My stepson is difficult to like
Hello,
I feel bad, but I can't stand my 14 year old stepson. I was married for 15 years before my current marriage. I accepted two children that were not my own and during my adult lifetime I've accepted many other children and raise them in my home. I am so troubled that this kid makes my skin crawl, he is disrespectful he does not follow directions, he does not do chores well, he has no concept of germs and bacteria transference and he is sneaky. to make matters worse he does not practice good hygiene. my husband is a really great guy but now I'm looking at him like, it must be his fault, he raised this idiot , he does not use proper manners at the table, does not communicate well and is just weird. I have tried everything! I put my feelings aside and told myself it was wrong to dislike him. so I made an extra effort to like him and to talk to him about things that we might have in common everything will be okay for a week or so and then all of the sudden I cannot stand to be in his presence. What do I do? I would hate to divorce my husband because I can't stand his son but I cannot ask my husband to choose between us. The biological mother lives out of state and has never taken care of the child and she appears to be an idiot as well.
No, you don't ask your dh to
No, you don't ask your dh to choose between child and wife. But you do work with your dh to parent that kid up to acceptable standards. (I know others will disagree) You have to do some deep and scary partnering with your dh to accomplish this.
Start with one issue. Talk to dh about it. Ask him why he allows it. Eventually move on to telling him how difficult it makes things for you and work on a plan together to extinguish the behavior.
That's the basic outline. You can fill in the details and tailor them to your own personalities. This has been working for me and my dh. It has been working for us because my dh is super-spectacular as a partner and he is definitely worth making an effort for.
You can always cut your losses now if you don't find your dh worth that much effort. Couldn't blame you. But I do love to see these things work out. Good luck.
Thanks for the very good
Thanks for the very good advice. I thought about coming up with a plan. Based my many discussions with dh we are so different culturally in terms of using manners . Stuff like don't act up when we have company. He is a great guy and I'm sure he worth me continuing to work through the behavior. I'm not sure if its worth my sanity, not sure I'm the right influence for this kid. My dh and I moved really fast we called it "love at first sight"
Your SS sounds like mine. Is
Your SS sounds like mine. Is it possible there is any high functioning autism or Aspergers involved? All in all my SS is a nice kid. But he's... "off". Socially he is distant, cold, abrupt, disconnected, and awkward. Hygiene and table manners have been two torturous obstacles.
It may be that your DH is completely well aware, but has learned that because of his sons limitations, he has lowered the bar to avoid eternal frustration. I've helped raise my SS since he was 4, and I can assure you I learned to let some things go. No amount of parenting was going to change it. We weren't bad parents, we just stopped beating our heads against a wall. You can't make an Aspie be "like us". and maybe you shouldn't. (variety is the spice of life, right?)
I've settled for: Knowing not to eat until all are seated, not leaving until everyone is done, mostly chewing with his mouth sort-of closed, acknowledging people when he enters a room or leaves a room. And some of those are half-ass.
I wish I had advice to offer.
I wish I had advice to offer. I can't stand my step son either. Cannot pay attention unless you threaten to take away a video game. My DH says to be patient, but how many times can you same the same thing DAILY, NUMEROUS times DAILY and be patient?
A last couple years my 15
A last couple years my 15 year old SD was having the most disgusting hygiene issues and I had a hard time with it especially since she was becoming a woman. She never washed her hands, she would come back from her BMs after 3-5 days in the same clothes not having showered, she would come out of the shower in the same clothes she had on before showering...i would find her period underwear stuffed everywhere in her room, just gross crap. We had a lot of conversations about it. It was a lot of struggle. We started just making a rule of shower every night before bed. I went and bought a bunch of bathroom stuff just for her, razors, soap, shampoo, body spray...stuff to make her feel grown up. I think it was partially her way of not wanting to grow up. She struggled with her parents divorce and I think she wasn't she what another big step puberty was. She didn't want responsibility but slowly she did get it. Now she has grown out of all that...it did take over 2 years thought...sorry to say.
Try to keep the mindset that he wasn't born this way, he was made or allowed to be this way. He is not choosing it, it's all he knows. No one wants to be smelly or unliked or have bad manners. How many times did you hear chew with your mouth closed, use your napkin, all the manners things that he obviously wasn't taught, which I can tell you is not uncommon with boy that live with just fathers.
You can say things to him without sounding naggy. I would like it if you chewed with your mouth closed at home but make sure you do it at school because you don't want the girls to think you have bad manners. Or something like that.
He will roll his eyes, but he's listening. I did a lot of that with the burping and the table manners...as bad as I wanted her to do better at home...the easiest way to insert it into conversation was to say it's ok to do that around family but make sure when your out in public....
or...do it back to them...show him what it looks like...and ask...how does it look when i do this vs when i do this...
the biggest thing with my SD was not to nag...a mistake i made a lot. I needed to just say my peace and let it go. Give her a chance to make the change instead of saying it two or three different ways at which point she would get defensive and roll her eyes and i would lose her completely.
Try to take a compassionate view. He is a child. One who has been abandon by his mother and desperately needs guidance if he is going to be successful in the world. You can be that person. Good Luck