Dear lord give you strength to deal with this crap. I can say that not caring about what a skid does is a lot easier for me and my sanity. I used to get all worked up when the skids didn't want to take a bath or little things like that because I thought I was teaching them something and making their lives better to prepare them to be in society. I learned that if the parent don't care then it is best for you not to care either. The one thing I do care about is having my sanity and being comfortable and respected in my own home. I hope everything works out for you!

That because he is used to both mommy and daddy catering to him. How old is he?

I so feel your misery!! I just had the worst 2 weeks of my step-mothering life, vacation. I had already decided to cut the actual vacation time down by 2 days because I was having so much anxiety over keeping SS11 busy that I couldn't deal with it. As soon as SS get to our house he starts in on the itinerary, I had already told DH that this was super annoying and I did not want to have to plan out minute by minute of the next 10 days, but I also didn't want to have to report it to SS. Literally the night before we are leaving DH tells SS to take a shower, I come downstairs and I can hear what sounds like a tv in the bathroom, while the shower is going. SS come out of the bathroom and the floor is covered in water, the corner has about an inch of standing water, so I ask SS why there was water all over the floor, he says sorry I'll clean it up, so I ask him, were you watching a movie on your phone with the shower curtain open, while taking a shower? He says yeah....I was speechless, so I just say, don't do that again, and I head upstairs to inform DH. DH yells at SS and takes his phone and tells him hes never getting it back, then he gets mad at me for "making a big deal all the time", so I leave. I come home a few hour later and go to bed. Next day we are leaving for vacation, DH and I aren't speaking and he is being a marter, packing everything up by himself, hitching the RV onto the truck, etc. SS comes to me and says can I download some movies onto the iPad? I'm thinking are you kidding, but I tell him to go ask his dad, he comes back and says dad says it's up to you. Now I'm super irritated, I go find DH and tell him it is not my decision, but why would he take away the phone for watching movies while showering (too much screen time) and then give him an iPad?!?!? Apparently that made DH feel stupid so he gave SS back his phone AND let him take the iPad. But don't worry Coco, DH told SS that while on vacation he needs to be be off electronics and playing outdoors or reading. Guess how many times that happened, 2 bike rides and 1 game of corn hole with DH because SS can't entertain himself, and the book was never opened once. But I stopped keeping track of the hours he spent on electronics.

While we are on vacation, I'm really trying to focus on the positive, but his behaviors are so irritating. He is manipulative and passive/aggressive, ignoring doesn't work because he will repeat himself and follow you around forever!! It's hot, I really wish we were at the beach; you know what would cool me off, swimming; I just looked at the weather and it's cooler by the water; and on, and on, and on. On the days that we went to the beach he needed someone in the water with him, he couldn't just swim or play. DH cut his foot so I went into the water to play, but if the ball went too far I was being mean, and he scraped his chest on the sand and said that I injured him. I told him that was the last time I was playing anything with him because making false claims like that is not funny. Then when he is done with an activity, whether it is hiking, or tubing down a river, or swimming, or shopping, whatever he starts acting out so we leave.

We got home a couple days ago, and yesterday everything needed to be cleaned, the RV power washed, etc. So I am cleaning the house and doing laundry, and DH and SS are outside taking care of the RV, every time I walked by the front door it was wide open, which is a huge pet-peeve of mine, for a couple of reasons, first I think it looks trashy, secondly it's unsafe, and most important I am deathly allergic to bee-stings and the last thing I want is to be vacuuming away and get stung in my own house because the front door is open. I go outside and tell DH that if the front door is left open one more time I am locking it and they will need to ring the doorbell to get in. Of course I know it's not DH leaving the door open it's SS but I have told him 1000 times and he still doesn't do it, DH says something to him about it and he says "I forgot", which isn't good enough for me. So things got very ugly. DH asked me if I had brought my epi-pen with me to the RV because I could bet stung by a bee, of course I hadn't so he says I'm just being controlling, and want everything my way. Needless to say we still aren't speaking and SS comes back in 2 days........I'm so miserable. 

Lol, this is great. I mean, it's not, but. I feel "fuck your fortnite" in my soul as well.

Sweet Jesus, the video game thing is my life. SS12 is obsessed, and gets whatever he wants when it comes to it. My SO is not one to trifle with either- he can be very hard on the skids. But when it comes to video games and his son, it's all "SS really loves video games, so who cares? Anything goes"! He actually suggested that I go into SS's room to "watch SS play video games", as a way to bond with him. Are you fucking crazy??? 100 times nope. How about he come out and socialize like a person? He has almost no limits on screen/video game time. I had to insist that my SO set the controls to turn the PS4 and SS's phone off at 11pm, so he wouldn't stay up all night playing. Now...SS wants an X-box. SO agreed to pay for 1/2, SS has to pay the other 1/2. SS called the other day and said "how about if you buy the X-box and I'll pay for the (insert some stupid X-box related thing here)". SO says "Um, no". SS: "Why not"?. SO, because that's just not going to happen. I'm cheering inside at that, but also annoyed that he's even paying for 1/2. 5 minutes later, SS says "So dad, what are you thinking about the X-box"? I am biting my tongue, trying not to scream out, No one cares about this fucking X-box!!!!, but luckily my SO exasperatedly said, "Idk, we'll talk about it when you're here". This kid does not need an X-box. I feel like you do, where fuck it, If I'm the only one who seems to care about them being normal contributing humans who care about more than video games, then I give up. Also, we recently came into a "free" computer. I asked SO what he wanted to do with it and he says, "I might give it to SS in case he ever wants to try playing computer games". REALLY???

This kid is starting to become entitled. Recently he went kayaking with his BM's boyfriend, so he knew what kayaking was like. The next wknd we took them to a lake where kayak rentals were available. He wanted to rent a kayak soo bad. So my SO did, for $15/hr. I'm cheap, so that seemed like a lot, but whatever. 10 MINUTES later, SS was bored and done kayaking. Like, you JUST went kayaking last wknd, so you knew what it was like and that you wouldn't want to do it for long. Yet you'll let your dad spend the $ on it so you can do it for 10 mins. Then he wanted ice cream. My SO said, Jesus, everything just has to cost money with you, doesn't it? I said, no kidding, you're lucky I'm not the one who paid for that kayak since you only used it for 10 minutes. I would have made him go for at least half an hour, but no, SO let him just do the 10 minutes and be done, wasting $15.  

I'm also looking at buying a house (by myself, but SO and skids would live there), and we did a few drive-bys of houses for sale. One was 3 beds 2-1/2 baths, and twice the square footage of the house we currently rent. As we were driving past it, SS said, "Oh, is it that small house"? My SO said, It is literally TWICE the size of the house we live in now. SS said "Yeah but it looks small, and i thought we wanted a finished basement? I just don't want to buy a house that's crappier than what we have now".  OMG. The whole point of buying a house is to get us out of the shithole we live in now! SO said to him, "I don't think you get a say in any house that we are buying, because your view is obviously very skewed".

I need to not care. I need to just let SO handle it and not be engaged in it. But I hate entitlement, and I see it happening (despite SO swearing he doesn't want entitled kids), so it's always this internal struggle of "Fuck it, but also, turn the fucking games off"!!! The point of all my rambling was that I feel your pain, and I too drink a lot of alcohol when skids are around as a coping mechanism. It's all so exhausting.

Lol. Truly an underused phrase.

Yes, as if SS12 isn't obsessed with devices enough, my SO bought SD9 a smartTV for Christmas, despite my very verbal protests, because, fuck it!, might as well get her obsessed with electronics too! She never talked about wanting a TV, and actually said once that if she had a TV in her room she would never go outside. So of course he buys her one. Now she's in there daily watching youtube videos where grown adults play with dolls and act out different stories with the dolls in the most annoying high-pitched voices imaginable. She's 9. This is well below her age range. I can almost hear her getting dumber. But SO looks like dad of the year because hey, new TV!

I have started to embrace the screen time, because it means down time for me. And I'm sick of fighting a losing battle. As someone else said, you can't care more than their actual parents. So now I sit and drink wine in peace with skids in their rooms rotting their brains with Youtube and video games. I'm all out of fucks to give.

Regarding houses: SS12 keeps saying if we get a house , he gets his own bathroom. When he sees a house for sale with 2 bathrooms he says, I get my own bathroom! What in the actual fuck? I say, no, absolutely not. Then he says, well if we build a house I definitely get my own bathroom. Yes, we will spend an additional $5,000 so you can have your own bathroom. WTF?? I said, under no circumstances will you have your own bathroom in a house we buy or build. 100% you will never have your own bathroom in our new house. I know he is a kid and this is probably somewhat normal behavior, but Jesus, it is annoying!

Honestly, your SS sounds exhausting. Hopefully he will grow out of some of this, but your DH needs to step up too. There is nothing wrong with being firm with kids!