New One on me....Daughter Begging for Step Parents....

Kids say the darndest things!

Sounds normal. A Kinder wanting what she doesn't have with no clue to what she is asking.

LOL! In my elementary class I was one of 3 kids that had parents on their 1st marriage. My youngest sister actually lied about having my parents divorce because she was the only one. I had nothing to do with 2 over everything it had to do with the fact it was the norm and when someone said "my step mom was a meany" she wanted to be able to relate. If she said, "my parents are still married" the girls would just shut up or say something like "well then you don't know what I am talking about so I don't want to talk to you". She didn't want to be left out so she made up a divorce.

I wanted step parents when I was young. You still got both of your parent PLUS 2 more amazing people. And 2 bedrooms. And 2 birthdays. And 2 christmases. My friends who were children of divorce didn't come out of nasty divorces... they had coparents, before that was even a phrase. And not step monsters, but really killer awesome step parents.

I know you're asking about copying, but from a purely child-logic thing, it may have nothing to do with copying, but simple math. 2 being better than 1.

I would guess some of your daughters peers have parents that are divorced but have explained that having step parents is a good thing and how lucky they are to now have 4 people that love them instead of two and such..... you know to make their child feeel okay by not having her real parents. So these kids spread the word at school. I always thought it would be cool to be an adopted child or a foster child when I was a kid.
Kids at age 5,6,7 are sort of monkey see monkey do for the most part. They have to "fit in" first before they step out into their "own". And then when they become teenagers they become monkeys once again. It's pretty comical actually. We were all little monkeys once but the reality is that eventually we become who we really are when it's our time to get there.

When I was a kid, older than your daughter, I wanted glasses and braces bc all my friends had them. I was so bummed I had great vision and straight teeth!!?? Go figure, of course now I am so happy every time we enroll for insurance and we skip right over the vision section! Kids are so crazy sometimes~

this reminds me of the phase when I was a young kid when kids asked for glasses and braces.

When she was six my daughter wanted me to work so she could go to daycare like her friends. lol. The grass is always greener........

I wouldn't read too much into this. I really wouldn't.
She is only 5 and she is figuring out that kids come from different types of families. Nothing wrong with that. It's a fact of life.
My son has friends who told him they were jealous because his mom and dad aren't married anymore and that means he gets two Christmases and two birthday parties.
That might seem pretty awesome to a little kid.
They don't understand all the other dynamics.

I don't think your daughter has changed her independence, I don't think she's just trying to "go along with the crowd". Unless you and your husband fight 24 hours a day, I'm fairly positive she doesn't want a divorce.

Keep in mind that little kids can try to make their situation sound a heck of a lot more fun than it is because it's a way for them to cope.
Your daughter is 5. She doesn't really understand the full meaning of things.

Let her know you and daddy aren't going anywhere and try not to worry about it too much.

Best wishes.

This made me laugh, it's kind of cute especially since she's only 5.
My 10 yr old asks to go to Kids Korner which is an afterschool daycare onsite at the school. She said because a lot of her friends go there. You think she would be happy to have her mom picking her up after school and go home but i guess not! lol Kids always want what they don't have..oh and of course they wanna be like their friends:)

My son is 4.
He tells me "I wish I didn't have parents... " as he looks so forlorn. I ask him why. He tells me "So I can do whatever I want..."

He also tells me "I wish I was a grown up..." I ask him why. He tells me "So I can tell everybody what to do.... and have no rules..."

I am a SAHM. My Daughter, since she was in Kinder, says when she grows up, she is going to be a SAHM too, and have kids and be home, so that her kids don't have to go to Daycare like her friends. Meanwhile, my relatives that she tells this to, gets all aghast... because they tell her "Is that ALL you want to be when you grow up? What about being something important? You can be a Doctor, or even the President."
Ahem. Like a Mom....is not as important as a President.
LOL

Its a phase.

When I was little, my sister went to the hospital to have her tonsils out. She also went back to the hospital when she broke her arm. I was SOOOO envious! What I was really thinking, without knowing it, was, "Do these things make her more special than I am?"

Many years later, I went to the hospital - to have my babies - and later, I went back to the hospital - because I broke my ankle. I still have my tonsils, I guess, but I think I'm caught up. :^D

Give your daughter lots of hugs and tell her you're glad your family is just the way it is!

I can totally understand that! There was a program at my elementary school called Banana Splits for kids with parents that were divorced. I clearly remember asking my mom why they couldn't split up so I could be a part of it. See, the program allowed the kids to leave the class once a month for a banana split party, they went to a local amusement park (after school hours) around Christmas, and did tons of other fun things together. The point was to obviously make those kids with "non-traditional" family life not feel left out of fun, but it definitely made those of us who had the "normal" family feel left out.

Anyways, my mom explained to me how much better it was that they were together, but I still wanted to be in it. Soon enough, though, I realized that I was blessed to have them still together. This is just a phase, and know that it will probably pass as quickly as it came.

My guess is she has heard friends w/ step parents say something like "we get two Christmases" or "we had two birthday parties" or they have had both moms and/or dads in an audience. They probably didn't share the downside.

She's only 5, she really has no idea what she is talking about and what parents getting divorced and remarried really means - she only knows that this is something that many of her friends are going through. And it's probably been explained to them in such a positive way that that is how they have come to believe it to be. Kinda sad really, IMHO, when you think about it - it has become so commonplace that some kids accept it as normal and something to be expected that eventually happens to everyone.

Yeah, you're right. Don't sweat it. When I was little I asked my parents when they were getting divorced because everyone else was. I, of course, had no idea what that entailed.

I agree I wouldn't stress about it. She obviously doesn't grasp the concept of what having "step parents" is all about. I would just simple tell her that everyone has a different family structure and some people have step parents and some people don't.