ok... so my stepdaughters are twelve and thirteen. their mom who passed tragically several years ago was apparently a raging psycho. thankfully, i never had to know her. we are pretty sure that both girls have learning disabilities but the truth is they are rude and vindictive, addicted to other people's drama, make up their own drama to incite the other or anyone around them, foul mouthed and inconsiderate.
i am pretty smart. but i use logic. when i don't see or feel logic, i get tense and irritable. i have brought my daughter up using logic and reason and, until she has now spent about five years with these two little snots, she got it; mostly. she was at least on the right track until i met their father.
i love my husband. i truly believe i was sent by God (or whatever anyone else wants to call it; i call it God) to enter his life and bring peace or calm or Zen or... well to help him with this: he fought for custody from their bio mom for years, did not have a significant influence in their lives and, ultimately, got sole custody of both of them when she passed away. they were six and seven years old. he worked full time and had some gf that never, ever wanted to be a parent to these kids. between his full time work and hers, the girls got passed from babysitter to babysitter; anyone who could take them, influence (mostly not great)aside.
Now we are struggling with preteens and have fights with them daily about what they think is appropriate, the way they treat others and their entitlement to any and everything anyone and everyone else has. The oldest is 13 and has a mouth that NEVER stops running. Even when she is alone, she is talking… mostly negatively and mostly about other people’s business. She almost literally walks on her father like he is a doormat and she gets to me by bullying my bio-kid. To say the least it is a daily trudge to try to use my “blinders” so that I may find some peace from her. The middle child, his youngest, has recently been diagnosed ODD, which I’d bet most folks on this website have heard of before but for those who have not, Oppositional Defiant Disorder is usually prevalent in boys between 15 and 20 years old or is often diagnosed along with other conditions like autism, Tourette syndrome, bi-polar and ADD/ADHD. His 12 year-old also has had a rage issue. That we know of, their mother was a pathological liar, on anti-psychotic drugs, and was something of a sex-addict to which acts the child (to our knowledge) was witness more than one time. We have recently sent her to live with our pastor because we could not handle the fits in combination with her bio-sis’ mouth. I personally tried for 3 years to get somewhere with her behavior to no avail; and now, my pastor has decided that she can’t do it either and my daughter is coming home. The two of them are addicted to other people’s drama and the sound of their own voices. I do not want my daughter to come under their influence because she is really a nice kid. Does she have her issues? Well, of course she does but she has a good heart and she is friendly and she at least used to care more about the feelings of others than the business of others.
So, the long and short of it is that I vent and vent and vent like this all the time to my husband who is pretty clueless as to how to deal. I have had advice from my family and many others but short of beating the logic and reason into them (which I really can’t and shouldn’t do) I can’t for the life of me figure out how to get these very simple concepts into their heads. I am frankly scared to have the third daughter back in the house and I feel like my head is on backwards.
Any advice???