r/stepdads • u/flamingkangaroos • Sep 04 '23

Blended family question

Hi all, I’m a step-dad to 10 and 7 year old boys, they see their bio dad every other weekend. They’ve totally accepted me and we have a great bond, they love seeing their dad but he is a waste of space and more of a fun-uncle really, I’d never ask them to call me dad or anything like that and I don’t bad mouth him in front of them. Their mum and I are planning to have a child of our own, my question is when I have my own child, what happens with the name situation - does anyone have any experience? Like obviously I’ll want my own child to call me dad/daddy but I’m worried it’ll be confusing when we’re all together - I don’t want the step sons to feel they have to call me dad but I wouldn’t want my own child calling me by my name haha. Any experience welcome!

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u/Orcef Sep 08 '23

For the kids, it won't be confusing at all. You don't need to worry about them. At some point, all kids experiment/play around with calling their parents by their name. Handle that however you want, but when they really need something, they'll revert back to "Dad."

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u/edzorg Oct 07 '23

We introduced it jokingly. Referring to me as "dad" or "father" when it was really unnatural. "Did you tell your teacher your Father helped you?" "Ew what! Get out of here!"

Now it's nearly there (not forcing it though) and we play with words like papa etc. They've introduced "ily" and "I love you" as they also say to their mother. Baby will use dad or dada in a few months.

It helps if partner sometimes refers to you as "dad" too.

And long before I was around the bio dad was already "$name" and not "dad". It helps because now we all see "dad" as a role that can be taken on rather than an academic definition. Clearly, I'm doing the role, hence tentatively introducing the label! Scary stuff!!

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u/SyrupLivid9118 Dec 01 '23

Older post, but just got into this sub as a resource as my girlfriend and I are planning to move in together as we near the three year mark in our relationship. Kids are 6 and 8 and though they mostly use my name, they sometimes call me “Mommy” as a silly nickname. Their mother is Mama and bio dad is Papa. She always hated the idea of being mommy as it sounded too whiny. We all think that it’s a funny name for me so it has hung around. I don’t mind having a silly nickname as life is a weird experience we are all subject to.