I am new to this site and never really participate in online support message boards but I am now at my wits end and am looking for some advice.
My girlfriend and I have been living together for over 6 years and up until the last year, things have been great….so I thought. She has a 16 year old son and I have a 12 year old son from a previous relationship that lives with me on the weekends.
My girlfriend and I were raised very differently. I was raised by a single mother who had fairly strict but reasonable rules. I was raised to do chores, respect adults, be polite, etc. When I did not follow these rules there were consequences…simple groundings like no TV, no friends over, or when I was really bad it was a good spanking. In my mind these are core lessons that all children should be raised with as they serve as a foundation for later lessons in life. My girlfriend was raised with no rules, no boundaries, and no real guidance. Because of this she dropped out of school in 9th grade and moved out of her home. She got involved with the wrong crowd which began a downward spiral that ultimately sent her down to rock bottom. She had her son at 19, had him taken away by the state, she had no job and no place to live. Life was hard. She ultimately began pulling herself out of this abyss and went back to school, got her GED, took some computer classes and started a career. She got her son back and put all her energy and focus in to building her career. She is now finishing her MBA and by all accounts is very successful.
She moved in with me when her son was just 10 and she immediately began to see differences between our 2 boys. My son, almost 7 at the time, was polite, respectful, and always in a good mood. Her son was rude, disrespectful, and generally angry all the time. My son would politely ask for things and say “Thank You”, her son would demand things and show no gratitude. She never disciplined him and never provided any guidance or boundaries. She simply tolerated him and gave in to what he wanted because it was easier than conflict yet she would get upset with him when he acted out. Poor kid was confused…this coupled with the fact that now he was living in my home and he had to share his mom with someone else was surely difficult for him.
She was at the point where she even said she did not like her own son because of how he acted but didn’t know what to do. She asked for help so I told her that at 10 years old it would be a difficult adjustment for him and her but that with some guidance and boundaries he would be fine after a while.
Fast forward 5 years. Every attempt to set boundaries and enforce rules was met by stark opposition by her son and zero support from her. I would ground him, she would un-ground him. I would tell him to do chores; he would throw a fit so she would just do them for him. I did not really put this together until about a year ago and I looked back on the last 5 years trying to figure out what went wrong. Every time this would happen I would lose more and more credibility as an authority figure in my own home until I was finally rendered insignificant and a source of frustration for everyone.
He constantly slams things around making sure everyone knows he is annoyed with the world around him. Many times breaking things like glasses or dishes to which he offers no apology. He ignores me when I talk to him and just walks away. He treats my home like his personal 5 star hotel with a deliberate disregard for me or my things. He has no rules, no boundaries, and no consequences.

He is very smart and very focused on getting in to college. Doesn’t do drugs or hang out with a bad crowd. By all appearances outside of home, he is a great kid. He makes good grades in school and is a dedicated athlete. Being involved in so many extracurricular activities required him to be at many places at inconvenient times for his mom as she would have to constantly leave work in the middle of the day to take him to practice of events. This was used as leverage for him to get a car on his birthday. When he turned 16, against my wishes, she bought him a new truck. He practically demanded it. He did not have to work for it or contribute anything to it. This was her solution to her being inconvenienced all the time having to drive him all over town for his sports events. What he learned in this situation was that that he is rewarded for inconveniencing her. A lesson that he continues to leverage today.
Now, on top of him having no rules, no boundaries, and no consequences…he can now come and go as he pleases and is accountable for nothing. Sometimes he will just take off at 11:00 at night and be out for hours at a time.
This was the last straw for me.
I put my foot down. She blasts back telling me that my way did not work and that the best way for him to succeed is to not have rules or boundaries. He should not be bothered with stupid things like dishes or taking out the trash because those things are petty compared to him doing good in school and sports. All the things that bother me do not even register with her…and she even went so far as to tell me that it does not bother her so it should not bother me…that maybe I am the one with the problem. This has obviously had a detrimental impact on our relationship and over the past 6 months has forced me to re-evaluate our relationship. Obviously we do not see eye to eye and she does not respect me or the things that are important to me.
The tension in my home when he is there is thick. I do not enjoy being in my own home with him there. It is obvious he does not like me and obvious that I don’t like him. The really sad part is that none of this is his fault. He is angry and confused and has an unrealistic idea of what the world is like. He feels entitled to everything, everything belongs to him, and he should have to do nothing to deserve any of it. In many ways I feel bad for him. I am sure he will end up just fine as he really is a smart and capable kid….but he is going to have a very rough time.
He is 16 now and things just get worse and worse every year. I already want him out as he is also becoming a bad influence on my son. I don’t want to go on for another year, much less two plus years in this kind of environment.
This conflict has now created a big rift between my girlfriend and me. We have discussed counseling, which I am all for trying, but she feels it would be a waste of time because she doesn’t see that there is a problem with what she is doing. She truly believes that what she is doing is right…after all that is how she was raised and she turned out strong and successful.
She is heads down focused on her career now and I am just doing the same. She works until 9 or 10 at night and she shows no interest in me anymore… to be honest I have been doing the same which is just not healthy for either of us. At my work I am a manager over a large department. People respect me, look up to me, and value my input. I feel important and needed. At home I feel insignificant, disrespected, and unappreciated. My girlfriend and I are basically roommates now who had a relationship at one point. The problem, in my opinion, is not her son. He is merely the symptom of a bigger problem.
I am really not sure where to go from here. My first instinct is to just call it off and let them go. Her and her son would no longer have to put up with me, which would probably make their day to day lives easier and less stressful. I would no longer have to deal with him, which would make my home a much more relaxing place…but I would be throwing away a 7 year relationship.
She could just move out and get her own place so as to remove the perceived source of the frustration and we could continue to stay together…but I feel that would be taking a step backwards and not really addressing the real problem.
I am at a crossroads. I don’t want him to stay, but I don’t want her to go.
Sorry for the long rant but it helps just to get it out.