Feeling powerless
I am a mom and a step mom to 5 kids. I have 3 boys that are from a pervious marriage and my husband now has 2 daughters from his previous marriage. 3 of the 5 kids live with us part of the time. The oldest has his own home and the oldest girl only lives with mom. We have been together for 7 years and married for 4. The kids are well taken care of, active at school and friends. Involved in church. Just good kids. Just one problem. The oldest daughter, lets call her D1. We have had lots of problems with her and following the rules at our house and if you tried to tell her no or disipline her it would be a fight to the end. She had gotten upset with us for trying to take her phone away for the weekend (she is 16) so instead called her mother up and had her come and pick her up. this was 9 months ago and now she only shows up if she is getting something out of it. (Gifts for holiday, or dad change oil in car) She has been in theropy for a few months now with no change. She says we cause her anxity. Though I have to say once she left our house calmed down a ton. Makes it really hard to miss her. Though I know her daddy misses her terribly. It is harder and harder for me to keep letting D1 back in. Now her birthday is in a couple weeks. I want to make sure she understands that its not ok to treat people this way. She is hurting her dad so much. What do we do? Give her a card and that's it? Do we get her presents like nothing has happened?
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WE do nothing and DH can
WE do nothing and DH can reach out if he wants but he needs to keep is simple. A card and small gift card or gift. Nothing much to get excited about.
I recommend you backing off from any relationship with her and let DH handle it outside of the home.
I also had 3 skids that brought the doom cloud to my home and it was great when they weren't around anymore to darken my doorstep. BM wasn't happy they came back to her with smiles so she ruined them.
No sense in tying yourself up in knots over this. Teenage girls are drama queens and she needs to know you aren't playing her games or sitting in her audience for her shows. That's what parents are for.
You do nothing
let her daddy handle it however he wants.
You might also want to talk with him about her using him. My own DH had this problem with the skids for years until they made it brutally obvious they only called for favors or to get him on their side when they had a disagreement with BM. It was heartbreaking when he finally admitted it out loud because he would have done anything for these kids. He loves them so much.
I have been doing nothing but
I have been doing nothing but like I said alot of times i feel powerless in my own home.
I agree with
I agree with SonOfABrisketMaker on this one. Let her daddy handle it. Every year for her bday and Christmas I would get a list of what she wanted and I made sure she got everything on her list. After I disengaged all she got a $50 gift card for her bday from her dad and for Christmas DH was out running around on December 23rd trying to get gifts.
This is what Im going to have
This is what Im going to have to do. Nothing. I am the one that runs around getting all the gifts and cards for everyone. This time I just wont do it for him. I know the bigger problem is his follow-through with it all but I like to think in our marriage thats where I was always needed.
Custody order
So #1, If you and DH have a good custody order in place, the kids and BM have to follow it or they are in contempt. A parent cannot hold a child away from other parent at the whim of the child. The child cannot simply "decide not to see mom or dad". The custody order dictates everything. If there is none in place currently, get one.
#2. Dont get her anything. If she is disrespecting anyone, at this age, it will get worse if you sweep in under the rug. This happened with us regards Toxic Feral Eldest. No repercussions and she just got worse and worse over time. Now, at 20, with her arrested development, lies, and general bad behavior, she lives with mom and mom gets all that and more. Of course, she has decided to go "no contact", because we have rules and would not allow her to be her filthy dirty grimy self. She gets to be that at moms though. She will say hi or briefly hug DH during drop offs, giving him stingy little morsels of attention.
I know it hurts DH, and yet, he knows, without a doubt that it would NOT work and would make everyone happy if she lived with us. She has a temper (lke her mother), cockroaches and moldy dishes currently inhabit her room at moms, and she has accused everyone of abuse. We keep her at a distance. Love her from a distance.
If SD refuses to have a relationship with her father, why should she benefit? Perhaps she will make more of an effort, if money is withheld.
We have a court order for 50
We have a court order for 50/50 custody and we do have D2 as always with very few issues. Nothing that doesn't fall under normal teenager stuff. We even went through therapy with my DH and I to try to work through this. We didn't include her because we are the adults and needed our house to be on the same page. I have always felt that DH expects so much more out of the "boys" then he did the "girls" which is where our problems came into play. before therapy we were doing this kid thing as a united front, everyone under the same rules. Because of D1 I now don't get involved in the girls issues at all. If i need them to do something around the house or pick up after themselves I tell the DH to have them do it. It just seems so dumb cause they still know its coming from me. Cause unless the cops are bringing them home I don't know that DH really does anything about it.
Enforce Custody order
Child cannot make decisions. DH needs to be able to parent her. I always like to remind myself "they have 2 parents and neither one is me".
I went through the whole "tell So who will then tell SD" thing. You probably should do what I did - disengage. Because it got to the point with us that then-SO was telling me he felt like a dog being given orders to parent his child, I went the direct route of disengagement.
"DH - can you wash these dishes. Oh my what a mess, laters". DH then can take it upon himself to deliver the instructions, without me micro managing things. Now it is so much easier - SD 20 doesnt live with us, she lives with Toxic Troll BM, who is reaping the rewards of her horrible parenting.
With the youngest there are no issues except the darn rabbit cage cleaning. I let DH handle that one too. If I want munchkin to do something, I ask her directly, so the issues have effectively moved on. I had to REALLY disengage through them, however.
House on same page
I think many times women make the rules at home, so while you think these are OUR rules, the kid thinks they are your rules. You think he is harder on your kids, he thinks your are harder on his. Let him see her outside of the house, he is an adult, he is capable of telling if he is being used. I do think as kids get older, seperate finances are a good idea, Things like college and cars might get handled differenlty.
Yes this is true. I feel like
Yes this is true. I feel like I'm harder on my BS, but my OSS thinks I'm harder on him. The truth is, they have different behavioural issues, so I'm not getting on them for the same things (usually) and the ones I'm getting on OSS for are new and different for him (though it's been almost 2 years, so he should get it by now). By and large these are not bad kids...but like all kids they have quirks and self-centredness that needs correcting.
My OSD was like this. Just a
My OSD was like this. Just a little black rain cloud of a person...
she also claimed anxiety...didn’t want to come over..used her DH. And when she quit coming over DH was heartbroken and I was elated bc I no longer had to walk on eggshells in my own home.
I completely disengaged from the situation and let DH handle it entirely. Not my job to fix something I didn’t break. If he convinced her to join us for something, or if her siblings did, I went along with it...but I ever invited her or engaged.
It was tough because she was a total b****. One time, her siblings got her to agree to come out with us for Father’s Day. It was so, so sad bc she cane but she was rude and mean to her dad the whole time. When he found out she was joining us, he was like a little puppy with excitement: “OSD is coming?!?! Really?! She wants to meet us?!”
Then after I bought her a really expensive meal she shoved a crappy card at my DH and said: “Here. Mom told me I had to come and give you something.”
Little s***.
But now she’s grown and their relationship is good and I actually like her.
Moral of story: Don’t do anything. Let your DH figure it out.
Thank you
Oh my, I love this page. I have been so busy taking blame for all this crap that has gone on. I feel better that I see other people in the same situations. It really has so little to do with me and more with how BM (very toxic trollish) and DH have handled their lives and their divorce. BM is remarried but that has not stopped her toxicness. We have blocked her on all social media and D1 thinks we are mean because we did. BM was mad, not D1. She wouldn't have even knew if BM hadn't brought it up. Lots of crazy crap like that. BM verbally beat up DH so bad that he will do anything to avoid talking to her and will just agree with her to not start an arguement. I will practice my let go, let DH hand it.
Yes. Instead of feeling
Yes. Instead of feeling powerless...look at it as taking back your power over how you spend your time and who you CHOOSE to engage with.
I was never rude to OSD. If she decided to do visitation (or DH coerced her) she was totally welcome. But I wasn’t going to beg and plead to have someone in my home or at my events who left my DH in tears 70-80% of the time. No thanks.
Our BM was also verbally and emotionally abusive to DH and used manipulation, guilt, and shame to try to get what she wanted. Sometimes the kids figure that out as they get older and work to repair the relationship when they move out of their mom’s home (my OSD) and sometimes they have a great relationship with dad as kids and teens...but grow enmeshed with mommy and cut off dad when they’re grown and moved out (currently the situation with my SS...but I don’t think it will last), sometimes they completely PAS out (none of my skids), and sometimes they have a solid relationship from childhood through adulthood (my YSD).
No matter what the situation...not your job to figure it out for them...you’ll just drive yourself crazy.
Disengagement
or she doesn’t have a space in your head. Let DH handle all of it. If she comes over then DH has to cook, clean, ect for her.
Any kid who has a parent who
Any kid who has a parent who will rescue them from rules at the other home is going to take that option. And BM is allowing her to violate a court ordered 50/50 arrangement. She's given her all the power to do as she pleases.
Yes, of course he should get her a card and small gift for her birthday, he does still love her. You just stay out and do nothing. If he gets her nothing, that will just reinforce all the poison BM is putting in her head. But she can come over to get her gift, no mailing it to her.