So, a lot goes into this and I’m sorry in advance.
My partner is the legal guardian of his younger sister. Recently he has started to annoy me with some of his behaviours. When we first started dating, we would spend weekends together, as he was with his sister during the week. More recently, he seems to be less interested in me. He is cutting our weekend short, constantly calling her when we are together, not in a very good mood most of the time, and seems to be expecting more and more from me in regards to his sister. He says I should make more of an effort to get on with his sister, and I have tried my best to make a relationship with her, but she isn’t overly interested in spending time with me, or talking to me. My approach to the relationship with her has been to be more cat-like than dog-like, meaning that I let her approach me as and when she’s comfortable, and don’t force any kind of relationship that she doesn’t want. But the way she behaves is sometimes absurd. She is about to turn 13, and is incapable of doing anything for herself. And I mean that literally.
She doesn’t make herself anything to drink, not even a glass of juice.
She can’t make herself a bowl of cereal, or a piece of toast. She even has to be told that she needs to shower. And brush her teeth. Sometimes I feel that she is behaving much younger than she is, and that it may be to get attention. I tried to talk to him about her behaviour and independence, but he brushes it away saying that she’s had some difficulties in her life.
We’ve also discussed living together, we’ve been discussing this for almost 6 months. Obviously I wanted both of them to move in together. He said he wanted that too, but not until he had sorted out his driving and a car. Which I completely understand, but my issue is, he hasn’t made any kind of effort to get his driving test done. Making me feel like he doesn’t actually want to live with me.
What’s really capped it off, is that recently he hasn’t tried to initiate any contact with me through the week when we aren’t together. Because we only see each other on weekends, it was important to both of us to talk through the week, recently he hasn’t bothered to message me first, or ring me. It always seems to fall on me to initiate conversations when we aren’t together.
I know his sister will always be his first priority, but recently I’ve started feeling like an afterthought, or being forced into a type of relationship with his sister that isn’t wanted.
I’m really at a loss how to talk to him about this. I feel like if I say anything, he will say that I don’t understand that he is responsible for her, or that I’m not trying hard enough with her. Looking for some advice as to how to approach this, thanks in advance