Hi there freshstart. I too have a teenage SD (18) and I am the bad guy. I haven't tried the disengaging yet, and others will probably be able to guide you better than I will. But, I can say THANK GOD for forums like this one. No one else does get what we go through, except for those who are SMums. This forum allows you to vent, picks you up when you're down and gives good advice from people who know exactly what you are going through. I just wishe we weren't spread all over the world !

Take care and be strong

Smile and look over her shoulder, into the middle distance but in an absent-minded rather than pointed way. Have lots of conversations with friends on the phone about other matters, have friends round, go out with friends... she is old enough to look after herself entirely unless you are making shared food in which case, as another poster said, it's more effort than not not to share. But if she eats with you, ask her casually as you are leaving the room to wash up after. If she does not, make no point about it, simply leave it there for DH to do as and when he thinks of it.

I don't understand the disengaging thing at all. DH gets mad at me when I leave everything up to him regarding HIS 12 year old daughter. She lives with us 85% of the time, so she is his responsibility (BM has no responsibilities with her). He feels like this should be a partnership between the both of us for raising her. I'm at the end of my rope taking her bull and watching her run all over him. I can see right through all of her lies, etc. Disengaging seems like the only way to keep my sanity. But if I ignore her in the house, my DH gets really angry and me and says "You're not treating her like a human, you're treating her like a room mate or the red headed step child". Uh duh?

MORE ADVICE ABOUT DISENGAGING...HELP!!!!!

DISENGAGING
To disengage--to simply try less or stop trying at all--requires accepting a number of truths about being married to a man with children.

*They are not your children.
*You are not responsible for overcoming their upbringing or any emotional or social problems they have.
* You are not responsible for what kind of people they are. You are not responsible for what kind of people they become.
*These responsibilities belong to your husband, who will likely not raise his kids (or make interventions with his adult kids) the way you would.

Having accepted this reality, you then make a promise to yourself: I will never give them the opportunity to treat me disrespectfully again.

Seriously genius MarriedaBalless....a round of applause please.

I think I was taking the disengaging thing the wrong way. The child is my responsibility when she is in my care (i.e.: clothes, bathed, fed, roof over her head), she simply cannot be if she lives with us almost full time. HOWEVER, her mental, future, past, or present is not my prob. I was constantly feeling responsible for this child SD12 since she was 8. Responsible for ALL.

This makes sense now.

Thank you. Very well put! Still a battle everyday tho!