I am currently suffering from stress and have been signed off work and whilst taking this time i have decided to face some of the issues that have got me in this state.

My so-called step children!

My partner and i have been together from just over two years and although his ex would like to think i am the course of there relationship breakdown i am actually not as she had started a relationship with someone else prior to myself and my partner getting together. However she likes to plead the poor single mum that has been left for an evil woman who has taken a dad away from her kids.

So along with this woman come 3 kids, well i say 3 kids, 1 of them is 20. They are ok kids and at first the thought of these kids was ok, a little concerned about the eldest ones on how they would feel about me but after meeting them all was ok, they were a little quiet but then so was I.

They come over once a week and all day one day at the weekend, this was fine but i am now starting to struggle with it for so many reasons, firstly i struggle to look at these two girls and like them when i have to much hatred for there mother, but i try and put this aside as that is not there fault. Secondly the youngest i have started to really dislike, her constant whining voice calling dad every 5 minutes, she eats and wipes her hands on the furniture but makes sure her dad is not looking, she gets everyone around her to do everything for her even get her a drink.

Now i refuse and after speaking to my partner he has also stopped as he knew it was annoying me, but she is so strange for a 10 year old, she wants to know everything, when there is something new she wants to know where it came from, which one of us bought it how much it costs, continuosly like she is reporting back to her mum when she gets home.

Along with this my partner and his ex had an agreement in court that should she live with someone in there house for more than 6 months, my partner had the right to force the sale of the property or recieve rent from the man living there. Well after 6 months of monitoring this guy and the kids admitting he lives there our solicitor wrote explaining his wishes to sell the property and she and her partner could buy it or that they were to pay rent. She has denied that he lives there and it seems impossible to find whys that would stand up in court to prove that he does.

My partner HAS to pay £220 per month maintanance so he pays the mortgage which is £440 therefore he is still paying his half of the mortgage.

So when the kids come over and explain how they have been out for dinner and they have new shoes and clothes etc, how does a single mum who works part time pay for this, in turn we are acutally paying for it and it is so hard biting my tongue and trying to be happy when this is going on.

Now i know she is only a child but i cannot see how i can go forward here....

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks

Cinders x