another "can't stand the sd"
Let me first say, just like many others before me, I am so relieved to have found this site and relieved to know I’m not the first person to have Googled “I hate my step child”. The continual fluctuations between frustration from being around this child and guilt for disliking an innocent child are driving me crazy.
My SO moved in with us (me, my now 14 year old BD, and my now 10 year old BS) a little over a year ago. He has a son who is now 14 and a daughter who is now 6 years old. I have known them for over 4 years. I have always liked the son, and could even see loving him, so I know it’s not that I’m incapable of caring for another mother’s child. The daughter has always used crying, pouting, and tantrums as forms of manipulation. When she was 2 or 3, I chalked it up to toddler type issues. At 6 years old now, I just can’t stand the whining, pouting, demanding, and other assorted manipulation. This dislike has brought out really ugly intolerance in me to where I now can’t stand small things like her open-mouthed chewing, refusal to eat anything other than snacks or dessert, refusal to brush her teeth or hair, apparent inability to use toilet paper or soap and water, refusal to sleep in a bed in a bedroom as opposed to on the couch because the TV has to be on and her dad has to be in the room all night, disguising judgments as questions (why do you do it like that? Why do you have so many animals? Why is your house messy?), picking on my pets, and the fact that through no fault of her own she is a little clone of her mother, who easily could be an additional topic with all the grief she causes us.
Side point #1) My 14 year old daughter has her moments of bad attitude and laziness. My 10 year old son has his moments of bad attitude and hyper-activity. SO is a prince about putting up with them, so I feel like extra crap for not being able to stand his daughter.
Side point #2) Long before I was in a relationship with SO, both SO and his ex-wife separately told me they doubted the daughter is SO’s biological child. She looks nothing like nor has any characteristics of SO, while the other child does. I know this happens, but BM is very publicly known to have been sleeping around at the time the daughter was conceived and not sleeping with her husband. I know it is an admirable quality that SO still treats her like a biological daughter. Still, I am consumed with the thought that this is the spawn of ex-wife and some stranger. It is totally none of my business, but I can’t let it go. SO has even said he wouldn’t mind having a DNA test performed, but I haven’t pushed it any further because it really wouldn’t serve any good purpose. I might feel better, but it could wreck a child’s life.
His daughter stays with us on weekends and occasionally during the week. I went into this with a good attitude and intentions. I would do craft projects with her and take her places. Despite my efforts, the more I saw her, the more I began to see what she is really like. After several months it got to where I had to leave the house when she was around (either my kids would go with me or they would be at their dad’s). I am so dismayed at the thought of every weekend with her for the next 12 years. Weekends come fast, especially when you work all week. I keep thinking I’ll just get more used to her, but I’m not so sure. Also, I have grossly understated how difficult her mother is and how much trouble she makes for us.
Now I’ve pored through hundreds of posts on this site and it occurred to me it could just get worse. Her Dad, my SO, is somewhat supportive of me, since at one point I felt forced to tell him a milder version of the truth, although I did not have the heart to tell him the extent of my dislike for her. He is also a large part of the problem. He is aware of much of her behavior, attributing it mainly to the BM, but says he doesn’t see his daughter enough to have a positive effect on her. He continues to be more a companion to her than a constructive parent.
So I’m asking the collective experience of this forum…can I realistically think it will get better? Has anyone else been able to turn a situation like this around? Could I learn through counseling to suck it up? And my kids don’t like her either, so is it fair of me to subject them to her? What is wrong with me that I can’t even stand the sight of a child who doesn’t particularly know any better? I guess this forum is full of people still stuck in their situations, because if they’ve ended their relationship, they really have no reason to be here…so maybe I’ll hear some positive experiences?
In the meantime, I would just like to vent this: Keep your feet out of the freakin’ Pringles can, you ill-mannered little dirty-faced band-aid obsessed whinebag, and, oh yeah, we keep the toilet paper on that roll-y thing next to the toilet!!!!
Thank you for listening and for any input…
PS - I'll go back to reading,
PS - I'll go back to reading, but I got to "DNA will wreck a child's life"...NO! A child has a RIGHT to know their bio parents! Period. And BM will be the one who will need to explain.
So, as far as her behavior
So, as far as her behavior and what your DH says...hmmm...if that's what he thinks now, wait until she's 15 and a nightmare! sigh...What the heck is wrong with parents nowadays? My DH was somewhat the same...now, I really don't give a hoot about him seeing his daughter is a loser, slutty, 9th grader with a baby...he could've prevented it by being more strict with her...he didn't. He didn't want to argue with idiot loser BM and he didn't want to hurt the little witch they were creating...not my problem. Unfortunately, it stays forever! The only reason I am with DH is because of our SON TOGETHER...if I had only my own kids (which I don't), I would've left by now.
Thank you for your responses.
Thank you for your responses. I’ve been reading these and other posts on these forums and so many lightbulbs are going off in my head. I’m dealing with a Guilty Ostrich Dad. He’s doing what a lot of us working parents do: trying to cram a whole week’s worth of love and attention into a weekend. He’s compounding it by trying to make up for not seeing her often during the week as well. And then he’s an Ostrich to how she acts and to how his ex manipulates all of us.
The thing that makes it so hard to explain to SO and so hard to fix is that his daughter doesn’t really do anything so wrong that it requires an act of discipline. It’s just these ways she has about her. I can’t really describe her whining, manipulation, and personality on paper with any sort of justice as to how obnoxious it is. I don’t think it’s just me either, because I’ve noticed her own grandma keeps visits with her shorter and less frequent than with her brother. I forgot to mention before that she lies about things that are really pretty small (juice stain on the carpet, breaking some minor object, etc), but if I try to prove it to her Dad, I just kind of look like a petty jerk. It’s not that I even usually care about the incident in question- you know, normal kid stuff- it’s the fact that she lies. Then it bothers me more that her Dad always believes her. The ol’ Ostrich just can’t see the manipulation and the lying.
So now it sounds like my issue really should be with the Dad and not his daughter, but I think I could overlook poor parenting skills (my kids aren’t always well-behaved and my skills are far from perfect) more easily if the daughter were remotely likeable to me. I’ve known friends and relatives who didn’t always make the best parenting choices, but I still liked their kids. Of course I didn’t live with said parents and spend 28.5% of the week with their kids- maybe I would grow to resent them as well under the same circumstances.
In my reading, I’ve come across some backlash at SMs saying they are jealous of their SDs. I’ve been trying to examine my feelings and see if there is any truth to that here. I guess if I were to be truly honest, I am feeling something like jealousy, although at the times it happens it feels more like a flush of anger. SO and I both work during the week and weeknights are full of chores, homework, errands, and sometimes more work. I get sick of the weekend revolving around SD and what she wants to do (his guilty Dad compensation?) instead of what I or the rest of the family wants to do. And even when we plan family activities, her attitude and complaining set the tone for the rest of us. And I resent the hell out of leaving home for the weekend just to get away from her. Again, I guess the blame for this should lie on her father, but I want the same consideration she gets. I’m just not willing to pout around and whine until I get it. I am also angry that he sits up all night on the couch next to her where she sleeps. Maybe this is jealousy. Feels more like anger that she has manipulated him to give in to getting her own way, but I could be deluding myself.
I’m so thankful I found somewhere I can talk about this and not feel so horrible. I do have a therapist I sometimes go to, but as much as I respect her, she just cannot relate to what I am talking about, although she has been all about Dad setting up boundaries and discipline. Plus, it’s embarrassing to say these things about a child. Coming here has helped me feel less like a bad person and has also helped me realize some things that SO and I could be doing better, or at least where our responsibility in the situation is.
I think I now know intellectually that this isn't going to work out. Two adults changing their behaviors and attitudes and then trying to re-mold a child. It's too much to expect. It makes me really, really sad though.
"he thing that makes it so
"he thing that makes it so hard to explain to SO and so hard to fix is that his daughter doesn’t really do anything so wrong that it requires an act of discipline. It’s just these ways she has about her. I can’t really describe her whining, manipulation, and personality on paper with any sort of justice as to how obnoxious it is."
THIS, yep. I am here. Its not that its just soo horrible, but it is a bad personality conflict between you the SM and the SD. I go through the exact same thing.
There is a snotty entitled poor me way about her that is really annoying. Its so hard to be around.
I think your SO is partially
I think your SO is partially correct in that it is difficult to shape and mold a child with bad behaviors when you only see them every weekend... think about how adults like to wind down and not be there normal work week selves on the weekends... I think kids do the same thing. So you guys are consistantly getting her at her worst times to boot. I'm really not sure what the solution is to that other than alot of structure coupled with consistant discipline for her.
As far a paternity, I'm not sure what good will come out of that for you. For her, yes, if your SO is not her father then she deserves to know. But for your SO, do you think he will be willing to just up and walk away from a little girl that he just spent 7 years raising as his own? Because my guess is that the answer to that question is "no" and it is only going to cause resentment between the two of you. And let's say that it is found that she is your SO's, you don't think that BM will use that against you and your SO every chance she gets?
So that's 2 people so far
So that's 2 people so far that have said it would be right for the child to know who her birth father is. I was assuming it would be worse for her to find out. When I brought it up to SO my thought was just to do an unofficial test for our own information, planning on only keeping the results to myself. My thinking for my own sake was that if she does turn out to be SO's biological daughter, I can put it to rest and hopefully accept her a little better. I have also held off knowing it could hurt SO, even though he says he wouldn't feel any differently about her.
Ever since she started receiving child support, there has been no more talk from BM about it not being his daughter, for sure.