Mr. No-Balls Strikes Again

(I did make an effort to reach out to a few other frustrated folks before I started my rant again. Showing support for others is important - it can definitely be a hard, lonely road for we step parents. I also want to warn readers that some content in this passage is PG-13, so skip this message, if you have delicate sensibilities.)

I really appreciated everyone's comments on "I blew it!" Everyone seem to universally perceive that my DH is having trouble setting boundaries and maintaining discipline with the two full-time live-in skids. I've sort of got him galvanized into doing a better job maintaining order, but sometimes, I think he JUST DOESN'T GET IT!

(Just like on the Infomercial... "BUT WAIT, there's more!")

Despite being given about $240 in collective cash for Xmas, two weeks ago Skid2 calls me up in the middle of a shopping excursion with Big Daddy No-Balls to ask for help from me with an underwear purchase. She was at Victoria's Secret (keep in mind, she is FOURTEEN YEARS OLD) and asked if I would spot her $30 on undies so she didn't have to spend her xmas money. Being caught off guard and unwilling to deny the kid clean underpants, I said, "sure." We bought them all the basics when they fled their mom's chaotic household about a year ago, but I can understand a girl wanting to feel pretty all over, and being unwilling to do so at the expense of more visible items. I'm not totally heartless!

Well... when she returned from said shopping trip, she showed me some very nice, basic bikini drawers, and I just let it go. I was sort of a dolt for letting her winkle more cash out of me, but that was my bad, and I had to just deal with it. (Hey, I buy my undies at Walmart, when the occasion merits such niceties. I'm too busy with other crap to be anything other than a cheap date.)

Then last night, when unloading the dryer, I discovered she was washing some extremely skimpy THONG PANTIES. Oh, FABULOUS! Not only is she depressed, ADD, and on two kinds of medication -- she is wearing sexy underpants AND .... yes, folks, I found remnents of a rather exotic "haircut" when I was cleaning her bathroom last Saturday!

My first reaction was simply being so thrilled that she was doing her own wash that I didn't think about A) what the hell does a 14-year old need with thong panties the little bugger totally LIED to me about the reason for the expenditure and made me look like a trusting fool!!!

DH and I also ended up in a last-minute scramble with this same skid to salvage a decent grade in a couple of classes where she elected to treat about 4 assignments as "optional" (they weren't). Her skid sis made all A's, but Skid2 ended up taking tutorials and doing extra work to make up for blowing it earlier in the semester.

(Don't even get me started about the book report I ghost wrote for her. If there is anyone in this situation who needs to grow some, I'll admit right now -- IT'S ME. I feel like SUCH a loser for trying to be nice, only to have the whole friggin' menagerie walk all over me like a cheap rug.)

DH finally found some spleen/spine when he started to enforce two hours of mandatory study time every night. He's been doing a better job about staying after them about picking up and doing the things that are connected to their (generous) allowance. But now he's away on business, and I sent him a message that we are headed for SERIOUS trouble with a 14 year old kid who is grooming herself for a fabulour career involving a pole, and he better get REAL about dealing with her bu*&^^T!!!

Everytime I bring this stuff up, it results in a fight. We are averaging one big fight a week now, and while we aren't fighting in front of the skids, and we are always talking things through afterwards... I just end up feeling like HE MISSED THE POINT.

Let me share a bit of today's response to my email about being more strict and watchful: "It does not work well to vent on e-mail. At some point, I just stopped reading. Remember we are on two extremes of reacting- I admit I under-react. But the other end of spectrum is not ideal either."

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!

I admit after that one, I started looking online at divorce websites.

I love my husband, but I wish he would SUPPORT ME FIRST and be REALISTIC ABOUT WHO HIS KIDS ARE and stop STICKING UP FOR THEM WHEN THEY ARE SOOOOOO CLEARLY IN THE WRONG!!!!!!!!! I am terrified that these monsters are going to be driving in 1.4 years, and I'm even more terrified that I may suffer through this for the next 6 years or so only to have these miserable little twits coming back into my life when they can't make a go in the real world. And I'll be 6 years older and have gone through all this hell for NOTHING.

Where is the website that HE can go to so THEY can tell him to stop being such a wimp????????

I'll tell myself so you don't have to: "YOU stop being SUCH A WIMP!"

Count2ten's blog
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I don't know if this helps

I have to admit I busted out laughing at your title... very creative... lol! Anyhoo, I noticed watching my little cousins (teenagers) & reading the news that kid's clothes are getting more & more inappropriate. I think all the girls are wearing skimpy clothes & there is a peer pressure there about it. We can all thank Britney Spears & the whole lot for that.

Hipi

When you wish upon a falling star, your dreams can come true. Unless it's really a meteorite hurtling to the Earth which will destroy all life. Then you're pretty much hosed no matter what you wish for. Unless it's death by meteor.

As Chris Rock always says...

"Keep my baby off the pole...."

Take it from a woman who became a mother at 17, she needs a good talkin' to. I'm not saying that she for sure is doing what we think (and our minds tend to sway to the perversion possibility)when she buys a pair of thongs and gets a new "haircut", but IF she is it may be a good idea to bring up the idea of birth control. BUT she also may not want to show her pantyline and she doesn't want her girlfriends to witness a forest peeking out the sides of her panties when changing for gym class. (Now THAT I can relate to)

You're not a wimp. You're just doing what we're all guilty of...spoiling the little monsters that we love.

"Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass...It's about learning to dance in the rain."

What CG??

What the heck do thongs have to do with needing Birth control??
BWAHAHAHA!!!

Catch xx
*The Real Catch 22*

Point Taken

Heck, I suppose thong panties aren't the end of the world. It was the lying/manipulation part that bugged me. Geez, can't I have ONE DAY without a some sort of mind game?

And I've already told them point blank, "If you are thinking about being sexually active, then just tell me, and we're off to the doc." I worked for Planned Parenthood years ago, and let me just say, I am not nearly as interested in moral judgements as I am in their finishing school and making a life for themselves. Yeah, I'd like to spare them the heartache that comes from casting your pearls before swine and giving yourself away before you even know your own worth. But... all in all, I'm a pragmatist about these things.

This is probably some sort of karmic retribution for the wild being I used to be. Now I get to raise TWO teenage daughters. Man, oh man, what comes around goes around.

God has a sense of humor....

doesn't he?

I have two (bio)boys and three(step)girls and all of us "mom's" and "dad's" don't have the best track record in this area. The 90's were a lot of fun....

"Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass...It's about learning to dance in the rain."

Yall are Cracking Me UP !!!!!!!!!!

ACCUSE THE DRYER OF EATING THE THONG !!!! I tell my daughter that I can't afford thongs, that a bikini cut panti's are a better bargain for the money. That will work for a while. I guess when she has a job and can buy that stuff with her own money it will be different. Her friends, may be wearing thong and shaping their cha cha's and she may feel as if she needs to also to FIT IN? I don't know.

I tried the whole spying thing. Not really a good idea, cause you will find out things that you don't need to know. But I can say this, my husband only after reading emails, believed me that SD was having sexual relations and he started putting his foot down. Don't feel bad, Count2Ten, all preteens/teens are master manipulators. Is there a class in school for that? Protect your kids!! Get Husband to understand that girls are not princesses.

The age now for sexual activity is starting at the age of 12. That is real scary. They have wrist bands that will code a pleasure. Oral sex is not sex - thank you Clinton. I was in witness to a 25yr old female with small children who died with syphillis. This woman contracted syphillis at the age 13 and was never diagnosed. (can lie dormant for years) It can be a dangerous playground.

This is what I am doing with with my 12 y/o BD. I know her friends, I know where she goes, we talk about certain things we see on TV - ask questions, talk about who is "going" with who, reputation, education, life goals (short/medium/long term). I try hard not to be my daughter's friend - I want to be her advisor.

I understand that you are trying to be proactive, but hubby needs to get his head out of the sand and pay attention. Just my thoughts.

Stepwitch
Thank you Disney for portraying a positive image on all stepmothers!!!!

balls

Does mr. no balls know that after 3 strikes he is out?

Thats what Scares us the most...

Is knowing what we were like at that age, things are so much different now and we really need to be up there with what the kids are doing to track whats happening.

I have a BS14 almost 15 and it scares the shit out of me. He seems to be a well balanced kid, has his first job and a good set of morals, hates smoking and thinks drugs are for idiots. But my head is well and truly out of the sand as that could change in a second really...You seem like a good SM, don't be so hard on yourself when your weak and give into them, we all do it.

Catch xx
*The Real Catch 22*

Been there, done that

My SD is 14, and we have had to deal with the thong panty issue, among others. Her BM bought her thongs when she was 12. SD mentioned them to her dad, and he said "Don't bring them to our house." Of course she did. If I find them, I throw them in the trash. She won't say anything because she knows they're not supposed to be here.

This is the same girl who convinced her father (my husband) to buy her a padded push-up bra when she was 11! What was he thinking? I read him the riot act and convinced him to return it. So she got BM to buy her padded push-up bras, and that's what she's been wearing ever since.

I really don't know what to

I really don't know what to say except that I love the way you write

A New Installment to the Dishonesty Thread...

(Thanks for the comments on my writing. I'm a frustrated creative writer who does tech writing and marcom for a living. What can I say? It pays the bills and keeps me blogging on the clock...)

So, DNB (Daddy No-Balls) had a heart-to heart about 3 weeks ago with the Thong-ager about to flunk social studies. She batted her purty baby blues, made many promises, and seemed to hit the books with renewed energy. All the way up 'til finals, she gave DNB (Daddy No-Balls) every show of being a good little bookworm (sitting in her room, cracking the books, etc.).

Her final grades are now published, and to our surprise, she still only got a C, after all she had promised DNB. He emailed the teacher and found out she turned in a major assignment late and didn't turn in the extra credit that she SWORE to him she had completed.

Her Skid in same class made a 92, just by keeping up and doing the work. This was a GOOD teacher. Offered plenty of help. NO reason to do less than her best - which is typically a B.

The Thong-ager is NOT a rocket scientist, okay? Her Skid sister definitely is a brainiac, but we adjust based on the individual. All we expected was her to show a little effort. Give frickin' myspace a rest and put her mind on her future (hopefully not the one with the pole).

The thing that gets me is that she keeps LYING to DNB, who ADORES HER, defends her every action, and who has done EVERYTHING for this brat from expensive ballet lessons to never-ending orthodontia. I keep telling him -- don't believe everything she tells you. She learned how to lie at the knee of the best (BM).

With this latest episode where he has it written BLACK AND WHITE from her teacher that she lied to his FACE about the two assignments, surely, SURELY he will catch on. SURELY those testicles will start to sprout a little!

When he forwarded me the email from the teacher, all I said was, "Think very very carefully about what you do next. She obviously betrayed your trust, and she needs to know exactly what that means NOW and in the future."

Sign me, "Praying for testicular growth..."