My truth is that my DS is an addict, lazy, rude and intolerable. He is 19, my DD is 15 and "a normal teen girl" and the two SS that are teens who moved in last year are lazy, dirty and lack ambition. I raised my DS, so I have to wonder too, when I read about "loser BM's" that I may be called that as well? Because of the way that my son has turned out?

I love your post.

I only can speak from my experience, but my son is an honor student on a full scholarship. SD17 is drinking and driving and drugs and failed two classes last semester. SS15 was not doing great, but now that we have full custody for the last year and half and his contact with BM is nominal, he is doing great and his grades are pretty good and he is planning on college. But, we are consistent on rules and what is expected of him. DH and I agree fully on parenting. We didn't but when I disengaged and he sees how SD is turning out, we are on the same page now.

Honestly, my personal opinion is the reason is the divorce. These kids were having guilty parents and were not held accountable. My son was raised with two parents until the age of 6 and then it was just me. I had expectations for him and raised him as such. My SK's weren't. My husband tried, but BM undermined him at every turn. She thought we were too strict and I was a terrible parent. This applies to behavior and manners, I constantly worked with my child and they tried to avoid it at every turn.

Basically - Divorce causes a family to have to no longer parent together and now you have two different parenting techniques and that causes these kids to have issues.

I think it is very possible that the step child is more difficult and is seen as a brat by the step. We will never know what is going on in our step kids minds, but we feel like we know our own well enough to see all sides. We have control on what goes on in our own children's lives for the most part.

In any relationship with or without kids we feels like our parents are better than our in-laws. We have seen their struggles first hand and know them better than the in-laws so we judge them more than our own.

Crazy BM's yep they are out there and I personally have not meant one personally who I liked. Even a long time friend of mine went nuts after her divorce. Manipulating the kids and using them as pawns. I never saw that one coming. I would like to think if I were to get a divorce I wouldn't become a controlling vindictive person, but who knows.......

I often wondered the same thing. SS7 isn't horrible but the truth is I just don't like him. So every little thing he does makes it feel likes he's the spawn of Satan. I think it's all about perception. In some cases we perceive the skids to be horrible while our bios are angels. But in other cases the skids really are the spawns of Satan.

I'm sure there are a lot of people with GREAT skids. We don't hear about many on here because their steps don't go looking for a site where they can get advice/vent over horrible skids.

So, I think it's fair to say that, yes, there are a lot of people on here who truly have awful skids and great biokids. This isn't a fair representation of ALL blended families, those of us on here mostly found this site when googling "My stepson lies all the time" or "My stepdaughter hates me".

i am not perfect as a BM...my kids are not perfect either...but...but...they act like normal little human beings....not a spiteful, entitled, manipulative brat like Dhs'kid...and that's fact....my kids also don't treat their SM like shit either, cause i would hang them by their toes if they did (no not really, but they would be in deep trouble)...i may not like the SM but i will be damned if i allow my children to act like ungrateful brats...now on the flipside of that, BM has ALLOWED Princess Boy to act the way he does towards me and my marriage to his father...she sees nothing wrong with it because her precious spawn is never wrong in his actions or his words...and i mean NEVER.......my girls may fight with each other, but that's typical for siblings... but at least they are not plotting against DH....

Yes, it is possible. Some people (and kids are people) are just bad. Some parents do a craptastic job raising their kids resulting in someone you cannot like (even if they are kids). I feel a little bad when I dislike someone's kid but yes, it is possible that you happen to have one set of kids who are well-rounded and were well-raised and now they are stepsiblings to hellions.

Now, I do not think my kids are perfect. I think DH expects perfection from my kids ("they're so smart"; uhmm, are you saying your kids are dumb? No? I didn't think so) yet he has guilty, guilty, guilty daddy syndrome. And he was never married to their mother nor has he ever lived in the same household as them. But he feels my kids have "so much more" and "should be more grateful" and blah, blah, blah now they are bad kids.

DH and I both grew up poor. DH pays ridiculous CS. Skids13 live in a sort of rural area and no, it isn't spectacular. SS8 is 10 years younger than his mother's older child and is more of a middle class, suburban kid. I busted my ass and raised my kids with no CS and have a professional career and my kids have always lived in nice areas with nice schools. They play instruments and sports and what not but they are "ungrateful" in his opinion. There is no basis for this ungratefulness...but he says they are ungrateful all the time.

My kids are teens. They get on my $*&(*&()(#$@ nerves a lot of the times. My daughter is generally a sweetheart. She has shown me that teen girl =/= crazy and hormonal. She is different from me though in that she is very direct and very outspoken. I do not think this is a bad thing; she is like her father's mother. But DH calls her rude and smart mouthed. My son; holy cow. I want to strangle this kid every other week. Is he "bad"? nope. He's a 14 year old boy and he IS messy (so is his mother) and he is clumsy (as are both his parents). But for DH, this becomes unacceptable.

I do not ride my skids. They aren't bad kids. Ss13 is very aloof, so much so that I do get annoyed with him at times. SD13 is very manipulative and if DH isn't turning her into a mini wife, she's trying to turn herself into one.

My complaints are bar none about DH's behavior as a stepparent and parent than my skids.

It's totally possible, when you consider that those of us here have been driven here for a reason. Yup, my kids are great (lol), which is just another reason the stepkids infuriate me. I don't get them, don't understand why they do the things they do, and that's why I come here for insight. Now, if we were all visiting bradybunchblended.com......

What a great question/post/discussion.

Personally I have two comments that may shed some light for some people,at least I hope someone else can relate. I know once I really thought about them they helped me put my own situation into perspective.

1) My hubby made a great point one time when we were having issues as we married in 2012 and moved in together with my BD18 and the SS19 and SD17. When I asked why he didn't stand up to them when it came to rules he asked me if my kids had ever threatened to go live with their Dad when they fought with me. The answer was NO (if they had I would have helped them pack their bags as a learning lesson and driven them over myself and they would have been back within 48 hours). Well his did, at the prompting of the BM who was constantly in their faces about coming to live with her full time. For 8 years he lived under constant fear of losing access to his kids...really sad.

2) I spoke with SS (now) 20 shortly after we moved in together and this is what we discussed. Basically as parents we are programmed from the start to teach our children NOT to do the things that most annoy us...right?? So in my case I can't stand snot noises (SS20 has sinus issues), I cannot stand disrespect in the form of constant swearing in my home, calling a parent by their first name (when under 18yrs of age), laziness, refusal to help with chores, irresponsibility with money. Where did I get these values from, my parents, and who did I pass them on to, my children. The Skids however were raised with a different set of rules and values based on the laundry list of items that most annoyed their parents and guess what??? none of ours match.

It doesn't make them bad kids, it just makes them more annoying to me than my own kids but the love is there.

And my kids are not perfect, my BD19's room is a disaster and she can be moody (like me...lol) and we are sometimes so alike that we clash but she has less of the triggering annoying traits that drive me mad, because I raised her that way. What she would never do is to refuse to do a chore that my new Hubby askes her to do (my SK have done that), she knows how to turn on a dishwasher, she has been saving money for the past year and a half for her education, she does not swear around me and she is helpful around the house.

Skids also have great traits that mine (I have one BD21 out of the house) do not have and I wish I had thought of these in order to emphasize them as well but that may have been too much...then mine definitely would have been perfect

Anyway, I hope a little of this makes sense to someone and helps them out with their own situation.