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Step-parenting

Connect with other Mumsnetters here for step-parenting advice and support.

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Original poster

DSS and work

16 replies

IceniMist · 08/10/2014 19:59

DSS is 18. Finshed college in May and works maybe 10 hours or less a week. Lives with us half the time.

Doesn't put any effort into looking foranother job and will only do chores if you stand over him.

We have tried most things to encourage him from finding jobs to dictating. Nothing works. He pays a small amount of board.

I am fed up of working and coming home to him doing nothing. DH no longer wants to discuss it with me stating 'what can I do?'.

Feeling like I have to put up and shut up. Don't partically want to be around DH at the momemt.

OP posts:

wheresthelight · 08/10/2014 23:35

padlock the fridge and the cupboards, stop doing his washing/ironing etc until he starts pulling his weight

but then I am in an evil bitch mood as my dsc's have been bloody awful the last couple of contacts and practically expect me to wipe their backsides.

Original poster

IceniMist · 09/10/2014 07:25

Well I don't touch his washing.i think he might take it to his mums.

OP posts:

DwellsUndertheSink · 09/10/2014 07:32

look in your local paper for cost of shared rooms in communal houses.
Work out the cost of food for an adult and share of internet/utilities/council tax. Present it to him, and explain that he better get a job and pull his weight or he'll be out and having to find £XXX a month just to live. Id also let him know that he wont be living with you forever, so maybe he needs to look at getting some useful qualifications so that he can get a better job.

Sometimes kids need a kick up the behind.

Original poster

IceniMist · 09/10/2014 07:44

We have done all that and threatenedto up his rent to match his sisters as its only fair but DH won't implement.

He isn't a bad teen but lazy/clueless. But he won't budge and now DH has given up and I can't do anything.

OP posts:

Anotherchapter · 09/10/2014 07:49

This could have been my dd but I really dug my heels in and said she couldn't live here if she wasn't going to college or working. She did actually move to her dad's but was back after a few weeks with apprentiship. I was living in a flat at 16 with a new baby- so I know what these young adults are capable of. She also didn't clean up after herself and honestly that was my fault not pulling her on it when she was younger. The conditions of her moving back was that she cleaned her own shit up and paid rent.

My BIL son (19) isn't workng, sees no urgency. Why should he when he is getting treated like a little prince at home. His parents are exasperated, can't understand why he is so lazy ect.

op this will become a bone of contention between you and dh. Talk to dh, tell him for a grown MAN/ADULT this isn't acceptable and you are not willing to carry a man child. His dad's needs to give him a kick up the arse. If he goes to his mums so be it.

Anotherchapter · 09/10/2014 07:50

He wont budge because he knows his dad won't force him. Ohh it gets my goat lazy teenagers

Original poster

IceniMist · 09/10/2014 08:29

It has been a bone of contetion since last November when he went throught the whole wanting to go to uni thing but never got round to doing it despite us getting prospectus' s and the UCAS site explained.

DH were not talking last night but DHhas gone in and read him the riot act before work (again). So he is to sit with me because I am working from home. Wonderful.

OP posts:

Anotherchapter · 09/10/2014 10:36

Dh has got to stick by what he says. Dh should be making him get up early and activly looking for work- that does not include chilling in bed room all day.

I think when they have been moddy coddled especially after a marriage break up, guilty parenting kicks in and it can have lasting effects of entitled ness on the teenagers.

If he was living here, he would be woke up when we got up, expected to complete chores and the be activly looking for work. That will soon shift him.

Petal02 · 09/10/2014 10:59

I think when they have been molly coddled after a marriage break up, guilty parenting kicks in and it can have lasting effects of entitled-ness on the teenagers

Yep. Got it in one. My DSS went to Uni after A-Levels, but prior to that was so completely apathetic, he really, really didn’t want to do ANYTHING that didn’t involve the sofa/wi-fi, and DH wouldn’t challenge him for fear of risking his ‘preferred parent’ status. In the May-Sept period between finished A-levels and starting Uni, DH was keen for him to find a summer job, but DSS’s idea of ‘job seeking’ was to fanny around on his laptop ‘looking for jobs on-line’ and I swear he wasn’t doing any job hunting at all. And if he hadn’t gone to Uni, I’m convinced we would have ended up in the same position as the OP.

OP – if you’re working from home, do you really want him hanging around the house with you, do you find this frustrating?

Original poster

IceniMist · 09/10/2014 11:35

I found some jobs out for him to apply for. He says he has done them.
He is upstairs in his bedroom though so no idea what he is doing.

OP posts:

Original poster

IceniMist · 10/10/2014 15:10

I work all my hours in four days so went out to DDs classes, and DH hadtime owed so came with us.

Had a lovely day but just got back DSS hasn't done the vaccuming I asked and left shit all over the kitchen. He has gone out.

I am pissed off. Asked DH to tidy tte kitchen and what DSSs plans were for job hunting today, and he has just shouted he doesn't know, he isn't micro managing him.

DSS hasn't worked this week and has done about less than an hours work of chores.

OP posts:

Original poster

IceniMist · 10/10/2014 15:23

DH just said he has had enough and walked out.

Should I just ignore I have an 18 yearold in the house who doesn't work or help out and just leave them to it?

OP posts:

Anotherchapterinthebookofdead · 10/10/2014 16:50

Hi icen sorry to hear if the bust up. Must be so frustrating. There will be others that come along and tell you to leave the mess and ignore it but I don't know if I could. I didn't take it off my dd when she reached that age so I would go take it off anybody else.

How are you broaching it with dh? I bet as soon as you mention it,its like a touch paper going off. Dss will be aware off of this.

Have you done his chores? Can you leave them? Will he be back tonight?

Original poster

IceniMist · 10/10/2014 16:58

I haven't done the chores. It was onlyvacuuming.

I can't mention it to DH now without him snapping. DH has made me feel like its all my fault.

OP posts:

Original poster

IceniMist · 10/10/2014 21:19

Well DSS is not home yet, so a whole day out chilling on top of no work, but DH has done the vaccuming.

I will continue to ask DSS to do chores and then ask DH to do them in the evening when not done.

OP posts:

Anotherchapterinthebookofdead · 10/10/2014 21:37

Sounds shit. Dss won't change though until his dad sticks a fire work up his arse!

What about leaving it for a couple of days then broach it saying how upset it's makng you, you don't want to fight about it but some thing proactive needs to be done as you don't want to look after an adult.

The don't suddenly stop bring your kids at 18 but they do need to be treated differently. I wanted my dd to become more pro- active and independant so I withdrew a lot of things I did for her. I realised she had got to 18 with out even boiling an egg! I was so much more self sufficent at that age with my own child.

If it was my dp son I'd catch him when ds wasn't around. Ask if you can talk with out it escalating, talk about your concerns (with out critising dss too much) and see if you can agree on a time frame for when dh talks to dss again about upping the anti on finding work. Between now and then I wouldn't mention anything about dss not pulling his weight. Dh will be well aware of it. I'm quite pushy so I'd probably say " I can't carry on like this, it's too frustrating for me. I'm not askng you to choose but I need you to look at it from my perspective"

There isn't much you can do about proving he isn't actually looking for work (apart from not actually going to job interviews) as going through is things will be an invasion of privacy.

Hope you get it sorted .

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