My Boyfriend and I have been together for about a year now. I love him and I love his daughter, but I honestly cannot stand her. We’ve had our ups and downs, but the biggest problem in our household is her behavior (which is sad because she’s only here maybe 3 days a week). He gets her once in the middle of the week, (luckily I have to work that day so I miss it), and then from Friday night to Sunday night. She used to be better behaved when we started dating. But then after a while she started throwing hissy fits and hitting my son, crying over absolutely everything, taking toys from my son…etc. the list goes on. Now mind you she is 31/2 while my son is only 16 months. She’s been tormenting him since he started to crawl at like 10 months old. I thought maybe she wasn’t getting enough attention because my son had come into her life and her mother recently had another child, but even when I try to give her more attention, I feel like she just gets worse.
My boyfriend is constantly buying her stupid things she doesn’t need and DEFINITELY doesn’t deserve. All she ever does is whine, whether you tell her yes or no. On top of that any time my son whines for anything, even if he’s hurt, my boyfriend turns around and tells him to “knock it off, you’re fine”. When I ask him why it’s ok for his daughter to cry over everything, but my sons not allowed to whine at all, he just says “well he’s a boy, he doesn’t need to be a wimp”. OK yes he is a boy but he’s still a baby, he’s been telling my son not to cry since he was 9 months old. She got more for x-mas than my son last year, even opened most of his gifts too, and then turned around and said “where are the rest of my gifts?” It’s been almost a month since then and most of her gifts are still unopened in the hallway at our apartment.
His mother is even worse when it comes to spoiling her. She sees her every weekend and always comes home with new toys and candy, which she doesn’t need because we only got her off a pacifier a few months ago after she turned 3, and her front teeth are brown and stained. Before I came into the picture and put my foot down she was sent to bed with juice every night. He only started making her brush her teeth after his ex asked him if he was making sure their daughter was brushing with non-fluoride toothpaste. He told her “of course it’s non-fluoride”, and acted offended that she would even ask, although he left out the part that he never made her brush her teeth anyway so who cares what type of toothpaste she doesn’t use!
For a while she gave us a hard time about eating every time she was over, all she ever ate was junk food or fast food. When I would say something to my boyfriend about it all him (and his mother) would say was “at least she’s eating something”. But that all stopped when I pointed out that his “skinny minnie” started to gain a little tub in the midsection. He always teases her and calls her a “tubby wubby”, so she cries “I don’t want to be a tubby wubby I’m a skinny minnie”. And I’m like wonderful give the child self-esteem issues at 3!
She has a real problem with sharing. She hits my son for touching her toys. She hits him for touching his toys. She takes anything that he picks up away from him immediately even if I told him he could have it. I’ve told her to keep her hands to herself, put her in time out, my boyfriend has smacked her butt, (which doesn’t affect her because she still in diapers)and I don’t know what else to do. I feel like she always gets what she wants because no on wants to deal with her, instead of disciplining her so she doesn’t throw a fit! Even her own grandmother has said “I’ll watch her overnight, but you have to come get her in the morning because I can’t deal with her2 days in a row”. I don’t know how her mother does it all week! I get so irritated I just want to move out at times, I’ve even debated breaking up with him all because of this child. Do all 3 year olds act like this? I don’t know if it’s just that age or the new baby… I know her parents to work on disciplining her; I just don’t know how much longer I can take it!