H says he thinks about SD all the time but doesn't know how to deal with her!
I'm sure most of you know the story of SD22 and her relationship with H. The screaming fits to the point where the neighbors called the police once 5 years ago to come to our house, which was utterly embarrassing, the swearing she'll never talk to him again and he isn't her father and she never liked him and leaving in the middle of the night putting on a whole show for the neighbors. It's been 4 months now and no word from her. I'm happy as a clam but H says he thinks about her all the time but has no idea how to deal with her. She would never talk about anything that mattered and if H asked about if she was going to go back to school or get a better job or leave her boyfriend that she complained about she would get defensive and run into the other room and call BM or just pout. He said that until she can have a real conversation with him that he isn't going to contact her. That it's up to her. Well I think he's going to be waiting a LONG time seeing as how he never sent back the things she left when she ran off in December and he hasn't made any effort to contact her. If he did, I'm sure she would just ignore the calls and if he doesn't then she'll tell everyone how awful he is.
The thing that absolutely kills me is that he never listened when told him that this Disney vacation with her was going to be a disaster. It was 8 months in the making that I was worried about. And we saw her once in all those 8 months before she flew up here for her very brief visit the night before we were supposed to leave and then threw her fit and left in the middle of the night. He kept saying after she left "I'm SO sorry. I should have listened to you". Yes you should have! But no, he kept insisting that she HAD to meet her relatives and how much fun it would be for her and it would get her away form her boyfriend and the drama.and how he'd keep it light. NOPE! I knew all along it woudl be a shit show and thank god that shit show happened before we got on the plane!
He gives up on her but yet he was always on my case to "try" with her. How I never really "tried" and if I did we might be really bonded. Oh puh-lease! I have not bonded with her since I met her when she was 8 years old!
Don't talk with him about her.
Seriouslyl. His kid, his problem. If he brings her up and says he is thinking about her, he is trying to get you to engage in a discussion. During that discussion, he'll probably try and convince you to try again or that you are somehow the problem.
Don't play. If he brings her up, say nothing. Walk out of the room. Mumble an "oh" or some other inane response. Just don't go there with him. If you don't engage in discussion about her you will be much better off.
Of course he thinks about her
Of course he thinks about her all the time, it's his daughter.
I'm not sure that's true of
I'm not sure that's true of everyone. I recently decided to step back a bit from concerning myself with my DD37 whose Dad (my exH) died at the end of January. She can be very moody, demanding, and uses me as a whipping boy for her negative feelings. I made a conscious decision that I was going to change my end of the relationship, and not make myself responsible for her mental wellbeing as I have done for the last 6 yrs since her divorce and her Dad's decline and death. I can honestly now say I don't think of her all the time and I am much more at peace because of this.
Sometimes as a parent you need to step back not only for your own good but theirs as well.
I'm not saying obsess about
I'm not saying obsess about your child - but it seems to me that many parents at least "think" about their kids quite a bit. In other words, because the OP doesn't like SD, doesn't mean her DH will ever feel the same way.
I don't understand these
I don't understand these parents that expect us to try harder with their children than they are willing to try with them. If a parent's relationship with their kid is iffy, it's likely going to be the same or worse with the SP. We're not these magical creatures who can come in and bippity-boppity-boop a good relationship for everyone in the family.
If he wants to have a relationship with her, then he has to meet her where she's at emotionally. If he is disgusted or embarrassed by that, so be it. Having a kid who disappoints you is a possible consequence, even in intact families. But thinking that a trip to Disney and a short conversation about her future was somehow going to fix 22 years of programming was foolhardy at best (and idiotic at worst).
A toxic kid is like a bad
A toxic Skid can be a lot like a bad case of jock itch. The burn and itch is so bad it cannot be ignored and some cases are very difficult to eradicate. DH needs to buy a "can" of idiot Skid spray and purge the fungus from his life. It is far easier to get rid of a toxic pelvic ejecta than a bad case of jock itch.
Stop the burn!
My skids are such horrible people who ignore hubby
Until they need his atm or favours for jobs etc.
i have disengaged long ago and every now and then hubby is suckered into their bs how they’ve been neglected by biomum abandoning them etc for a year when barely months ago you were all good and couldn’t spend time with us as a family. Hubby is then getting suckered into the guilt of sd24.5 & sd14.5 coming on our mini family holiday with the excuse “oh i addressed those issues with them and they apologised so why not give them a chance”
reality is they told daddy they were sorry and didn’t know they had done anything wrong (translates to I don’t feel i did anything wrong but just to shut you up i will apologize)
they did not apologize to me and have been strangers for the past 17 months as i have had no contact whatsoever so why the heck would i want to go on holiday with strangers.
i had to remind hubby that i have no blood relations to his kids from exwife so any feeling of having a relationship with them is based on us mutually being pleasant. It doesn’t work when they’re allowed to be such pos and i’m expec To suck it up. As an outsider i have every right to not want anything to do with them and he needs to manage his relationship with his kids from exwife away from me...
It's like he wanted me to
It's like he wanted me to jump in and be the mother she never had! Oh he keeps telling me how her mother shacked up with all these guys and she never had a steady father figure in her life because BM would try her damnest to keep SD away from H. Yet the times he did get her he seemed to not want to spend time with her because she exhausted him with her talk of nothing so he always went to work on his motorcycle or take a long nap or play video games leaving her with me. I hated it but I felt bad for her and didn't want to leave her alone.
Oh and how many times he asked others to talk to her becasue she wouldn't listen to him. He asked his stepmother to talk to her about how her life is going nowhere, he even asked his manager who came up for a party when SD was here to take her aside and talk to her about moving up here and getting a job wih them. Why is it everyone else's job to deal with SD and set her on a path to righteousness, but you! Yet he has no problems partying with SD and being a buddy. I even said to him a few years ago about how he woudl ask her to come over for a weekend but then he'd have to work one of the weekend days and we'd have to hang out or he'd ask her to spend the week when I was working from home and he was gone from 1PM until 11PM at night M-F but I was with her 24-7. He told me that he was hoping we'd bond! YOU are the one who always complained you NEVER got time with her and now she's here and you pawn her off on me with the whole "Oh I want you two to bond". You want us to bond when you, HER FATHER, isn't even bonded!