After all the coddling of SS12 over his phone, combined with past incidents with no punishments for breaking rules, I was legitimately feeling like my SO had lost his backbone completely with skids.

Yesterday my SO took skids to church, and immediately when they got home he told skids to clean the cat litter. He had them do it since I wasn't feeling well. SD9 said she would do the upstairs litter box- There are 2 boxes downstairs. Right away SS starts arguing and whining about how it's not fair, blah blah blah. Mind you, I timed this once- it took SD 1 minute and 43 seconds to do all 3 litterboxes. This is not a hard chore. SD went off to clean the upstairs litter, while SS was still in the kitchen whining about it to my SO. I was in the living room and hear SS say "I'm not cleaning the litter boxes downstairs". HA! My SO said, the hell you aren't, Just do it! He said something else that I couldn't hear, I think it was about taking away video games if he kept it up, but then I hear SS MOCK him, repeating what my SO said in a shitty little voice. Talking back to his father, who just spent $100 to get him a brand-new phone, with no punishment. The little a*shole.

Talking back in general does not fly in our house. Skids don't even try it because nothing will make our heads spin around faster than a kid being disrespectful. My SO yelled at the top of his lungs that SS was about to find out how hard he could make things on him. That shut SS up. Meanwhile, SD gets done with the upstairs litterbox, and because she is sweet kid and always willing to do nice things for her brother, she started scooping the other downstairs litter box for him. SS comes in when she is almost done and says "MOVE!", and kind of pushes her a bit. Again he said, Move SD, I'm doing this one!". Ok really?? You just whined about a chore that takes 2 minutes, and now you're going to shove her and be mean to her when she's helping you? I was planning on just staying completely out of it, but when she didn't move, and I watched him grab her ear and pinch it. I lost it. I yelled, "Don't grab her, are you serious right now?? What the f*ck?!?" (oops lol). My SO heard and walked in and saw SS let go of her ear, and I swear he yelled so loud it was in a pitch that only dogs could hear. He said, That's it, are you serious??? You're going to get all pouty about a 5 minute chore? You're done, no video games! There was more screaming at SS and and then he cut the wifi off to SS's PS4.

People, I'm here to tell you that miracles really do happen. Just when I thought he was incapable of punishing this kid, he did it.

SS was all "I didn't grab her", as if I was lying and making it up, but he knew it was futile. So he went to his room and stayed there for the next 3 hours or so.

My SO came and sat next to me on the couch, just fuming. Awesome! SS has now successfully caused issues on 2 wknds in a row. After a while he chilled out, and then later he wanted to go play Switch up in SD's room. Sigh. I didn't want to play, I still wasn't feeling well. About 15 mintues into this, he sends SD down to ask SS to come up and play. Really?? So he can't play his Playstation, but he can play Switch...great punishment SO! They played up there for almost 2 hours, then they came downstairs and he then played bball with skids in SS's room. After a while he comes and tells me he is going to have SS do the dishes/dishwasher to earn his PS4 back. I pointed out that tomorrow was SS's day to do the dishes anyway, so really he would just be doing his chore a day early. He said he didn't know what else to have SS do, and asked if I had ideas. I said he could sweep the kitchen and swiffer it. Then I hugged him and told him thank you and that I was so proud of him for actually following through on a punishment (I left out the part about letting SS play Switch) and making SS do a chore to earn back a priviledge. He told SS he needed to sweep/swiffer the kitchen to my satisfaction- once he was done he had to pass my inspection in order to get the wifi back on....trust me, I didn't love this either since it makes me the bad guy, but I was just so happy he actually was making SS do a chore to earn priviledges back, without me even suggesting he do this, that I didn't say a peep. SS passes inspection and of course goes to play video games, and eventually starts very aggressively and angrily yelling at the game. I'm getting pissed, because SS's room is off the kitchen where I was making dinner, and I really don't want to hear this negative crap. My SO goes into SS's room and calmly talks to him about learning how to not get so upset (although SS is still yelling about how the game is "garbage", and how this "garbage game always makes him lose"...yes SS, it must be the game's fault, not yours!), then my SO sits there for 30 mins watching SS play video games. 

I just can't. I am at a genuine loss for why, how..... At this point, I'm pissed, because I am so over SS and his antics, and also over my SO's need to spend 12 hours a day playing with skids. I get that he's a good dad. He spends time with them. But it seems a bit much, and It has increased over the past year so I'm fairly certain he's guilty parenting. He went to church with them, played video games for hours, played basketball, watched SS play video games, SD was with us in the living room the rest of the time....enough!! We have them every day except 8 days a month- it's not like he never sees them.

Eventually he came into the kitchen to be lovey dovey to me, but I was just irritated by it all, especially when SD immediately came into the kitchen and stood there too. And then my SO says he's going to watch SS play one final video game before he goes up to bed to sleep before work...GAH! 

Is it just me? Is this how dad's play with their kids these days? Feeling like they have to spend the majority of the day playing with them? How does everyone else's DH's do this? It's hard to relate because my childhood was the opposite.

Side note, I have always thought of SS as a mostly good kid. I still think he is, but I have seen a lot of manipulative, shitty behavior out of him lately that makes me feel like he has potential to be a real a*shole. He's selfish and doesn't care about others. It doesn't bode well.