To be pissed off with stepdaughter, DH thinks so.

[Munchkins1316]

All right, this is just a small thing but it's sort of the whole straw = camels back thing so bear with me.

I've had some expensive toiletries bought me for Christmas. I'm not a special snowflake but I have extremely sensitive skin and there is only one brand that fits in with my animal testing ethos AND doesn't leave me looking like a creature from Hellraiser.

My sister bought me a bottle of said favourite shower gel and some other bits for Christmas.

I had a lovely bath about an hour ago and then sd jumped in and ran one after me.

As a bit of background Sd knows she can ask me for anything she needs/wants and I've always given it to her. She is 13.

I've just been in the bathroom and my brand new, barely used by me shower gel has gone, all gone. It was filled with some water and shook to make it look full.

This upset me a) it was a Christmas present barely used b) Why didn't she ask me to use some c) why on earth use an ENTIRE bottle then fill it up with water to trick me!

If it had been Dd I would have gone mad but because it's dsd I have to walk on a tightrope.

I was going to say something along the lines of 'Dsd sweetie why didnt you ask to use my stuff, and why did you use a whole bottle'.

However upon mentioning I was a bit upset to DH when he came upstairs it transpires I am just being an evil stepmother. Apparently she wouldn't have known it was mine (despite it being in my cupboard and me being the only person ever in the house that uses said clearly different brand) and it's totally normal to use an entire bottle of shower gel.

I've just been made to feel out of order if I say anything.

Like I would have been out of order to mention to her to stop leaving chewing gum stuck everywhere around the house where toddler DD can get it.

Like I would have been out of order to say anything to her about the awful things she says to me sometimes when we are alone.

I have to ignore her sneakily pinching dd because I've been made to feel I can't say fucking anything.

I'm trying, I really am. Every time I start to feel like things are going ok she does something sneaky like this that makes me wonder whether it's all in my head. Things dd wouldn't get away with I feel I can't say to her or DH and Mil think I'm evil for wanting to.

I even borrowed money from my mum to help get her a ps4 this year.

Most of the time she's lovely, it's just these little things that keep happening.

Am I a step monster?

Not the ow by the way. Met DH years after he was left by sd's mum.

You should just tell her that she owes you a new shower gel & taking stuff from your room is not OK.

Tbh, if she deides to not see her dad because of that then the relationship between them is pretty shit!

What's he like when she's there?

Does he insist that she does stuff with both of you/just him that she doesn't want to?

Does she have friends nearby that she can see when at yours?

I mean it's hard, but she's 13 & maybe just wants to be with friends.

I realise this seems to have blown up out of proportion.

Before speaking to DH I was a bit annoyed, as I will and have happily shared things with sd if she wants them. It's not a secret stash but I thought in this house we had a policy of asking to use something if it was specifically one persons present etc.

I also felt she was wasteful or perhaps spiteful to use the whole bottle, but I was just going to go with wasteful.

It was only after DH making me feel like I couldn't say anything that I've gotten angry.

All the little unfair things have just been building up in my mind.

DH is not talking to me and sd is in her room playing on the ps4. I think I'm just going to relax tonight and then ask her about it in the morning. I don't want her to think my current anger at DH is directed towards her.

Yes, she can do shitty things. But as pp have said if DH had stepped up before maybe she would know by know she shouldn't do them ( or shouldn't get away with them)

Is it too much to ask for a simple life and a bit of respect from everyone in the home?!

Using something without asking is different to wasting using the whole thing.

She can have her own nice stuff at her dad's I am sure.

It sounds like he has been doing this for a long time OP and you have become used to him failing to support you and raise his dd properly.

Do you think you will be able to have a proper discussion about this when you've both calmed down? If not, I don't see how your relationship with him can continue. He is being very unfair to you, your dd and his dd.

Sorry just realised I have answered that!

Sd is over for all of the holidays but apart from that only two weekends a month, she lives a two and a half hours away and when she was younger decided she didn't want to come every weekend. Apart from family etc. she all of her friends are near her mums house.

This was only three years ago, until then her mum lived quite close so contact was no problem.

You see, my first thought was it could be wasteful or it could be accidental and then hidden by adding water because she panicked and she's 13 so didn't think it through that clearly. But if you're being told not to raise the topic then how will you ever know?

Thank you Vintagedress. Perhaps I read it wrongly apologies. Dont bloody shoot me you lot
What brand is it. Im sure we all want to know

She took it out of your bedroom wardrobe (she shouldn't have been going through that, anyway!), emptied it, then refilled it with water to trick you? That is not normal behaviour for a teen. Using it is, borrowing your clothes is, all manner of PITA behaviour is, but not that degree of slyness.

It is not remotely normal for a 13 year old to deliberately pinch a 2 year old. That's rather chilling, tbh.

You need to have a proper, sitdown, honest talk with your DH. He is failing both his girls as well as his wife by ignoring these problems - part of being a parent is dealing with the shit stuff as well as the happy. And not just when he and he alone is adversely affected, either.

It's not too much to expect some respect and certainly she should be dealt with as if it's expected but when you have teens in the house, it's probably a bit unrealistic.

I can see DS1 sometimes having "teenage" strops etc, with a little twinkle in his eye, as if he's acting out being a difficult teenager IYSWIM and I find laughing at him, like the games up is sometimes the best way to deal with it.

You do need to pick your battles and when she's pinching the baby, probably shower gel isn't one to pick.

You see, my first thought was it could be wasteful or it could be accidental and then hidden by adding water because she panicked and she's 13 so didn't think it through that clearly. But if you're being told not to raise the topic then how will you ever know?

Absolutely. She needs to be called on bad behaviour, or how will she ever learn?

I'm possibly taking a different, softer approach to most posters. Given you've said you generally get on well, I wonder if she's testing you and your relationship with her with these small things. If I've read right (skimmed, sorry), you have your child, another on the way (neither of whom you'd be without I assume) and a husband you picked. The only one you didn't pick was her. She may be worried that you only have a relationship with her because of your husband. She may be irrationally annoyed that your toiletries appear hidden away from her. I think she likes you as a step mum. I'd still have a quiet word though about the fact she can ask to borrow items, feeling let down that she didn't etc. 13 is a funny age.

Op it's really sad just what does your DSD have to do for her Dad to give her some boundaries!!!

They do stuff they know they shouldn't, they get told off that is life!

I'd go mad with my own teen girls (14 and 15) if they went in my bedroom, went through my cupboard, took my shower gel and used it all up - and tried to hide it by filling with water. This would definitely be a battle I'd pick. If she did that to a friend or a room mate she'd know about it pretty damn fast.

Your dh is being a lazy parent and is not doing his daughter no favours. It is harder to reprimand her than to just let it go so he is taking the easy way out and justifying it by pretending you are a wicked stepmother.

The pinching the 2 year old and the chewing gum would all elicit pretty strong responses from me too - and I am regarded as a very mellow parent by my teens.

I would be as angry at your husband's laziness and poor attitude to his daughter as I would at her lack of respect for you and your property. Of course the one is probably the consequence of the other.

I've heard the brand slated in here a few times, to be honest the crux of my problem wasn't that it was a specific brand.

Just that it was a present which I tend to get for birthdays and Christmas as its a bit too much for me to spend on toiletries, it's expensive for us. Others might not blink at the price.

It's the only kind of toiletries I can use with my hideous skin, and I'm the only one who usually uses them. Sd does have her own stuff (it smells lovely, shame I can't use it!) but as also asked for and used my stuff in the past if she's wanted to try it.

Sorry I didn't think anyone would really be bothered by what brand it was! 😄

Thirteen year olds can be horrible entitled beings who at this age in life have empathy lapses.

I wonder how many people would be calling this child a spoiled selfish brat if she wasn't a stepchild? .

Op I would imagine that dsd knew you had some nice shower gell and because she's a teenage girl decided to try it for herself. In the wrong - definitely, but I can see how she might have used a whole bottle (again, a teenage thing) and then decided to fill it with water in the hope you wouldn't notice. But probably then forgot where she actually got it from and left it in the bathroom where you discovered it.

It really is simple. Just go to her and ask "DSD did you just use my shower gell?" If she answers no then just say "well, I had it in my wardrobe, then after you'd been in the bathroom it had ended up there, empty. Do you want to tell me how, and why that is?" Equally if she says yes just ask her why she used it all. It's naive to think that teenagers just comply with other people's wishes - they are by definition selfish beings who need to be guided. And from experience, shouting achieves very little, whereas talking to them as humans achieves much more because they feel engaged with IYSWIM.

Also, I don't get this notion of "not allowed to say anything," which is so often trotted out by step parents on here. If it's your house then you say something. If it causes issues with your partner then you deal with them. If he can't deal with that then he may well decide to not stick around, but likelihood is that if he doesn't then the relationship was never going to last anyway. How is it women end up years into these relationships and even have children with someone and yet won't open their mouth and discipline the step children for fear of what the dh will say?

Screw the shower gel, her dad needs to stop her hurting your toddler!

Yes that's what it really boils down to I guess.

Just a basic lack of respect. I know, I know, she's a teenager!

But I'd at least hope o could speak to her about these things without being told I'm picking on her. I most certainly would have spoken to dd about it! (If she was that age and had done that)

As it is I'm encouraging my dd to pick up after herself and dsd just drops everything where she stands.

Dd actually picked sd!s crisp packet up the other day and binned it!

I didn't know whether to be proud or sad tbh.

I can assure you wanna I would be calling any 13 year old who deliberately harms a toddler a brat - and worse, regardless of what relation they were to me.

I think it's pretty sick, and it is telling that you didn't react and speak to DSD as soon as you realised what had happened. You knew that DH wouldn't back you.

Next time I would tackle her immediately and if DH doesn't like it you need to have a serious talk with him about boundaries and her behaviour.

It's more I feel I can't say anything because if and when I do I'm made to feel that I'm blowing things out of proportion or being unfair. Especially be DH or occasionally mil.

A few years of that and a genuine desire to not push your sd away and it just makes you wary I guess.

Wannabe its not fear of what the dh willsay its fear of what the childs mother will say! Heaven forbid we overstep our boundary! Op you have bigger problems with your husband. Nothing wrong with asking dsd why she used all your stuff. If you let it go she will do it again.

You are right that the issue is DH. all children are naughty sometimes, I am sure many children occasionally pinch smaller siblings. But the issue you have is how her father treats this behaviour, and by extension, you.

This child's parents need to sit her down, find out what happened to the gel (mistake? careless? Malicious? greedy?) and make it clear that it was not ok, on the basis that it was a personal present. How would she feel about her Christmas stuff being trashed less than a week after christmas? Pick an example and suggest that the thing might be taken or given away. Make it seem serious. (do not threaten, or you will have to follow through - you can just say "in some families, punishments for things like this can take the form of... what do you think about that? How would that feel?")

It should be her dad and if he won't, and won't accept you having this conversation (calm but serious; no screaming, no shouting, but absolutely no holds barred that this is not ok) then you can't have her? or him? in your house. You can't live like that.

How can you raise your daughter in a home where you can't speak up. She is hurting your child and you can't say anything! Is your dh her dad?

Your dh is the issue - if I found out that my dad was doing that at her dads house I!d go ballistic on her myself.

I think she needs to be set boundaries by your DH. She needs to be told to ask in future. Also pinching your little one is not on. Shes 13 not 3.
Sorry about asking about the brand. Was being a nosey mare nothing else

My dad (not sure if I can even call him that tbh) met a series of women, whose lives/homes I have had to slot into as a teenager and I can tell you it wasn't easy
The expectation from my mum or my gran s house, to then his or another one of girlfriends houses was so confusing it was untrue and I honestly think, even if you are all normal and settled she's thirteen years old. Can you remember if your parents were divorced, had new children, how confusing that was for you?
Maybe she has been being spiteful, I don't know, but she's thirteen she is a child.
Step back tonight and speak about it when the pair of you can act alot more adult if telling her how to behave.

Alot of my memories of being a teenager are of being too wound up to eat or even speak because I'd upset somene or another, unintentionally!

I even had to sit at one of his girlfriend's houses on Christmas evening whilst they all opened gifts from one another and my mum had made me take them small things (like chocolates) and no one had bought me anything