Situation worsening every day
Hi all,
So, I am new here. I have been with my SO for a bit more than 5 years now. She has 2 kids, one is 18, other 10. I met them 4 years ago, moved 3 years ago with them and shortly after we decided to get a new home (flat, not big) together. I bring like 2/3 of the household income.
Situation with SS was fine until recently. It was even "great" I would say. I was surprised. I got accepted by the youngest one quite easily, and for the teen, I showed a lot of patience and affection. When we moved together I invested for his comfort, getting him stuff for his room, to study, and to enjoy. I let him access my comp, console, TV, etc... It went well but I quickly realized the kid was never asking for anything. He did not want anything for himself. He just uses other people stuff.
Things got wilder when he entered highschool, decided to hang with the worst people he could find (drug addicts, rich girls with their own flat at 16), and the smart kid became an arrogant kid very quickly. At home, while at first he was a great help, caring etc... he started to do nothing, wanted to hang out a lot etc... And he started to lie. Big time. I busted him the first, being suspicious, while my woman was not believing me. The lies started to get bigger and bigger, we found he was going out hundreds of miles away while he was saying he was going to sleepovers with friends, etc...
Recently it worsens everyday. See, SS18 has a girlfriend now, and it seems the only thing that matters to him is to be able to "sleep" with her in our house or to make her live with us. He keeps asking his mother about this. At first, she wanted to say yes. The girl is using drugs, not studying, and SS18 had extremely poor results at school. I said to my SO I would not accept that, for simple reason that they do not have their own place, no income, our flat is small, and I don't want to have 2 couples in the household. She said to the kid that I was not accepting that.
See, SS18 never discussed this with me. He never asks me for anything. Always asks his mother. When I am out at work, he keeps asking if he can bring his girlfriend etc... He never asks for anything else. He sleeps 2 or 3 days a week at his girlfriends parents place, and always says "his girlfriend single mother is very nice and cooks him dinner and allows him to sleep at their house with his girlfriend". sometimes when we go to vacation we allow him to use our flat. He invites his girlfriend, but last time we found joints, dirty underwear, dirty clothes, and the flat was dirty too.
Last weeks, while he was going to a - good - university that he was able to join due to a miracle I guess, he told his mother he would stop to attend classes because he did not feel like investing his time (yeah.)
I was angry as hell for this. He now hangs out at home every day, doing nothing. He borrows my stuff, not really asking me, considering all my stuff is his too. I tell him NO sometimes when he asks etc but when I am not at home he will do that.
Recently I have a BIG suspicion that he took money from my wallet. Money that I know I did not spend disappeared. It made me crazy. He asked for money to his mother 2 days before and she said no, and after that, the exact amount he asked disappeared from my wallet.
I had a big talk with my SO about that. The kid does not even speak to me anymore. He does not say hello if I don't say it first, when I work from home, he is pissed because he knows he will not be able to do what he wanted. He also uses the household food to feed his friends / girlfriend sometimes when we are out with my SO. He does not help anymore at home, he barely cleans his room or his clothes.
SO decided an ultimatum and that if he does not get a job he will get kicked from house. But my concern is even greater : what if he even gets a job and continue to do nothing at home and behave like this ?
I seriously don't know how things evolved that way so fast, but the atmosphere at home is very bad now, and my SO is always super stressed when the kid is home. She even told me that "she does not feel like she loves her son anymore, even if this is a horrible thing to think"
A bit long, but had to vent a bit today...
#1 Do not make the same
#1 Do not make the same mistakes with the younger one that y'all did with the older one. No fitting out the kid's room with every conceivable luxury and convenience. Kid must earn privileges and show proper advancement and behave as a contributing member of the household. By that I mean age appropriate contributions such as picking up after self, doing dishes, various chores/responsibilities, etc. Proper politeness (asking permission, saying thank you, etc) required at all times.
#2 18 year olds who are not advancing toward proper adulthood can make their own way in the world Starting Now. They'll soon learn. If not, they are an adult now and you can't control them anyway. They get to decide what kind of adult they want to be. They just don't live in your home and trash your vacation house.
#3 No introduction of or association with drugs whatsoever. That gets the locks changed. This fellow cannot be around the little kid in the house nor can his lousy gf. End his access asap.
You are lucky, it sounds like your wife is ready to support these types of measures. I urge you to talk it over with her immediately and come up with a plan between the two of you that you can implement together and keep each other strong.
Best of luck to you.
Thanks for your insight,
Thanks for your insight, feels good to see I am not the only one dealing with those situations on this forum...
I try to act very different with the younger one. I can also see he has issues of accepting that his privileges are not granted. He has quite different character. Problem is that his father consider him like a little king, which is not the case in our household. Sometimes it's very difficult and cause a lot of anger but his grades, behavior in school improved tremendously.
For SS18 it's more complicated of course. Since his mother, last week, asked him to get a job (and not search a job - I insisted) before end of January, he slept at his girlfriend mother place and did not come back... I cannot understand how her mother accept that he is there (in a household with 3 kids, in a flat).
Maybe there are lies and they crash somewhere else, I don't know...
BTW, perhaps friend Rags will
BTW, perhaps friend Rags will come along and relay how launching an 18 year old onto a good path looked at his house.
And for him it was a generally good kid who has since gone on to a very honorable young adulthood and even asked Rags to legally adopt him around the age of 22.
I recommend that story highly.
So sorry you are going
So sorry you are going through this. During the economic downturn, rotten SS came home asking to live with us. We set rules. At first, he complied but over time, he didn't respond. Long story longer, we eventually had to kick him out. Like you, we had a very young child at home, can't be having a poor role model like that, not to mention the attitude, stress, etc. Of course, I get blamed. But multiple DUIs, failing out of college, not being to keep a job, all that stuff is on him and he knows it. You are paying 2/3 of the household expenses. He's paying nothing. Nobody rides for free. Suggest to SO that tough love will help with his self-entitlement issues. Get her complete buy in. No money behind your back, etc. Give him a short time limit to find another situation, stick by it and be there on the day he moves out. Until then, keep the valuables under lock and key or in a storage unit (seriously) because addicts put their addiction first and if you are on their hit list anyway, they will have no problem stealing from you or wrecking your stuff just because they can. Look at it this way, it CAN get worse. He will stay there as long as you tolerate it. Years. This problem was in the making years before you showed up. Let him crash at a friends. Surprising how resourceful people can be when they need to. You'll feel alot better doing what you know is right. Good luck!
Yeah the issue is that he
Yeah the issue is that he will comply for 1-2 days after we scold him, but he forget it as soon as possible.
To me he is a young male who chose the path of least resistance and maximum satisfaction, which is not good. What I am angry about is also HE decided to go to "college" (in this country, university), was accepted in an elite school, he had every incentive to succeed : he will never get there again, we supported him, he asked for books, desk, etc... 20 days after, decides to stop. He even had "not so bad" results.
We challenged him "are you sure you want to engage in a 5-years-at-least cursus in college ?", knowing how bad he lived high school, etc... It was his decision. SO also told him if he decided to engage there he should give everything he had.
He also decided to not work last summer because "it was the last summer before studying and he wanted to enjoy"... Of course he was broke in September, spent all his savings in parties and a 1 week vacation.
All those bad decisions, if no one would have told him, I could at least understand. But everytime I try to give advice, he considers he knows better.
An 18yo can do as they are
An 18yo can do as they are told when they are told or they can move out. Pretty simple.