Ever since we were invited to SO's aunt's house for Thanksgiving, we've had an intuition that we'll be walking into a trap if we go. Based on my historical research (getting screwed by these people many times before), one of three things could happen:

1. BM was invited long before we were and she'll leave before we get there (SO has a job where he has to work mornings, and the in laws know it. Great opportunity to see precious BM!).

Does anyone else have this problem?

My SO is exhausted and has to nap all the time. He gets up early to help SD get ready for school and to call his other kids. After work he crashes. Then, when SD gets home, he suddenly has a ton of energy to go talk to her. When she goes to bed he comes into our room and crashes again.

...this week.

Last week, her dad had a talk with her about drugs. I don't know why we never thought to say this before, but I had something of an epiphany. After getting some advice from a friend, it occurred to me we were trying to deal with all the symptoms of the problem without dealing with the problem itself. We talked about it and SO agreed with me.

Then, he told SD, "You have a choice. You can do one of two things. You can do drugs. OR you can live here. Pick one or the other, because we won't tolerate drug use from anyone in this house."

This is a long story, I'll try and be brief.

SD broke into the house (broke a window) a few months ago and has yet to pay it back. She's also been stealing from us quite a bit (money out of our room).

After several weeks of her not paying for the window, SO confiscated some money from her. Apparently this is money BM gave her for just "being." He let SD know this morning he had done that to pay for the window and she threw a fit. Called her mom.