For Step DD to grow up!

[Piglet28]

DP has DD of 22 and still pays for her mobile phone bill, servicing of her car, 500 for holiday (we can't afford to go away) and she just recently asked for 4 new tyres not the cheap ones either and didn't even offer to pay towards them. She goes to Uni doing makeup but is also working, is it unreasonable to expect her to pay for her own things, and for DP to man up and be honest with her. She knows were really skint but seems to be constantly taking the P!

She has only ever seen our DS 3 times and didn't even bother to send a card for his 2nd birthday. To cut a long story short she wasn't happy when I got pregnant and acted like a spoilt child (she was nearly 20 at this time) and we fell out over it now she can't be bothered with the family except for seeing the rich grandparents and DP when she wants something.

I'm sick of her taking the P and whenever I talk to DP about this it is ignored. He is scared of having a row and upsetting her.

There is surely a difference between being an older sibling in a family where the growing up has been with the same two adults in a parenting role, and being the older sibling with a half brother.
Which is why I wondered how long the OP had been with her partner, and so how new the idea of not being first was to the daughter.
I take it he only has two children?
She does need to grow uyp, but none of the adults in her likfe so far have seemed to enable her to, so she's 22 and still at the demanding teenager stage.

I also wonder how financially dependent the OP is on her partner, and if that has a bearing on her anger at having to share his money with another member of the family.

goblin can you see that your comment "I also wonder how financially dependent the OP is on her partner" is inherently sexist? So basically a woman is only likely to have an interest in her partner's means of expenditure if she is financially dependent on him? How odd.

"There is surely a difference between being an older sibling in a family where the growing up has been with the same two adults in a parenting role, and being the older sibling with a half brother." - there is only a different if the 'adults' have made one. Treating her so ridiculously just in case she feels 'put out' in some way by a half-sibling is just emphasising the difference imo. It is clear to me that this is likely to have been happening thus far, hence the issue to have got to this stage

No, not sexist.
I'd ask the same question about financial dependency if a man complained that his partner was spending money on her adult daughter whilst they had another child and household responsibilities and holidays and such to pay for themselves.
I had a financially dependent partner for several years who was the SAHP and earned around 1/4 of what I did. He didn't worry about what I spent our money on because he trusted me and didn't feel insecure.
I agree that the DD sounds like a mess, and I want more of the background so that I can try and understand why.
The DP must love her and want to keep contact with her, it's a huge warping of the father/child relationship to see that it seems to have come down to cash for affection and he doesn't feel certain enough to change the basis. It may well form the pattern for the girl's future relationships as well love= stuff.

Don't think the dd sounds like a mess at all, she's studying and working and sometimes asks her Dad to help out. All quite reasonable. If her Dad can't afford it, he needs to tell her.

goblin in many cases it's the pwc that encourages the 'cash for affection' attitude imho. Obviously can't assume this in the case of the OP's thread, but if a pwc sees the ex as a cash cow (which many unfortunately do) then it's not surprising when an adult child grows up to share that attitude.

and fwiw I'm not interested in my partner's expenditure because Im 'worried' about it or don't trust him, but because we are a family which shared commitments. If he was spashing out hundreds of pounds on anything I deemed to be a waste, then I would point that out. Not becuase I'm insecure, but because I am his partner and it is indeed my business if he is p*ssing our money up the wall

And any 22 yo asking daddy for money to go on holiday needs a firm talking to imo

She is at UNI still legally dependant on her parents - her grant/loan would be calculated according to their income - as they would be expected to ''top it up''. What make it feel different to a lump sum of say £2000 (which is what my DS gives my niece 2x a year) is the fact it has been given for a ''holiday'' or a ''set of expensive tyres'' rather than just as a lump sum to be spent as the DSD wants/needs even though it may have been spent on the same thing.

many parents help their kids out this way - if they can, it's not that unusual. Curious if those at uni and doing it all themselves with no help from parents come from families where money is tight.

topping up a grant is very very different indeed for paying for holidays and expensive tyres. If the student is struggling with uni costs, I'm sure a holiday and car would have been well off the radar!

This is his daughter and I think that he should spend a certain amount of money on her, however a holiday when you cannot afford one yourselves is pushing it.

Could you put an agreed amount away each month for these requests and if its all used up then the answer is no until more has accumlated.

accumulated

"Could you put an agreed amount away each month for these requests" - I'm baffled, I really am. Surely a parent giving an adult daughter money should be based on need, not requests. And as a student, a holiday does certainly not, in my book, count as a 'need'. Most people are lucky at all to be able to put away money for anything, let alone random luxury requests from an adult daughter