Being a (pregnant) stepmom

we think that the boy has some issue, something beyond our capacity to address as simple parents, let alone parent/stepparent combo...

although he is clearly intelligent (some children aren't, you know, it's the truth) and resourceful in some ways, he has learning disabilities, or perhaps, difficulties... he has difficulties relating to other children, and can do so only under particular circumstances, he has developed difficulties at playing, which he did not have before... he is now, a week short of turning 6, peeing on himself... he has difficulties, in the end, relating to himself, to the person that he is becoming, to his life, of which he is increasingly aware the more time passes and the more mature he is...

the poor boy, after all, has two families that are very different. in one, his father is a grouchy man who both scolds him constantly, and sometimes scolds him jokingly, and often scolds him as if he were joking precisely because he--the dad--is trying to reduce the strength of the rebuke... and a stepmom who tries to stay out of the way of these interactions when they happen... (the rest of the time i keep telling the father, do not scold him for stupid things, he does enough things that require scolding as it is, and in a few months time, scolding will lose all effect because it is used many times a day, every day... and especially, do not scold him jokingly, because the child is too young and not bright enough with words to understand sarcasm, or to realize that you are in fact, scolding him but trying to be "nice" about it... ) and we don't know exactly what goes on in the other family, but we do know that there is a lot less discipline, a lot less scolding, and a lot more freedom to watch television endlessly, do no chores, and that type of lax child-rearing that works wonders...

the child never knows where he will sleep, where he will be that weekend, what day of the week it is. mom's house? dad's house? the grandparents' house? he has not been able to learn the days of the week or the months of the year, or to manage time at all...

i think he has add. so ig looks it up.

he finds this webpage, it describes the boy as if it were about him, personally.

so now we should learn to deal with our part of being his family. learn to discipline him and help him and learn to be organized and timely. ig has to stop waiting for the last minute to say, "let's go, hurry up, we're late," and instead, give the child 10 minutes even if a "normal" child would need just 2... that sort of thing... be very specific about what the child is doing wrong instead of saying, "stop misbehaving" or something that some other child would react to... etc...

whatever.

as a stepmom, however, what should i do? it is not the same, what parents can and should and need to do, and what stepparents can and should and need to do... does the child need an extra parent? no. the child has too many parenting models as it is... he needs something else, and i can only give something else, but no webpages or books address the roles of stepparents of children with ADD or other psychological issues that are related to parents' bad divorces...

and not only am i a stepmom to him, i will soon be the mom of his sister. and that will change everything, but what will it change i to? for one thing, i will feel with the right to discipline this child of mine, and get more directly involved when her father does or says something crazy. my stepchild cannot help but notice that when it is his sister, i get involved, and when it is him, i do not, or do so less... he doesn't know that when he is not present, i do intervene... perhaps from now on, i shall do so. i shall say, hey, this or that... i dunno...

in any case.

the environment in the house is a lot more tense--the boy is getting increasingly difficult, and it is hard to know how to deal with all of this, and to think ahead, all the time, "oh my god, imagine how much worse it will be when the baby comes..."

help!