Navigating Love and Family Dynamics

Years later, after my mom moved back home, she visited my grandmother at the hospital where she met my dad. A couple of months down the road, she gets pregnant at 18, his parents force them into an unhappy marriage, I’m born (I’m a girl, lots of confusion about that) (my mom is now 19), 3 years later my sister is born, then 10 years later they get a nasty divorce.

After the divorce, my mom is in a terrible, inconsolable place in her life. She’s unhappy, my sister is alienated from her by my father, she works unholy hours at the hospital, she has few friends, the works. So, she’s on Facebook one day and links up with her old pal Danny. They instantly hit it off and started dating. I was always very wary of the men my mother dated because a) I had plenty of trust issues because of my father and b) she worked so much I barely got to see her or spend time with her (I was 17 and a senior in high school, I needed my mom) c) I didn’t want another father figure in my life yet (selfish, I know). I decide it’s time I start giving these guys a chance, so I go with her to meet Danny one day.

Everything about Danny seemed great. I was in love. I always wanted the perfect dad, and I was so sure it was him. He had a good job and could take care of my mom so that she didn’t have to work so many hours anymore, he was so nice and funny, and he always took us to do fun stuff (go-karting, bowling, arcades, etc), and most of all, he had a son. I always ALWAYS wanted a brother. His son was younger than me, around my sister’s age, 14–15 or so, but I didn’t care. I had a brother.

So after only a few months of dating (maybe 3–4), Danny, my mom, and I moved into a house together (my step-brother lived with his grandmother, but we saw him often). During Thanksgiving, they decide to spur-of-the-moment get married. I was happy, she was happy, all seemed well and we could finally get on with our lives again, or so we thought.

After a few weeks of being married, everything goes sour. Danny turns out to be a liar, a cheat, a thief, and all of the worst possible things you can think of. A wolf in sheep’s clothing. I won’t go into details, because there are a lot of details. My newfound brother turns out to be a giant, whiny pain in my ass who makes my life a living hell 99.9% of the time. As for my mom and I, we were back to being miserable.

Fast forward, I graduate from high school (with honors, top of my class). I go through a hellacious summer full of mental torment. I was at the point where I did not want to live, but I was too scared to do anything to take my life, so I suffered. (But it was all worth it in the end.) I end up going to college out of state and moving into to the dorms.

At this point in the story, I bet you're thinking that this is all about my mom. Well, you’re wrong. It’s about me, I just had to give a good background.

It was around the end of October when I decided that I didn’t want to attend the university next semester, and decided that I would move back home and enroll in the local community college, but I still had to finish out the semester. So, that weekend when I went home (I went home every weekend because it wasn’t but an hour and a half drive), I was met by this huge, handsome hunk who was sitting on my couch in the living room of my mother’s house.

Me: “Hello?”

Handsome hunk: “uh hey.”

Me: “…. …. .. … do you know where my mom is?”

Handsome hunk: “Uh, yeah, she’s out back.”

Turns out, Danny had another son. He’s older (19 at the time) and has a different mom than my step-brother. Logan, aka handsome hunk, was moving in with my mom and stepdad for a little while so he could work with my stepdad (who was previously unemployed for several months and left it up to my mom to pay all of the bills).

As I mentioned before, I had always wanted a brother, but now I have 2! Logan and I hit it off quickly. I went to work with him the next day and spent the whole day getting to know him. I was so excited, he was so much cooler than my younger brother. We ended up spending a lot of time together, basically every waking moment of every weekend, and he ended up coming to see me at school a couple of times. It was official. I had the coolest brother ever. Soon it was Christmas time and I was moving out of the dorms and moving back home.

Up until this point, I thought of him strictly as my brother, nothing more.

One night, we were lying in his bed watching a movie in his room (this wasn’t unusual) while my other brother was asleep in his bed on the other side of the room. We got to talking, then to whispering, all while inching closer to one another, then he leaned in to kiss me. I kiss him back. It was one of the most beautiful, loving kisses ever (I’m not exaggerating). Literal sparks flew. Afterward, I looked at him and he confessed that he’d been in love with me the whole time! I had no idea and didn’t know what to say, because I had only thought of him as a brother. I ended up getting out of bed and going to my room.

The next day, we talked about it and I suggested that we shouldn’t do anything about it. We should end the romantic relationship there because, I mean, we were step siblings right ??? He agreed and things went back to normal, for maybe 3 days. Then I couldn’t take it anymore and decided I loved him too. We ended up having a moment alone to talk about it, then I ended up smearing my lipstick all over his face, literally.

We decided we would give it a try and secretly start dating, if our parents found out, we’d both be kicked out for sure because there’s no way they’d allow it.

We spent even more time together because I had moved home and I saw him every day, we grew even closer and fell even deeper in love. My younger brother became extremely, jealous of all of the time we were spending together. He started becoming even more hateful than he already was.

By this time, it’s around April. We had just celebrated Logan’s 20th birthday. One day, my younger brother was on this hateful streak. Cussing anyone and everything thing in his path. He’d already had his outs with my mom several times, but today was different. Today he said something unforgivable and intolerable. I decided to tell my mom. She decided she’d had enough. She decides to leave for the night. My step-father is livid. He blames me for everything wrong in his life, his marriage, his finances, everything you can think of, and more.

I’m inconsolable. Logan is trying to calm me down and trying to hand me my inhaler so I can catch my breath, with no mercy, my stepdad throws us out of the house. He gives us 20 minutes to pack a bag and get out.

We took the opportunity and ran. We’d been looking for a way to leave the house and live on our own for months. This was our chance. We packed everything we could fit in my car and left. We booked a hotel room for the night so we could sort everything out.

Almost 2 years later, we have our own house, he bought me a new car, we have 2 dogs, I’ll graduate from college with an accounting degree this May, and we are currently trying for a baby. We aren’t married yet, but we’re waiting for the right time. It hasn’t always been easy, we lived in a camper, that was barely big enough for 2 people to stand up in, for a solid year before we could get a house. We struggled and budgeted our money. We lived strictly off of his income while he supported me through school.

We have a very solid relationship. We’re true to each other, we love each other with a passion I can’t describe with words alone, and we’re the perfect match for one another.

As for my mom, she’s still married to Danny. She’s struggling in her marriage, she’s having a hard time coping and has turned into an alcoholic. I pray for her often, but I’m just praying for the day that things turn around for her.

It’s been a tough couple of years for Logan and me, but we’ve had each other. We’ve defeated every challenge that’s come our way and we’ve come out 10x as strong. Oddly, we’re step-siblings and not everyone is pleased with our relationship (most of my family still doesn’t know), but our relationship is built out of love and trust. It’s solid and true and that’s all I could ever want.