First of all, I just have to say I love my family, including my stepsiblings... things might be a bit messy sometimes but I wouldn’t trade them. My family makes me who I am.

I technically have 8 siblings! I have an older brother, three older stepsisters, a stepbrother the same age as me, a sister and stepsister that will be high school sophomores and the youngest of us our littlest sister will be five soon. Now, before you say anything yes that is more than a handful but all of us have never actually lived in the same house at the same time before. Which, if you think about it having us split up in different places it actually usually just complicated things for my family.

Getting stepsiblings is a huge adjustment. I am going, to be honest, when my mom and stepdad first got together, before they got married, I did not really want anything to do with my stepsiblings and it was super complicated to explain to anyone that asked me who they were.

But just like living in a small town, they began to grow on me. It’s really hard to accept step siblings as siblings especially when you have the mindset that a sibling is someone that grew up with you, that can relate to you and understand you. It doesn’t matter if my siblings are full blood or not they are my siblings because they are linked to my parents and they have impacted my life.

It’s a handful living with stepsiblings because you have to deal with all of the chaos of the different parents, when all of you will be together to celebrate birthdays and holidays and when you will be at the other parent’s place. It can also be hard because your parents (mom and stepdad or vice versa) probably argue about whether they are favoring children, it’s a very fine line trying to be stepparents and being equal among all of the kids.

I know that I have even gotten jealous with my stepsiblings but it isn’t in their control what our other parents do or don’t do with us in comparison to them. Having stepsiblings is like having people that are forced to be your friends. It is never going to be perfect, they don’t always talk to me but neither do my full siblings.

Parents have different methods of parenting; my stepsiblings didn’t grow up with the same rules as me. My mom and stepdad had to cooperate and combine their parenting skills. In our case my stepsiblings had to start helping more, doing chores etc. If it weren’t for my stepfamily I probably wouldn’t have learned to fish or very much outdoor stuff that I had. Having stepsiblings is all about sharing and compromise.

I didn’t get to choose who my full siblings were and I didn’t get to choose my stepsiblings either, all that matters is that we are family so we are connected. There are positives and negatives to every situation you are in. I was blessed with the “curse” of stepsiblings and I hope when it comes to it that they feel the same way about me.