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BM alienating teenage daughter

Anne28's picture

I have been a lurker on this website for about a year and it has been incredibly helpful. This is my first post and please excuse me if it gets long...

For 2 years now I have been in a great relationship with a guy who has 50-50 custody of his two daughters, 13 and 9. Just to set the scene right, I guess it's important to mention that I am 10 years younger than him, never been married, no children (yet). Technically we do not live together but we spend all of our free nights together and he invites me to come over for dinner and stay at his place almost every night he has the kids. We are seriously talking about having children together in 1-2 years. He also encourages me (and expects me) to be an active stepmother - spend time with them (also 1:1), attend family occasions and school meetings, discipline when needed, babysit them when he has to go away etc. Well, this all works very well with my younger SD. We have a wonderful relationship, I love her to bits and I think she loves me too, she is extremely affectionate with me and wants to spend time together, asks me to put her to bed and talks to me about everything. I feel blessed to have her in my life. My older SD is a different story though.

I came into her life when she was 12, she has always been coldly polite towards me. I tried to get a bit closer to her but I felt like she wasn't very receptive to that, and I decided to just be nice and warm to her but not try too hard in order not to appear too pushy. For a while I thought that forming a closer bond with her was going to be the biggest challenge....boy was I wrong. Fast forward a year, she has turned from a 12 year old child to a 13 year old teenager. She is selfish and unhelpful, talks back, yells at her father, her sister, her BM, everyone(except me - I think she feels she hasn't figured me out yet and isn't sure what my boundaries are). When at home, she is in her room on the phone/ipad, she only cares about makeup, clothes and boys, recently she started lying about everything - from smallest things to serious stuff. She also says extremely hurtful things to my boyfriend - she hates him, she doesn't want to live with him, he's ruining her life, she understand why her BM left him (not true), he's the worst father in the world etc.

I realize that talking back, eye rolling and being stuck to the screen of their phone are normal for all teenagers and parents just have to be patient, set healthy boundaries and stick to them. My boyfriend does give his older daughter some free passes when she talks to him rudely or slams doors but in general he does try to impose some boundaries. In terms of parenting style, I totally and completely support his decisions. The difficulty is that compared to their BM, my boyfriend is the strict parent. He isn't strict, only strictER than BM. He is extremely loving and affectionate, but he is also very involved - he knows what classes they have each day and what homework they have to prepare, he doesn't allow disrespectful talk and lying.

HOWEVER, over the last year his relationship with his older daughter has been deteriorating very rapidly. Her BM has an extremely relaxed approach, she doesn't check her grades (which have been on a steady decline since my boyfriend was forced to stop helping her), doesn't insist on her doing her homework, her house is always dirty and there are no expectations for children in terms of help with house chores, respect, anything. Her 13 year old daughter even called her a bitch and got away with it!! It blows my mind. BM also gives her inappropriately a lot of money, so the end result is this disrespectful teenager loaded with cash (which every month she spends in one day on clothes and candy) and no responsibilities at all. When my boyfriend tries to calmly insist on her doing her homework, or grounds her for lying, she just leaves and goes to BM's house. In the meantime, BM further manipulates both girls' opinions of their father. She does it in a subtle way, here are just a few things that we heard back from the girls: she has implied that during the divorce their dad only cared about money (not true- he bought them a house and gave a huge cash settlement), that she alone pays for everything (not true, they have a joint account for the girls and my boyfriends' contribution is three times bigger than hers), that their dad thinks she (BM) is stupid (he and I only ever speak highly of her in front of the kids).....

Combined with the fact that she is the "no rules" parent, these manipulations are driving a huge wedge between my boyfriend and his older daughter. This results in constant tension at home, a lot of fighting and shouting. My boyfriend is suffering like crazy, cause whenever he says or does something she doesn't like, she says she hates him and goes to her BM (she lives 3mins away). He is trying hard to stick to his boundaries and not give into this blackmail but it's so hard when it's your own child threatening to leave you.... I try to be as supportive as I can but I feel resentment against this girl building up. I also simply don't know what is the right thing to do here. I would appreciate any thoughts on how to make this situation more bearable.

Comments

Anne28's picture

Obviously it was never my plan to fall in love with a divorcee who has 2 kids including a complicated teenager...but it is what it is.

I know I'll have to reassess the situation and our wish to have a family together in 1-2 years time, and of course if things go terribly wrong I am not going to put myself in a situation where I'd be living in constant hell. But I know my SO is going to do everything in his power to do the right thing in this situation, and in general he is very good at doing the right thing even when it's not the easiest thing to do (as in being the strict parent despite losing popularity, not giving into manipulations, knowing when to put whose interests first)....

Thumper's picture

Anne28 you wrote:

He also encourages me (and expects me) to be an active stepmother - spend time with them (also 1:1), attend family occasions and school meetings, discipline when needed, babysit them when he has to go away etc.

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CLove's picture

That was a lot, in a nutshell, and there are many "questions" posed here.

#1. Teenager 13 gets mad at rules and dad, and runs to mom at every chance.
Many times, when teens are using emotional blackmail on the stict(er) parent, and do the whole "boomerang child" thing, this can be remedied by a solid Custody Order in place before things get to far along in divorce processing. Your SO should get a really good lawyer, and either put a CO in place, or use the legal system to enforce the current CO. Legally, on SO time, child HAS to remain with designated parent during designated times. If that is 50/50, then it needs to ACTUALLY be 50/50, and you can get the legal clout to enforce this, using the CO.
*** For the child's sake, as well as future sanity, it must be enforced. Read through this site. Do a search on RAGS. He is the person who has experience in this area. He has used every inch of legal clout available, to much success.

#2. She is acting like a teenager Child Of Divorce and is pushing every button she can possibly think of to get reactions from your SO. That's what teens do, normally, she will hopefully grow out of that, but much of that comes from bad parenting. Does she have any activities? She would benefit from outside sports or some other activity. I found this to be good to get kids out of room and off electronics.

#3. As to the BM parenting and household - relevant but irrelevant. None of your business. This happens in my situation too. We have rules and structure, expectations, and BM does not. Winona SD18 calls BM a B!tch too, however we receive way more respect at our place.
YOUR BM is doing something called "Parental Alienation Syndrome", and trying to turn the child against her own father. This is beyond your area of what you can do anything about. AGAIN, I would mention the CO. This is the almighty tool of all tools. Once the BM is served paperwork, things will calm way down. Once BM learns your SO is SERIOUS about not allowing teenager to boomerang between household at her whim, once BM understands that her child custody is at stake, she will more than likely change her tactics. She has been allowed to run rampant over your SO, and now teen is doing same.
Tell SO "get thee to a lawyer! Get that CO in place/practice!"

Anne28's picture

Thanks for your reply.

#1 I did bring up the idea of seeing a lawyer just to discuss our options but SO was very much against it. He doesn't want to take or even threaten legal action because despite everything he still has a decent-ish relationship with BM - they help each other out when they need to swap days, discuss school stuff (mostly for the little one) etc. He feels that involving lawyers would complicate his relationship with BM and both kids. Also we live in a country where if things went to court, the SD13 would have a say where she wants to live, and it's likely that my SO would lose custody if she said she wants to live with her mother.

#2 You are right, a lot of it is the consequence of no-rules parenting, which was one of the main reasons for their divorce. And yes, we are trying to encourage her to do sports, get out of her room etc. She never wants to do anything but is always happy afterwards if she does end up going somewhere.

#3 I understand that we cannot control what goes on in BM's house. But I am happy to hear that you are managing to stick to your rules and structure and that your SD accepts it in your home. I hope we get there, too.