Why would he do that?  I don't understand the back story, no blogs to read.

Learn from this. Please!

I can’t believe I am saying this but Curious Georgetta, has some valid points. 

Dont have them in your house if you know they talk trash about you and don’t have any respect. But it does seem your DH wanted to hide something at the same time. 

I'm fine with DH seeing SS19 in our home - I've told him I don't want to be part of it, but as long as he never leaves SS there unsupervised (which he wouldn't, he doesn't trust him either), then I don't care.

HOWEVER, if SS ever bashed me, DH would shut it down so quick his head would spin.  I frankly wouldn't care if SS hated me, but I would care if DH sat and listened to it because he was too scared to set limits on it.

I could not live in a situation where I felt I had to either check security cameras to see what my spouse was doing, or disable them because my spouse was checking on me.  That's a fundamental lack of trust that would be unacceptable to me.

I think you have to decide if you can live with your DH tolerating his kids talking crap about you or not, whether it's in the home or out, because it seems that's what bothers you and DH won't do anything about it.

Ugh, I cannot believe some people actually think it is okay for your DH to stoop so low and disconnect your security camera in your own home so you cannot hear/see DH and his brood bad mouthing you and God knows what else.

I feel so bad for you, what your DH did is so wrong in so many levels, especially given the fact he seems to be well aware of how you feel and how his toxic brood feels about you, him and your marriage.

If it were me, honestly I would contact an attorney to see what my rights are about my spouse disconnecting a security camera that I assume you had installed or you and he had installed. I would also contact my local police chief to see what kind of charges could be filed against him for doing this.

Seriously, what is your DH doing? He is protecting his little snowflakes. Wrong, wrong, wrong. You are his wife, not a flipping spy. I'd ask him what is he trying to hide? If he has nothing to hide, then why did his disconnect the security camera?

Still I feel so bad for you, as this blows a level of trust.

I also would contact the security company to see what they recommend about what to do when this happens, as I assure you, this unfortunately has happened on more than one occasion. 

Best of luck to you and remember you do not deserve to be disrespected in your own home.

But for the dad to allow this to happen in the home you live in is so wrong and disrespectful on so many levels and the fact your hubby is so chicken shit to open his mouth, i’m just lost for words.

i’ve toler So much shit and unacceptable behaviour and disrespect from sd22, ss20, sd14 and their bio mum, their dad wouldn’t let them badmouth me in our own home or when meeting outside because they have so many behavioural issues and total failure to launch.

exwife doesn’t have the balls to criticise or trash me direct to hubby, its always via a 3rd person who passes the info on...

op you need to firmly tell hubby if he ever disconnects the security camera again that police will be called and security company advised of this. From memory security camera company will call asking if you shut it off, say no and noone is allowed to at home and authorise them to notify police. 

Maybe a knock on front door by police will make hubby shit his pants and grow a frigging pair of balls. Trust me i called my husband a pussy before for not standing up for me against his son with exwife... he didn’t like it because it offends his ego, but he learnt to stand up and man up more

I'm finding this whole mess to be a bit over the top for me. If my husband literally had to be babysat by a spy camera so I knew everything that is done and said, I think I'd really have to rethink whether this was a good marriage for me worth having. 

You didn't particularly want him to go a few hours away and spend a couple days out of the house with his children because you wouldn't know what was said and done unless her told you. You allowed him to have them come to your house, believing you could watch and listen via the security camera, but are livid he shut it off while his children came and then turned it back on when they left.

You're treating your husband like a child who isn't to be to trusted without your immediate supervision. I couldn't continue to stay married in this situation. To me, the best of the two situations would have been for Dh to go have the couple day holiday out of the home if these were his two choices. No, no one wants to think a guest in your home sits and bad talks you while you are out at work ( or wherever) , but do you really want the solution to be mandatory spy in the corner monitoring the exchange? 

To me, it's either time to let go of whatever rotten things the adult kid snarls about you or to tell Dh he is no longer 'allowed' to see his toxic offspring and let the chips fall where they fall. 

I do totally get your feelings of betrayal on your DH's part (your DH not standing up and shutting his daughter down, et) but I wouldn't want to have things the way they currently are either. I wouldn't find being able to peek and listen in via security cam the answer here. 

Could he have disconnected the internet, which also turned off the security cameras? Just a thought. 

And don't ever let this family in your home again. You don't need that negative energy in your home. I don't give a hoot what my OSD says about me, but she will never do it in MY HOME.

I do think this thread and the thread about the SM who called her SD a bitch are interesting.  Some posters on here really have different standards depending if it is a SM or not.     

OP I am sorry you are not happy in your marriage.  I hope you find peace. 

He is a sneeky ball-less asshole. Time for him to go.

He is your husband. He should put you first. That he does not makes him and his shallow and toxic adult kid gene pool a collective write off.

IMHO of course.

Please take care of you.

First, the security system a good move on your part.  Keep it, and do not ever let it go.

Secondly, due to his intentional disconnection, and his secrecy--- they never come back in YOUR home again, he goes to see them in their own locations and he can talk all he wants about whomever there with them.

If he has any issue, he can go live with them.  They do not deserve to come in YOUR sanctuary and he lost they priviledge of hosting them (out of your generousity), when he pulled this stunt. There was a reason to disconnect, that is clear to anybody.

Watch him very closely now....think about what else he may be secreting.  If you see too many red flags you may need a break from him....

I don't understand.  Have you used the system to monitor private conversations in the past? 

Have you talked to him about this?

We have a similar security system in our house.  I have accidentally caught some conversations when reviewing the video that I didn't intend to catch.  She may not have been spying.  Sometimes I will be checking on dogs or looking to see when someone got home and it catches an adjacent conversation.

At the same time, he might not have been planning anything bad but trying to make it so that he doesn't have to deal with your anger if his daughter acts in a way you do not like.  While I don't agree with it, I know that men often try to mitigate potential conflict.  Clearly this is something he feels very uncomfortable with -- meaning how to navigate the relationship he wants to have with his daughter while not wanting to upset you.  

He went about it wrong and it would call into question all sorts of trust issues for me.  I would have to assume the worst happened and the worst intentions by someone turning off the camera.  In our house a teen shut it off exactly once.  Turns out it wasn't for nefarious things, but to use the outlet there but it does not happen anymore because of the optics.  The optics of him turning off the camera looks like he thinks he has something to hide.

This should be brought to counseling and it very well may be that this is evidence of too little trust and too much distance between what you both want for your relationship to continue.  

I am sorry this happened.  It must hurt terribly.

These kind of incidents make you wonder if having a man in your life is really worth all the drama.

OP, curious if you have addressed this with him and what his response is. Give us an update when you have a chance.

Considering that #3 means that this was a part of counseling and proved your worst fears right, I do think you should go back to counseling maybe individually and discuss this issue in regards to whether you want to stay in this relationship.

He knows he views things as innocuous when others (you, counselor) see it differently. And instead of leaving the camera on to learn more and develop new skills at analyzing appropriate vs not appropriate, he turned off the camera.

Very not ok. 

Another perspective: Had he left the camera on, it would have been a great opportunity to demonstrate and be proud of proving how well he handles interacting with his adult daughter in appropriate ways.  There's no way for him to prove that now that he's turned off the cameras.  So you have to assume the worst and that he KNEW he didn't learn how to manage things better in counseling well enough to trust his own behavior.

How close are you to leaving?

What is being missed is that your DH has zero respect for you when it comes to his children.

Forget the camera, has nothing to do with the issue...

This man is allowing horrific statements to be made about his wife and is doing nothing to defend, but rather encouraging the behavior by giving them a safe outlet. 

OP - until your weasel of a husband can be a man this will never get better. Counseling. Communication. Banning the children from your home. None of it will make a difference.

I don't like when 'leave' is thrown around easily on this forum. But in your case what is there to salvage? 

Very true dysfunctionally. It all boils down to these DH's allowing their children to abuse their wives. They enable the abuse. None of this would go on at all if the stood up for their wives. 

There are no surprises here. He disconnected it because he knows what happened in the past with the tape.

The question is why did he disconnect it instead of telling SD (and others?) they can't bad mouth anyone because the tape is rolling? It just seems a little backward -- if he wanted to be proactive and protect you from hearing something you shouldn't, perhaps he should have made it clear that talk isn't permitted whether you're there or not.

They never handle this stuff the way they should.

I installed cameras inside and outside solely for the purpose of making sure SS34 never again enters my home. DH is 100% aware of why the cameras are there. It’s been 2 years. 

There would be HELL to pay if DH disabled those cameras while I was gone. 

I had a similar situation happen. I paid good money to have a security system installed. SD22 was home and suddenly the entire system "went offline ". This was way back in October, I haven't been able to get the system back online since. Have to pay to have it all reinstalled... coincidence or did someone kick it offline? Our city has gotten SO bad for break-ins and drug related crime, I'm home during the day taking care of our daughter... I don't know why she'd disable the security cameras, but I haven't had any problems with them until that night 

Support system means someone who helps you through your issues, not create them. Sd is on a selfish mission to end daddys marriage to stepmum for no other reason than she is a self centred narcissist!

if she were daddys support system, then guess what?? She wouldn’t create issues, trashtalk her stepmum and come to her dads house with stepmum for a bitchfest. She’d actually shut her pie hole, be respectful and listen to daddy. She can’t do any of that because she creates the issues, thrives on it and having attention on her. 

You always come here trying to create arguments and drama instead of being supportive, your advice lacks any understanding of the dynamics of a blended family which changes completely the issues we deal with often. My bad... you do have 1st hand experience in blended families by viewing your sister and ex bil treat their child as the centre of the universe so that of course gives you expert knowledge of  the issues we face.

Unless you are fully living in a blended family and dealing with these issues first hand, you shouldn’t even be a member of this group commenting!! You must have alot of free time to waste here criticising and critiquing the stepparents here and their issues with really stupid answers 99% of the time lacking any depth of understanding of the issues we face daily as normal life.