So, after our huge 4th of July blowout, I just decided to take a step back and maybe figure out another way to deal with my situation. I took the time to remember that I do have a background in child development, and that all the crap the skids have been doing has now actually gone from crazy inexcusable to normal teenage behavior. My new stance is to just accept this behavior as normal for insane teenagers, and instead of get mad and breathe fire about it, I'm just going to sit back, chill out, and take a cue from my parents who basically refused to play into the teenage crap and did nothing but call our bluffs repeatedly and use logic and reasoning to get their points calmly across (even if we were screaming at them).

For example: today the skids got in trouble because they just don't want to listen, follow directions, they have a tendency to break things, but never take responsibility, etc. DH pretty much had it by this time, so he made consequences and followed through (one of the things he said he would work on after our fight, and is actually going well...with a little help from me as backup). They were livid. SS13 has basically been saying how much he hates it here this weekend because we don't just let him do whatever he wants, so today he was saying he doesn't want to come here anymore. DH calmly said, "Fine, sorry you feel that way, but if you don't want to be here anymore, I guess you should call your mom and have her come get you." So he did, only SS13 made sure to tell BM that DH kicked them out, not that he was just calling his bluff. I made sure to calmly tell them to gather all of their belongings since they wouldn't be coming back if that's what they really wanted, and told them to say their good-byes to the dogs before their mom came (SS13 said he was only going to come back to see the dogs). That's when the tears started. Of course then they changed their tune and tried to apologize, but DH wasn't having it, and his response was, "Well, you guys did this to yourselves, sorry you don't want to come back here, but you can't just come to see the dogs." SS11 said DH never wants to accept their apologies. I told them it's because when they say sorry, but continue to do the same stuff repeatedly that gets them in trouble, apologies actually mean nothing. You can say sorry all you want to, but if you don't learn, and then you keep doing the same things, sorry doesn't fix it, and people don't think you're being sincere. Then it turned into "You guys don't care about us, you're so mean," etc. I don't care about them, but I didn't say it out loud. I just said, "You know, guys, maybe you think that, but I work with kids who REALLY have dads who don't care about them. They don't show up, they don't pay child-support, they don't help out. Some of these kids have never met their dads, some of these kids' dads are in jail. So maybe you want to think about what you're saying." (Yeah right.) DH followed up with, "I choose to step up and be in your lives and take responsibility for you. How many of your friends whose parents are divorced see their dads regularly?" The answer, of course, was none, so then it went to SS13 saying how it's SO hard for him to learn things and he has SUCH trouble learning...a total cop-out. I reminded them that the rules in our house had never changed in 8 years, so that time frame should've been sufficient for most learning curves. Rebuttals went on and on until BM picked them up, she clearly wasn't happy about it since she NEVER picks up or drops off if she can help it.

This whole thing was absolutely hilarious to me. It probably makes me a bitch, but I just can't help it. I actually found it to be really helpful for DH and I to team up and to watch all of their arguments crumble one by one. The two of us felt great about not having to yell and by using logic, his kids maybe learned that we're not as stupid as they think we are (like their BM is). I know probably they will have listened to none of the things we said today, and maybe it was a total waste of breath, but I just feel better knowing that I can walk away from the end of this day not having lost it, and having retained control of our tempers enough to at least get this stuff out in a logical, measured way without blow-ups on our part. The bonus: we got an extra half a day without them since they got picked up 5 hours early.