Auntie Agatha

Wednesday, December 16
My Stepmother Divides Our Family

Dear Agatha,
We lost our mother sometime in March 1975 and our father remarried in 1979. We had what a child will call a difficult childhood without a mother. My father’s wife never for one day treated us as her children. We were, to her, another wives to my father.

However, when we became of age I told my siblings never to repay evil for evil, and that whatever happened be regarded as part of our destiny. To an extent, they all agreed with me. Her three children had free access to our homes, finances. Anyone who didn’t know would think we are all from the same mother. God used us to sponsor them through universities, a fact our father knows and says.
Despite this, she still refused to give us our due respect or treat us as her own. Being Christians, we ignore her especially as we all live far from home. While we do not lay claim to being saints, we believe there are no grievances that cannot be resolved.

Going by her children’s attitude these days, it is becoming apparent they too want separation from us. To be honest, it isn’t as if I am afraid of trouble, but not one within the family set-up.
Agatha, how do we handle this situation so that we can all come together as a family? What role must each of us play and what do we tell our father. He is aged and sad about this development.
Kindly advise me.
Anthony.




Dear Anthony,
The major problem came from your father. Had he from the beginning curbed the excesses of his wife, insisted on all his children functioning as an entity from the same source, the situation wouldn’t have endured to this level.
There is no way you can get someone who doesn’t want to be part of a team to play your game. The wise thing to do is to allow them be. Until they desire it, you will only be wasting your time trying to make them dance to your rhythm. There has to be a corresponding desire from their end for any effort you and your mother’s children make to be fruitful.
Frankly, the only person who can do anything about it is your father. He must be concerned about what happens to his family at his death. If his family were divided when he is still alive, what would happen when he dies?
As the next head of the family, there is the need for you to go to him to impress it on him to call a family meeting of his wife and all the children. At the meeting he should give everybody the chance to speak out his or her fears and grievances. His wife should speak first. This is to ensure she sits through the meeting and stop her from accusing you and your father of setting up the meeting to humiliate her.
As the woman of the house, let her tell all of you what her fears are. Thereafter, starting from you, each child should be given the chance to talk.
During the meeting, the issue of inheritance should be discussed. While your stepmother may shy away from telling the meeting her real reason for maltreating your mother’s children, you shouldn’t. If God is blessing you and your siblings so much so you were all able to pay the school fees of her children, you and your siblings should meet to discuss what you all intend to do with your father’s property if there is anything.
But good wisdom demands that if the need be, allow her and the children have their fill, taking into account that life isn’t about the property we live behind, but the peace of mind we were able to enjoy. If her intentions have always been to corner the property for her children, nothing you do for her and her children would ever be enough or thaw her attitude towards you and your siblings.
It is the truth, one you cannot run away from no matter how religious you have become. So, in the interest of the unity of the family, you must be ready for some form of sacrifices, because with this type of person, only one way is good enough, her own way.
There is no pleasing this type of person, and if her children are anything like her, be ready for acrimony.
Family issues are the most difficult to resolve without the fear and wisdom of God. The issues go beyond your siblings and her. You would be surprised at the many unseen hands behind the issue you are now trying to resolve. A lot of your extended family members for personal reasons are waiting in the wings to help all of you remain divided because it is only in a crisis that they can benefit. For this reason, you must learn to let go of so many things, including what those who are not close to God term important things. If you are all true Christians and have the confidence in the God you serve to do all things, concede to her and her children whatever they want. It will never stop you from reaching where God has ordained. It would instead stop them from executing their evil plans against you and your siblings. Immediate victories are usually not the enduring ones rather those won after a long period of sacrifices are usually the lasting ones. Give her and her children their victory today and allow God give you the everlasting kind, the type that would see them coming back to you in later years to ask for forgiveness.
That should be your attitude at the meeting with your father and his household. God will give you the wisdom to do what is right.
Good luck.