So to briefly explain my situation, I'm 21, living with my fiance, trying to conceive, and at the same time facing parenting dilemmas as we unexpectedly became the legal guardians of his teenage brother (16 at the time now 17). I know on this site there are certain shorthand phrases used to describe members of the family for discretion but I don't know what they are or what they mean, please feel free to explain them but for now I'll refer to said teenager as teenager.
This teenager comes from a troubled home, as did I, as did my partner, they were kicked out at 16 following arguments with the mother regarding LGBTQ matters and their freedom to come and go from the house. There was police involvement in this kicking out as there was a small assault on teenager, this was obviously an extremely distressing time and since no social services or anyone offered to step in, me and my partner did. We took him in as he has nowhere else to go and thought at the time that the arrangement would be, he was taken care of in the sense of bills paid, food in the cupboard, companionship and emotional support from the two of us however since coming into our care, teenager has refused to prepare food for themselves, get drinks for themselves, clean their own dishes, do their own laundry, tidy their own bedroom etc. I could go on but you get the idea.
As it currently stands, if me or my partner don't bring food and water to teenagers bedroom, they don't eat or drink and then accuse us of neglect. Similar with all other aspects of everyday life, if teenager has no clean clothes it is our fault, if teenager hasn't bathed recently this is also somehow our fault.
I guess what I am asking is, these boundaries seem inappropriate. Whenever the subject of responsibility is broached it results in toddler like tantrums with slamming doors and sobbing and the arguably more upsetting, tiktoks being posted about how unloved and neglected he is.
The thing is, both me and my partner are clueless as to whether to put the proverbial foot down and let him sulk and accuse us of all sorts, or wether he is actually incapable of meeting his own basic needs.
Additionally, when teenager is alone with my partner (teenagers brother) teenager tends to say very upsetting and relatively unforgivable things. My partner then comes back to me upset, I comfort them, I explore the possible underlying issues, I advise him to verbalise his boundaries, but nothing seems to work. As an example, after teenager stormed off during a walk with my partner for (seemingly) no reason, the conversation looked like this.
Teenager: "Why the F* are you following me"
My partner: "Don't swear at me."
Teenager: "I didn't what are you talking about"
My partner: "Are you okay?"
Teenager: "I'm fine."
My partner: "You don't seem fine."
Teenager: ....................eyeroll and huff
This is somewhat typical of the behaviour issues we've been running into, as when he crosses a line and is corrected, he swears he never did whatever it is that two people saw/heard him do. Additionally, he expects us to know what has upset him every time he is upset and gets angry when asked, because he thinks we should know.
The funny thing is, if my partner says anything even slightly argumentative towards him (such as 'Stop speaking to me like that' or 'Why are you being like this?') he runs away and then sobs to me that my partner has been aggressive and triggered his PTSD. However teenager has no concern for the fact that he behaves aggressively and disrespectfully to my partner causing similar emotional pain for him.
While I'm lucky that teenager seems to behave more or less around me, that doesn't mean teenager doesn't say some fairly hurtful things about me behind my back. I don't know where I stand.
What I want to do is explain his behaviour back to him in a non confrontational way, e.g. "I'm not sure if you're aware but when you do X it comes off as X and makes us feel like X and we'd like to find a better way to communicate"
I don't know if that is the right response or if it would even work but at this point I'm considering that his behaviour is having a significant impact on our well being and day to day life and needs to change.
Any advice would be appreciated as I don't want things to escalate to a point where he needs rehousing.
TLTR:
My Partners teenage brother lives with us and is not looking after their own basic needs and is frequently behaving aggressively/disrespectfully towards my partner, and is saying nasty things about me behind my back but being nice to my face and we don't know how to help him or how to put down healthy boundaries.