I hate my stepdaughter.

[Rhootintootinboo]

There. I said it. She has been living with us since her mum kicked her out at 14 so 3 years. We used to get on. I’ve done a lot for her in the past but about 12 months in she decided to turn the hatred she was directing at her mum towards me. She is spoilt, selfish and totally entitled. Her dad (my fiancé) spoils her and cannot see any wrong doing. This year alone he has spent Over £10k on holidays and gifts for her. In the meantime I can’t even make reasonable requests for considerate behaviour without receiving anger, vitriol and dirty looks. It is now at boiling point and tonight I ended up calling her a cunt and telling her that she is the problem and that she is reason her mum kicked her out. I know my language is unacceptable. I just don’t know a way out of this. I’m supposed to be getting married in six months and the reality is I just want to leave because of her. She is utterly unbearable and I cannot cope.

I don’t have teens but I can assure you the following are not hills to die on

• pan handles
• not saying hello on coming in.

Don’t blame you did blowing up re telly though.

What she IS telling you though is she feels she now ranks below the dog in your affections and that may explain some kick back.

Between her mum giving her the boot and (in HER eyes) you favouring the dog that’s a double whammy.

And her telling you she doesn’t want to spend time with you is one of the few times it may pay to disregard what’s coming out their mouth and look at their actions.

My toddler tells me every day she doesn’t like nursery yet loves it when there. Bad analogy but you know.

It may pay to keep buggering on but your DF needs to step up. He is responsible didn’t her emotional well being too and it’s up to him to make her feel loved and secured too, not just agree with you about what a mare she is.

I’d suggest if he’s sloping his shoulders about this then THAT may be cause to walk; not her.

If dp can't step up then I'd have to leave.

I'd have to live separately from fiance and delay the wedding. Cant he send her away to university?!

Fiancé wasn’t here last night. It kicked off when she came back through the door looking at her phone, no thank you for letting her in or eye contact just staring at her screen. Dogs excited (he always is) and telly got knocked over by said dog. I said that she could have avoided it if she had been concentrating on what was happening around her. I then asked if she would help me lift it up. She told me to fuck off and sort my own fucking mess out.

Okay, this is how this plays out in the mind of a 17yo.
I've come home and the second I've got in the door they are having a go at me. Why do I have to be super grateful and make an appreciative song and dance about being let in the door to somewhere I live and belong, so now I need to be thankful for being let into my own house.
Great, the dog has now knocked over the tv and better still SM is now yelling at me about it. So not yelling at her dog (that ranks above me) for knocking the tv over but I'm copping it as somehow it's all my fault. Typical. After having a go at me the minute i step in and yelling at me for something that's not my fault, she now wants me to help her (pick the TV up)! Well, fuck that for a joke. Now she's called me a cunt. Ever since she got the dog I know that's what she thinks of me and now she's admitted it.

That's not the reality at all but that's how it plays out in the mind of a teenager. I have been through this and have the badge . Trust me, at this point you don't have a go at them for saucepan handles, making some noise, not expressing their thanks for being let into where they live and feel they should belong etc. So many things you just need to let go in that phase and eventually they do come out the other side as a normal human being again.

He was out?

Is that a snapshot moment, or have you been picking up the slack for him ever since you got together?

Some men are very good at finding a woman to deal with the shit they don’t want to deal with (housework, parenting)

Your problem is mainly with him. I’d say.

Obviously there have been parental failings for her to have turned out so troubled and he's demonstrated yet again how inept he is as a father by supporting a woman calling his daughter a cunt and listing off other spiteful things about the relationship with her mother, in her own home. Yes you should leave. Re-evaluate the relationship once the DD has left home. Insist that someone put her first for once.
The TV example is rubbish. That's the girl's home. She shouldn't be expected to thank you for letting her in. It's not your fault your dog is excitable.

Her* fault.

There have been some very helpful observations and challenges so thank you. I lost my cool. The things I said were hurtful and the language abusive. The examples are just examples and not the entirety of the drip drip disdain I live with day in day out. She is in my eyes a young woman, not a child and that is something I need to reflect on. Her dad is very present in her life. Just absent when it comes to boundaries and tough love. I don’t hate her. I just hate that I lost the relationship we used to have.

£10k! Unless you have a six figure income that’s ridiculous. No child needs that amount of gifts and holidays. That alone would be enough for me to leave - he’s going to bankrupt you to fund her lifestyle.

I would be running for the hills. What if she quits uni and lives with you for years to come? What if she got pregnant and had to live in your home? How long will her father allow her to sponge off the both of you? My mind would be filled with possible nightmare scenarios.

Alternatively he’s bankrupting himself to buy his daughter’s love whilst completely missing the one thing she’s looking for.

She NEEDS boundaries like any child does because believe it or not they represent parents actually giving a shit.

You got angry at her for not saying thank you for you answering the door?? Is that even a thing?? And you got angry again because your dog knocked the telly over? How was that her fault?

I’d have told you to fuck off myself tbh

If she forgets her keys and has to have someone let her in a thank you is polite, no? Or at least the presence of the door opener acknowledged with some eye contact. I didn’t get angry because the telly was knocked over. I did say it wouldn’t have happened if she’d gave been paying attention instead of walking through the door whilst looking at her phone. I got angry because she told me to fuck off when I asked her to help me pick it up.

This as an individual event is minor. In reality it’s never the big things that trip you up but the pebbles. Thanks for your helpful contribution.

No, I don’t expect to be thanked for opening the front door to someone who lived with me. And I still don’t understand the tv situation that you seemed to be blaming her for. Why weren’t you paying attention to your dog when it knocked it over. What should she have been paying attention to? We might have been on her phone, but she didn’t knock it over did she? And yes, individual events might be minor, but the ones you’ve listed aren’t even events. It reads like every little thing she does annoys you when she’s not really done anything wrong. You’re looking for an excuse to pick on her, she’s retaliating, and the situation escalates.

This is why the role of a step parent is so, so hard

As an adult, I would expect some small acknowledgement from someone coming in and thanks for opening the door. This is a regular, everyday occurrence at work

As a parent, you are bonded and a bit prepared for each stage as it comes.

You are sharing your hone with an almost adult stranger who is not being parented by your fiancé.

In your situation, I would call it a day. He can always fine and find you if he ever gets himself sorted out. I'm sorry, but now is not the time.

I have never lived in a house anywhere where people don’t acknowledge each other as they’re coming and going. I feel sorry for those that do and have no wish for that in my own living environment.

I wasn’t paying attention to the dog as we all manage him individually when we walk through the door. In fact she has asked told me not to intervene before and she will manage him herself. You can keep on attacking Raphael but it’s in the minutiae of daily life that you find the context and answers.

So no, I am not looking for any excuse to pick on her. But I recognise that I have regressed in my ability to respond in an adult way to minor provocations (probably because I have no control over the big stuff)

The only reason I ask about the acknowledgement at the door is that if every misdemeanour is picked up on you’re on a hiding to nothing.

I do believe you’ve tried and are trying. I was a hideous teen and cringe when I think how I was. But just don’t be too quick to write her off. And I repeat, your DF needs to shape up quick.

Else there will be three relationships down the pan, not just yours and hers.

As women we immediately try to nurture, to understand. We take on the lion share of responsibility regarding family. We work hard, we put everyone before ourselves that’s why you flipped and said what you did, it gets too much. Just some kindness directed your way, some assistance. You’ve had one eye roll to many, another sulky attitude at the end of a hard day. These aren’t isolated incidents, she’s treating you this way all the time. It’s a drip drip effect. Other posters will not understand until it happens to them. Some SMs have it easier, some challenges naturally but others get it really rough, they don’t understand us. We’re wicked SMs, it’s never the children. We want some understanding from other mums, to validate us and make us feel better. Your human, you made a mistake now shake it off and start forming a plan to make your life ( not hers, or his) better.

I have to say that from your latest posts, it is highly likely to be a failure on your part of understanding teenage behaviour of our time.

You do come across as an annoying nag. Do you really give her a hard time because of where she has the saucepan of the cooker? That means she is actually cooking which is more than what many 17yo do.

She does sound like a difficult teenager, but you don't seem to be handling the situation well at all, and have much too high expectations. It's totally normal behaviour at that age to come home and not say hello right away. Their notion of appropriate communication is quite different to that of our generation.

I'm suspecting that the issue with your OH is that he is more au fait of what is normal teenage behaviour and therefore is getting annoyed with the expectation you have of hers.

Teenagers are aliens. They are not very nice in the way they communicate, making you feel that they want nothing to do with you when actually, they care for you very much and do want you affection. Then that awkwardness goes and they turn into lovely adults. I still can't come to grips with my DS coming every day to talk to me, telling me about his day, asking my opinion on things. For the last 3 years, I didn't get a hello, thank yous were exceptional, and when asked how his day was, all I would get is a blaze 'fine'.

All you are doing by expecting her to be perfect is alienating her. What you've said to her much has destroyed her. She won't show it, she'll pretend she doesn't care, but it will have done quite some damage, possibly irreversibly.

Yes it’s not ideal to call the girl a cunt
Not ideal? What an understatement!

I resent the mother. Kicking her out means she gets to live the life I would like

So really want you want is for your partner not to have had to step up and support his child when mum, rightly or wrongly, was no longer able to? You seem unable to acknowledge that the problem her is not mum, nor even really your DSD, but rather your partner who is doinga great pandering to a young woman rather than actually parenting her. That’s not her fault and nor is it her mum’s fault.

And whilst I don’t agree with the ‘you knew what you were getting into comments as a general rule, you absolutely have to realise that when you enter a relationship with someone who has children, there is always a chance that the children will want or need to move in and they will always, without fail, be your partner’s priority.

Frankly, you really need to see that bigger picture and lay the blame where it’s due.

I would be running for the hills. What if she quits uni and lives with you for years to come? What if she got pregnant and had to live in your home? How long will her father allow her to sponge off the both of you? My mind would be filled with possible nightmare scenarios.

This. Life is too short to spend years living with someone who treats you like dirt.

I suspect you’d be much happier away from them both OP.

There is light at the end of the tunnel. SD is 17 and she is in the last teenage years. This is explosion time. At 17 children give the most push-back to parents and parental figures. They need to make things so objectionable at home that they are forced to launch themselves into the outside world and disconnect from doting parents and their childhood. Having late teenagers in the house is more difficult than managing, and similar to, the temper tantrums aged 2. You are very near to things getting a lot better. The moment they leave, you get your time back. My advice: 1) Encourage (indirectly) any plans she has to leave home to go to Uni or College, or a job ASAP. Things change instantly when they do. 2) Do not rescue your partner from her behaviour. Wherever possible step-aside and let him take the full force. Sometimes she will direct it straight at you. 3) Make sure you are doing enough to look after yourself by giving yourself little treats as compensation, to be able to remain calm and aloof. Don't take her behaviour personally.
Don't ruin a potentially lovely marriage by falling at this last hurdle of childhood.
There is a really good workshop coming up this week-end on how to step-parent. See: BeStepWise

“I don’t hate her. I just hate that I lost the relationship we used to have.”

I have a lot more sympathy for you in your later reflective posts OP, and I can see that you would like things to be different.

I would hate to think anyone ever split up because if the way I was as a teen (self absorbed, melodramatic, totally lacking in perspective and any ability to control my all consuming moods).

I have a just turned 18 yo, adult he may be but mature and sophisticated of emotional intelligence he is not.

It takes a lot of ‘sideways ‘ communication. That is conversations conducted side by side while doing something else. (Eye contact not required, there is an easy get out or change of subject if anyone needs time or the heat taken out).

Understanding and listening are not mutually exclusive with boundary expectations and respect within the household.

Something else to think about is that you say that you see her as a young woman yet you seem to treat her like a child. Picking at her for things that you certainly wouldn't do with a young adult.

I suspect she does care for you a lot, but you are probably not easy to live with. If my husband had a got at me like you if I'd walked in looking at my phone, I would have told him to get lost too.

I wonder if your OH spoils to her over compensate because he too can see that you are on her case too much. What are her plans for next year? Will she be going to Uni? I suspect you'll get close again, but will get along much better not living under the same roof.