Ok, they are not being angels.
No. They are being:
- Nasty to younger children.
- Openly disrespectful to the OP.
As a parent of a 12 year old, it is my job to do something about both of those things. For him as much as anyone else. Regardless of him being a stepchild.
The problem is that their father not only excuses this behaviour but reinforces it by telling his partner off in front of them. He’s a terrible father. Awful.
An 8 year old is a young child. A 12 year old is at a difficult age.
An 8 year old is really not that young. This gets trotted out on MN stepparenting all the time, as if the child were 3 or something. 8 year olds are in the period of middle childhood, in KS2 at school and are able to understand that their choices and behaviour are not ok.
This 8 year old is being let down by her useless father. He is doing the NR father having cake and eating it thing, where apparently she’s old enough to overrule young children’s actual parent on snacks and parenting, but presumably too young for anyone to challenge this behaviour. Similarly she should bd respected as ‘an elder’ but doesn’t need to have any respect for her elders.
But hey, this is MN and step kids, and those older than your own just have to suck it up, behave and apologise for their existence.
It’s not apologising for their existence. It’s being asked to behave acceptably. That is something their father should be insisting on regardless.
The 8 and 12 year old are with their mother the rest of the time. The logic trotted out about poor SC having to watch their father live FT with other children (and, if it IS FT, then those other, actual young children do not have a father in any meaningful sense at all yet get to watch their stepdad act like his children are the second coming of Christ every weekend) is bullshit. They are more than old enough to understand that their parents have split up and that they have regular weekend contact (every weekend with their dad). The rest of the time they’re with their mum not abandoned on the street wishing they could live with their dad.
Their parents should be helping them to accept this. Not pandering to poor behaviour out of divorced parent guilt.
But this is MN, a nonresident stepchild is always beyond reproach and resident (step)children do not matter in the least.
Otherwise maybe we’d be talking about his terrible it must be for two very little boys who must almost never see their own father (because otherwise they wouldn’t be subjected to their de facto stepdad’s daughters every weekend). How must they feel that two much older girls are allowed to come in and treat them badly - and to treat their mother with contempt. Indeed, to see that their mother is told she’s in the wrong for trying to protect them from bullying behaviour from children very much old enough to know better.
But no. We are making excuses for very poor behaviour in a 12 year old.