Hi all,

First of all I am so glad I have found this platform as I have been really struggling mentally with coping with my 23 year old SD moving in with us.

A bit of background being my SO and I have been together for 8 years,  I have daugher aged 18 who is living independently with her BF and we wholeheartedly support her and have a good relationship, although she was probably the SD from hell for the first 2 years of our relationship but has turned out independent and academically hardworking although a little workshy!  My SD is from his first marrriage which he left when she was 3.  He had another marriage from when she was 6-15 and his 2nd wife and SD got and do get on extremely well.  SD has been to university, so has been independent and is doing her masters, which will finish this year.  When she finished Uni she started living with her gradparents after a short while as her relationship with her mother was very volatile.  During COVID she felt it unsafe to continue to live with them, as she works part time in a care environment, so went to live with her SM.  I hope you have kept up!

In June last year we moved to our dream home and she had asked my SO if she could move in with us.  I have had very little contact with her and have only had a couple of small 'family' holidays with her, so I don't know her that well.  You may ask why this is but she didn't want to get to know me and always refused invitations to come to our house.  I have not ever not wanted to engage with her and have wanted to have some form of relationship with her for my SO sake as well as wanting to get to know her personally.  She finally moved in with us in the November and we made it as comfortable as possible for her, painting her room a colour she wanted, picking up furntiture and putting it together,.  All the small things you would do to make someone happy and comfortable.  She had gone on about having her own room with her own things as she had been living in others houses for so long.  I couldn't quiet understand this as she had lived with her mother for 16 years and visited her dad and had stability there and she chose to go to uni and move from her BM, but I went with it as it is how she feels.

We had a meeting when she moved in just to get ground rules in place and this really is where is started to go downhill.  She didn't agree with paying a nominal amount whilst living here despite earning a wage and wanted to buy her own food and eat ours.  I did point out that there are other bills to pay and it would be good to help out which didnt go down well.  To be honest no other rules were agreed on and we kind of just  agreed to see how it went.  Also my SO was about as much use as a choclate fireguard in this meeting and it made me look like I was being demanding.

I know am a very tidy person and I found it hard at first because of her age when she would just leave stuff in the kitchen and not wash up or take things out but I have relaxed a little and compromised, however there is no compromise with her.  She doesn't clean up and expects someone....ie me to wash her clothes and take them up to her, leaves the bathroom filthy and expets us to cook her dinner.  She has cooked twice which we both encouraged her with and she said afterwards she is an amazing cook but doesnt like the pressure, which I think meant I won't be doing this again.  This may all sound petty and I have tried to speak with her asking her to take the hair out the plug hole and clean the phlemge off the bathroom side (sorry it makes me gag) and she will just look at me like I have taken a big dump in front of her and ignore me.  I asked her the other day to empty the hoover when she had finished with it, the one and only time she had hoovered only her room in 3 months and again I got the look but she did ask me how to do it.  MY SO said she looked at me like that as no one ever asks her to do anything in the house and doesnt get why I want her to.

You may think I havent tried enough to engage but believe me I have.  I have lent her my car when hers broke down and I didnt get a thank you for it.  I will buy family takeout and her dad has to say to her say thank you.... I get her things I know she likes when Im shopping none of it is ever good enough.

Over the past 5 days she has stopped coming downstairs so much and I thought this a little odd, whereas before she was coming down and trying to have her dads attention all the time and sitting right next to him so I couldn't or she will come and talk to me about how her work colleagues think she is hilarious and intelligent and moan about life. I actually thought we were starting to slowly get on all be it I found things difficult.

Our house isnt very soundproof so when you talk in another part of the house it reverberates everywhere and yesterday I heard her talking about her dad and me which was really upsetting.  Apparently I am odd, I can live with that as I like myself!, and when I come in the room I just sit there staring at her, not sure what at but you know and she mostly just called me they.  Her BM and SM hate her dad as he manipulates words, which she said he does to her and she would choose her BM over him anytime.  Talking about how we interact with her and belittle her, which we do not, but if she does it back we bring her up on it.  She also said that she would wash up when she wanted to and her Grandma had to learn that when she lived with her and I was obssessed with being clean (cant say Im not so fair point about the clean bit).  Also her dad had asked her what her future plans were and she didnt like being asked this as she didnt have any and didnt want to have any plans and just because he always wanted to ahcieve didn't mean she wanted to.  I could go on and some of it was downright mistruths and really awful to the point I thought why are you living with us when you were happy living with your SM and clearly not happy here.  I put my headphones on in the end as I couldnt take anymore.  

Do not get me wrong she works (3 12 hour shifts every 2 weeks) and is finishing a masters degree but her entitlement is just wrong.  She believes her dad should pay for everything and doesnt undertand why he works so much but we are doing a house up and although he has a pension some of this went to the SM and also he paid out a lot of money to her too, so we arent left with as much as she and her BM presume.  

At first my SO acted harshly towards me when I said she wasnt contributing or that I felt it was expected of me to clean up after her and always said I was attacking her, even when I said something nice!  But because he isn't at home he doesnt see what it is like and presumes it is different to what it is.  TBH he and her BM haven't set her up for independence and always come to the rescue with anything minor ie she needed 2 new tyres and my SO took the car in and paid for it even though she has significant savings and never offered to pay herself.  At 23 I was in my own home just about to get married and a year later have a child whilst she wants me to wash her clothes, her dad to run after her and she will maybe go travelling (on whose money no idea) in the summer.  I just want her to start to consider being independent and think about living on her own or in a flat share, more for her sake than mine as she is choosing not ot be independent and I dont beleive she wants to be self supporting either.

I just don't like her acting nice to my face and behind my back being so disrespectful.  I know we all have a good moan but some of the things she was saying I was seriously shocked at and I would never have known she felt the way she did unless I had heard it for myself. I feel really uncomfortable in my own home and the thought of dealing with this for months to come fills me with dread.

Thank you for listening.and reading some of the posts has made me realise my feelings are normal as at times I really don't like her at all and it feels wrong to feel that way about your SO child.