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Can’t stand my stepdaughter

Lissy70's picture

My SD is young adult and hardly sees my husband because she doesn't like being with me or my kids. When she does see him I am always excluded, even though I don't want to be around her it hurts my feelings to be excluded. I even find myself getting jealous when my husband goes out with her. We had very rough teen years she hated that her father got remarried and "his new family". She should have been put in therapy but her parents chose to spoil her not discipline her. Any suggestions to not let this bother me so much? 

Comments

hereiam's picture

Well, you don't want to be around her, any more than she wants to be around you, so the best thing for your husband to do is to see her without you. As long as this is not ALL of the time and does not interfere with your life together, who cares?

Some of the blame goes to your husband for spoiling her, instead of disciplining her, or getting her any therapy that she needed.

If you are being honest, are there not things that you exclude her from?

Just think of it as one of those things/obligations that your husband does without you. Like a business meeting, you wouldn't expect to be included in those.

I know it sucks. It would be great if everybody could just get along and be in the same room together but it just doesn't always work out that way.

There is nothing to be jealous of, as long as your husband is not doing anything behind your back, emotionally or financially.

Loxy's picture

Given you don't want to spend time with your SD anyway, I think the jealousy you are feeling is more about unresolved feelings regarding your DH.  I wonder if you feel or felt somewhat betrayed by him because he didn't / doesn't stand up to his daughter (ie he doesn't have your back). If you feel that way, it would probably feel like rubbing salt on a wound every time he goes out with SD and excludes you. 

I think you need to talk these feelings through with DH and try to make him understdand how you feel. 

Lissy70's picture

You got the mail on the head. That's exactly how I feel. If I talked to him about this he'd think I just want him to stop seeing her. But thank you! 

Rags's picture

Yep, don't  let it happen.  Go with DH every time he meets SD.  She will either stop all contact or modify her behavior.  Either way, you win.

Diablo

tog redux's picture

You feel jealous because he has allowed it to be a competition over who gets his time. She "demands" things and she gets them, instead of DH being a parent and telling her that it's HIS decision, and yours,  whether or not you are included in events, not SD's.  He's never taken a stand for you and made clear that you are his priority, and while SD is free not to like that, she's not free to be disrespectful to you or insist you be excluded from anything.

So your problem is with your husband, as is often the case on here.  Yes, SD is a pain, too, but if he dealt with her appropriately, you wouldn't feel the way you do.

Lissy70's picture

You are so right. I guess that's why I'm so upset, who cares about her. But that he doesn't take a stand for me is what's hurting.

tog redux's picture

Maybe with this insight you can have a discussion about it with him. But these men are typically more worried about losing their kids than their wife, because they assume (often correctly) that the wife isn't going anywhere because she hasn't yet. And there is a very real chance that their kids will cut them off if they don't cater to their whims. 

Lissy70's picture

That's exactly it, he is afraid to loose his kids so does whatever they want. I'm constantly excluded from things and he'd rather listen to me complain than loose his daughter. I am dreading the day this princess gets married and has kids. 

Aly Fran's picture

I know exactly how u feel I'm dealing with something similar... I have two kids from previous marriage and DH has a daughter from previous marriage however my kids lives with us and his daughter lives with her mom she use to visit every Sunday and DH and I now has a daughter together that's when all the conflicts started with SD she developed a very hateful behaviour started telling lies on my kids and I to her dad then he'll come back and start heated arguments because he went with the fact that I jave a problem with his daughter I took all the verbal abuse because I told myself she's only hear for 1 day a week so I can tolerate it but eventually the lies and confusion she made started to become worse it even involved his family his sister, nieces his brothers anyone of his family that were close to me and DH would curse everyone out for her that girl cause some real trouble in our homes going into details would keep me here typing all day.. But nevertheless I retaliated and exposed her lies to him his family stood up with me and DH would still say we were against his daughter in his eyes she's God it took putting our relationship on the line when he finally realise his back were against the wall I made his bring her to my face to confront her about all the lies I new she told her father and there and then the truth came out shame was not enough to describe his expressions he was hurt all he kept telling her is I could of put my head on a block for u but I'm real disappointed however her and her mother wasn't to please that I exposed her to her dad by the way her mother was half of all the trouble she caused so her mother stopped sending her for visits altogether DH will still accuse me of having a problem with his daughter he said he misses her and he sneaks her away from her mom e times so far for the year and for those 3 times we still had pretty bad arguments after she left only now he wouldn't direct our arguments to her instead he'll look for any fault he can find to cause problems but I told him I knew deep down inside its not that we're arguing about is the fact that everytime he sees her a week don't pass without us having a terrible argument.. Her mother claims she doesn't want the daughter around me so she curses DH out for bring their daughter around me her mother told DH to take their daughter and carry her out for ice cream for 2hrs on a Sunday alone that they don't want me and my kids around but he refuses Instead he brought her for our daughter's birthday she behaved very rude and stayed in the hot sun she didn't speak to anyone only her dad and if she wanted to get a message across to me she asked her dad to ask while I were standing right infront of her she didn't step into the house she behaved like I would do her harm I offered her food, cake etc in which she replied no I good in a harsh tone of voice she went to the neighbour's house and basically stayed until the party were over ofcourse her dad had an answer to defend all of that..  she call her dad when she know he's on work and it's like they're both hiding to have a conversation dealing with this he has always look for someone or something to blame her behavior on most of the times he covers up for her and always accuses me of having a problem with her the truth is I do have a problem with her hateful behaviour 

lieutenant_dad's picture

If she is a young adult, she gets to dictate who she wants in her life. Same as you, as an adult. I understand why you're hurt - it sounds like she was resistant to your relationship from the start and your DH smoothed things over by throwing you under the bus. However, now that she is no longer a minor, you both can maintain separate relationships with your DH.

If the reason why you are jealous is because he is spending every weekend with her, or he's spending all his money on her and can't maintain his commitments to your household, that is an entirely different beast that has to be addressed; however, the issue there is your DH, not SD. Shift your perspective away from her and onto the person who is actually causing YOU problems, because so long as she isn't directly interacting with you, the problem isn't her.

Harry Potter's picture

Depends how regularly he sees SD, but just say for example you do a monthly thing where you and your kids do something nice while your husband and SD meet up. So you don't have to be around her, they get time together but you're not sitting at home feeling annoyed/miserable. And as long as he's not spending ridiculous amounts of money on her or taking her places that you want to go but he hasn't taken you, then it could be a win win situation.