
It looks like being there even when it’s thankless. Even when it’s awkward. Even when it hurts.
Especially when it hurts.
When She Didn’t Flinch
Right before I met Kristen, Gavin had been in the pediatric ICU for over a week. Complications from pneumonia and the flu. He was so sick they had him on a non-invasive BiPAP machine to help him breathe. He had tubes, wires, and a shit ton of medicine. And I lay in that hospital bed with him for days. I remember reading Paw Patrol books, singing songs, doing whatever I could to make him smile. I didn’t know if he was going to be okay. That memory still burns in my chest.
In that memory, it was the first where it really hit me that I was parenting alone. I had been doing that for a long time, but it became real in that moment. That these kids were counting on me.
A few months later, Kristen met my kids.
And then Gavin got sick again.
It was just a cold, but I was on edge. Trauma doesn’t need much to come back. We ended up in the ER again, and Kristen came with me. She didn’t stand back.
“Right now he is doing okay, but if his breathing starts getting worse, just bring him back in,” the doctor said very nonchalant. For me, sitting in that emergency room chair holding my baby boy, all I was seeing was a replay clip of just a few months prior. I was frozen, but frustrated.
Kristen helped me advocate for something—anything—that could help. Kristen said, “What should we do at home if he starts having retractions and can’t breathe?”
The doctor started to say something, but Kristen continued, “We could call an ambulance but wouldn’t it be best if we had something we could do until the ambulance got there? To stabilize him?”
The doctor shrugged, like, it wasn’t that bad, but Kristen said, “It was that bad, he almost died. Twice.”
I’ve known what it’s like to be with someone who shrinks back when things get uncomfortable. But Kristen? She stepped forward. She fought for my kid like he was hers.
“My oldest son has a nebulizer and albuterol for his asthma. When they gave it to us, they said it was because kids this age can go downhill fast and an ambulance won’t be fast enough. As a preventative measure?”
The doctor — acting like we were street dealers for albuterol — pushed back, “that is definitely something we could look at if he is having consistent problems with his breathing…”, Kristen interrupted, “He was just in the pediatric ICU a few months ago struggling to breathe, wouldn’t it help to have something to help us until we could get him to the ER?” The doctor conceded that this was a fair request.
We left with a prescription for Augmentin — a very thick, strong antibiotic that I have never seen a kid enjoy — and we left with a prescription for a nebulizer and albuterol.
Back home, I stood in the kitchen holding the dose. Kristen held Gavin. His head on her shoulder, whimpering. He didn’t want to take it. I gave it to him anyway.
He cried. Coughed. And then vomited all over her.
She didn’t yell. She didn’t flinch. She didn’t even freeze.
She moved toward the sink and leaned him forward so he could finish throwing up.
I stood there stunned, antibiotic bottle still in my hand.
That was one of the first moments I realized what kind of stepmom she was going to be. She was not going to be just someone who loves my kids in theory, but someone who stays calm in the chaos. Someone who holds steady even when it gets gross, loud, hard, real.
Not a second-string parent. Not a fill-in.
Family.
The Other Side of the Mirror
I didn’t just marry someone who became a stepmom—I became a stepdad, too.
And let me be honest: that didn’t come as naturally as I wanted it to.
Loving someone else’s kids isn’t the same as loving your own. That’s a hard sentence to write, but it’s true. There’s a rhythm to parenting that gets disrupted when you didn’t start at the beginning. When you don’t know which cry means they’re hungry and which one means they’re just done with the day.
There’s a weird limbo between wanting to help and not wanting to overstep. Between being fully present and quietly unsure where your lane is. I’ve messed it up more than once.
But something sacred happens when you choose to stay anyway.
It’s not about dramatic breakthroughs. It’s about the quiet trust that builds when you’re the one pouring the cereal or toasting the waffles, again and again. No fanfare. No titles. Just presence.
When my biological kids were little—Tucker as a baby, even—I used to sing Amazing Grace to help them fall asleep. It became a ritual. A comfort. A lullaby they could count on.
After Kristen and I got together, her boys had trouble settling down at night. They were carrying their own emotions, backstories, their own jitters. One night, unsure what else to do, I sat down on the edge of the bed and started singing Amazing Grace.
They listened. Then they asked me to sing it again. And again.
Now, they love it. Sometimes they request it. It’s not just a song anymore—it’s become a thread, woven through both sides of our family.
The other night, Cade—six years old and full of heart—tried to sing it to Abigail. He didn’t get all the words right, but he got the melody, the feeling, the intention.
And I stood there watching, realizing what a privilege it is to pass something so small but sacred between children who didn’t start life together but who are, somehow, learning to belong to each other anyway.
That’s what step-parenting can be.
Not a replacement.
An echo. A bridge. A legacy of love passed one quiet verse at a time.
The Myth of Blending
More than 1 in 6 children in the U.S. live in a blended family. That’s millions of kids who are learning how to belong to each other across old lines—kids who didn’t start out together, but who are slowly, steadily becoming family.
“Blended family” sounds so smooth, doesn’t it? Like all you had to do was throw everyone into a blender and push the love button.
But love doesn’t blend like that.
Blending implies sameness. A loss of distinct flavor. But our family isn’t that. We’re more like a stew.
Every ingredient holds its shape. Every story matters. Some days we simmer gently. Some days we boil over.
But we’re learning how to season this thing. How to make it ours.
And that takes patience. A lot of it.
What It Actually Looks Like
It’s figuring out who’s allowed to discipline which child without starting World War III. It’s tag-teaming bedtime even when one of you is fried. It’s choosing not to keep score, even when the work feels endless and no one’s quite sure who did what last.
It’s loving a child who sometimes reminds you they already have a mom. Or a dad.
It’s hearing “You’re not my real parent” and learning not to take it personally, because it is true.
Llewellyn, one of Kristen’s boys, took that truth and ran with it. He started calling me his “fake dad.” Not with anger. Just matter-of-fact. Like it was a job title.
I didn’t correct him. I wore it like a badge.
Last year on Father’s Day, Kristen gave me two coffee mugs. One said #1 Real Dad. The other? #1 Fake Dad.
I drank from both that morning.
Because step-parenting lives in the in-between. The not-quite-but-still-here. The fake that turns real, slowly, over time.
It’s also being the one they look for in a crowded auditorium. The one they ask to tie their shoes. The one they call when the toilet won’t stop running.
It’s the thousand invisible threads that start to form between you—day by ordinary day—until one day you realize you’ve built a net strong enough to catch each other.
That’s not blending.
That’s weaving.
And weaving takes time.
To Kristen:
You are the strongest, softest place I’ve ever landed.
You are a wonder of a woman. Not just for how you love me, but for how you love them. For how you keep showing up even when it’s thankless. For how you make space for their mom while still mothering them in the gaps.
For how you carry your own grief quietly. For how you let joy grow anyway.
You make this the life I love, with all eight kids in tow
I’ve watched you bite your tongue in moments you could have spoken. I’ve watched you stand firm in moments you could have folded. I’ve watched you become a safe person not just to our kids, but to the parts of me that never knew safety before you.
Happy anniversary, baby.
I’d marry you again, every day of the week.
And I’d still make your coffee, no matter how early it is or how many kids are already crying.
Spiritual Notes from a Blended Life
There’s a Hebrew word I keep coming back to lately: chesed.
It means steadfast love. The kind that keeps showing up even when it’s inconvenient. The kind that moves toward the mess. The kind that doesn’t demand perfection—just presence.
That’s what we’re trying to build here.
Jesus said, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Sometimes the treasure is time. Sometimes it’s patience. Sometimes it’s choosing not to be right in order to stay connected.
In Buddhist teaching, there’s a phrase: “Tend the part of the garden you can touch.” That’s step-parenting in a nutshell. You’re not the whole sun. You’re not the original soil. But you can tend. You can nurture. You can water gently and often.
And eventually, something grows.
Not perfectly.
But faithfully.
That’s holy ground.
Right here, in the middle of the mess.
Billy, I’m reading this at 2:00am with tears in my eyes. You and Kristen are so perfect together.
Love this. Great read. From the day I met Kristen I feel in love with her and saw the happiness in your voice Billy in Atlanta. So happy for both of you.