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HELP ME PLEASE....I need to vent

jacksway's picture

I hate being a step mum.......my partner of 3.5 years has a 6 year old daughter. Although she is incredibly bright and intelligent she acts and still does stuff that 3-4 year olds do. She can’t brush her teeth for herself, can’t get herself a drink, always asks for food every 2 minutes then never eats it, talks in this most annoying babish voice that it’s like listening to someone scratching a black board with their nails. I can’t say she is a naughty kid, cause she’s not. She’s just a spoilt, painful, high maintenance kid that I am having trouble connecting with. Around her dad she is such a goody good it’s sickening. Always craving affection, kisses and cuddles and talks to him like....dada I lovey lovey you poo poo.....and she even says.....oh dada googo gaga......honestly sometimes I just want to rip her voice box out.
I have a 7 year old girl. Don’t get me wrong she’s not perfect either, but at least she acts and does things that a 7 year old does – yes my daughter sometimes answers back, and doesn’t listen but she also talks properly, brushes her teeth without any assistance, gets herself food and drink when she needs, puts dishes in the dishwasher, shares toys etc – she’s been doing these kinds of things since she was at least 4. There is 15 months different between the two girls but you would think there was 3 years with the things they do and how they communicate.

My partners family are fantastic – I love them very much but lately I have notice they treat the step daughter quite differently to my daughter.....My in laws let my step daughter get away with everything and baby’s her. The two girls will be playing a card game and should my daughter win the step daughter has a mini break down and so my daughter is told (in a nice way) to go easy on the step daughter cause she is only little so then my daughter will let the step daughter win and the whole family do the big high fives with the step daughter and rub it into my daughter that she just lost?? I mean, WTF?

SD doesn’t play well with other kids either. I have 8 nieces and nephews....all normal (not perfect either but not horrible kids). Let’s say all the kids are in the backyard playing tag, the step daughter is right into it, having a blast and then she gets tagged. When this happens she says “I’m not playing now” and will go off into the house to watch TV.....so the game starts again without her and she’ll come back out after 5 minutes and wants to play again and then she gets tagged again and the same thing happens. Then my partner or if his family are around will say, hey you kids, don’t leave step daughter on her own....involve her in the game please. They try and tell the adults what she does but they all say, it’s ok cause she’s only little. One of my partners brothers was playing catch with my daughter, step daughter and another one of his nieces who is 8. My daughter and the niece were catching and throwing the ball back to their uncle and the step daughter couldn’t catch or throw back properly.....so she got upset and in a whiny baby voice says “uncle, can we play something else just you and me” he said that’s not fair on the other two so she performed, crying, hyperventilating etc until she was almost sick and then he gave in and the other two kids had to go and find something else to do.

My step daughter comes every other weekend and now it’s got to the point where my daughter asks to go to her dad’s on the weekends the stepdaughter is here. I hate that my own daughter doesn’t even want to be at her own home anymore. I have tried talking to my partner about it but he gets defensive and we end up arguing. I love him with all my heart and am so confused about what to do. The last thing I want is to cause a rift and also start treating my daughter in the spoilt manner that my step daughter is treated. I can see frustration building in my daughter that the step daughter gets help with everything from brushing her teeth to putting a plate in the dishwasher. On so many occasions when I ask her to do whatever she would say but step daughter doesn’t have too....and I can now hear myself saying (to keep the peace) well she is only little!!! I am starting to dislike myself and resent my step daughter. Please help!

joanie's picture

"of course she doesn't have to, she's a baby and a little bit stupid and you are a big smart girl."

if I were you id refer to the fact that she is " slow" or "backwards" or "not big ans smart like you"

every. damn. time. someone babies the kid. make it clear that they're basically saying she's retarded. go along with it by pointing that out.

it may shame her, or them, into behaving a bit differently.

I could be way off base but man I would totally make sure that kid knew that this behavior is not normal.

oncechoosetosmile's picture

I feel sorry for your daughter who needs to deal with this child who was made to believe she is a princess.
It is very typical-she was spoiled and got away with everything all her life , obviously a product of a guilty parent, who only "wanted her best".....The big problem is that a child who is brought up like that is a) not capable of doing anything for herself and b)will be deeply insecure and confuse since the normal world is soooo different to what dadddddyyy made her believe it should be which equals all about her!.
Those children can't simply be happy because they always need the world to spin around them, they always need to win and always be treated as special, better and more then anybody else.Another narcisstic personality has been created.
The big question for you is, how responsive would SO be to face a reality check?Or would he be likely to justify his behaviour with his parents doing exactly the same stupid things toward SD?Can you talk to him about those issues and will he genuinly listen or rather try to find flaws in your daughter in order to look away from the problem?
When I started dating my SO Sd was 5 and had total adult and mini-wife status.Life was really hard with her, she was also a "goody girl for dadddy"but at the same time possesive of SO and couldnt even sleep on her own without disturbing us several times or dragging him out at 4.30 out of our room to get him to play board games with her!!Of course my own kids are also annoying at times and especially my younger one is not the best listener which made it hard to say anything, but at the end of the day their behaviour didn't impact our relationship whereas she tried to put a wedge between us.
Good news is that I have an awesome SO who started to listen and really wanted to help our rs, so with the help of books and educating ourselves about stepfamilies in general, things changed slowly.
Though problems are still sometimes there, I feel so much better about being a step mom plus SD now 7 1/2 is a much nicer and less spoiled kid now - her true personality is a rather funny and bold little girl, who is much more likable than what came across at the beginning.
I hope that you can talk to SO and he will listen- in that moment he starts parenting her properly instead of babying her I promise you that a big part of your resentment will be gone.Don't forget, she was made to be what she is now-if SO and his other care giver would have had some common sense they could have prevented her to become what she is today.
Let us know how you go and read as much as you can about stepfamilies, eg "Stepmonster"

mommaTina's picture

OMGee your SD sounds like my SD2 when she grows up, no offense but I pray NOT. But the same behaviors you listed for your SD are there for mine. Doesn't play well with others, whines, constantly searching for attention from daddy. And like onechoosetosmile said they get made this way! So, I'm on here and people are bashing me because "she's only 2" but she started doing these things BEFORE 2. I ignored it because she was just a baby in my eyes and it's only gotten worse. So, now I know I don't want to ignore this behavior and, again no offense, but be in the same boat as you 4 years from now because I would LOSE it having a bratty child like that. Right now SD2 is selfish, manipulative, cruel to her siblings, defiant, etc. I think all of these traits can be channeled into positive ones I'm just trying to figure out how. I hope you get some guidance on how to mold her so that you don't have to endure her behavior for much longer as it is! Hopefully your relief comes soon.