Ok-if any of u follow my blogs-you know that my dh is out of town and has been since November-finishing up military duty. He will be retiring and becoming a stay at home dad. Prior to his my dh has not lived with us full time since 2007 due to miltary service. SS lived with us from age 1 until 2007 when he was 9 and then moved in with bm. Things have been super ugly for many years-with ss threatening to kill my son (he had detailed plan), being agressive with my kids, stealing, lying, taking my panties and taking them to school, and screaming at me daily. After he moved out some of these big behavior disappeared (we did not see him for a year while dh was deployed and have not seen him for almost 6 months now-in between times we saw him eowe)but ss continues to disrespect me by not acknowledging me, if confronted about it he simply states he doesnt like me or wish to be around me and has said the same about his sibs.

so dh and i had talked and I told dh I just couldnt bear for things to go back to the way they were when he returns home and he agreed. Said he had lots of time to think, knew that he had handled it all wrong with ss, and wants to make up to me. He agreed to visit away from the home. Victory!

However I spoke to dh today-he will be home in 2 weeks. He had gotten another message from bm just stating that she has no idea what to do with ss re: his behavior. So dh was saying, "I just wish you guys were civil so he could come back here and live" I immediately corrected him that I was always civil-and he did backtrack quickly and agree. He said he just felt ss had a better chance to be successful in our environment than bm's. I aksed him why and he said, "look where she lives". "he's got nothing to look forward to". "I just feel bad". urgh. First of all, dh is evidently a snob of the highest ranking. We live in a nice home in a gated community, but are definitely not the rockefellers. Just average middle class folks. BM works in a factory and lives in an old home that has been dividied into 3 apartments. She lives in a quiet neighborhood, with lots of older folks, I dont believe that the other apartments are rented and typically have not been the majority of time she has lived there. I've been inside and while it is not luxorious by any means-it appears to be in good repair, was clean the time I was in it, and looked ok. However, my dh just acts like she lives in a slum. He has referred to ss's school as "inner city" multiple times-and it is not-in fact it is considered a fairly good school in the city he lives in and as I said his neighborhood is considered a good, "old" neighborhood.

To say because of this "he's got nothing to look forward to" is amazing to me. What does that even mean? He plays baseball and is in band. So two extracurriculars. That's about what my kids average. BM gets a paycheck, plus cs from 3 different fathers. We still supply at least 50% of ss's clothes so he looks nice (when he chooses to). Why dh thinks he would be more successful I am unsure. I truthfully believe that he would crash and burn here. He gets d's and f's there because he doesnt do his homework. If he decides he wants to do homework in a particular class he gets a's and b's. Most of the time his teachers go easy on him and give him a's for homework turned in weeks late. Here if it is 1 day late your grade drops to 50%-it is not accepted if it is 2 days late. He would have straight f's. He has been suspended 4 times this year for mouthing off to peers and teachers. If he were here that would mean he would miss out on the out of state field trip my dd just went on, the trip to the local amusement park that is approaching,etc. Also, if he lived here he'd be grounded all the time. Because I just cant act like it's ok to not do homework and scream at people and hit them. That's why he wanted to move out in the first place. These behaviors were daily so yes, he was almost always grounded from something. The behaviors have not changed since moving in with bm but she allows him more privileges.

Ugh! Sorry I am going on here-I just dont understand how dh can even think this way. It was sooo horrible with ss living here-really bad even with him visiting here-nothing I've done has been able to change it-what attempts he has made to change things have not helped either. SS's relationship with me and his sibs have all grown steadily worse over the years.

To add insult to injury-he told me, "you are going ot help with the transportation when I get home?". Dh can't drive due to a brain injury/seizures. So he cant even make the 3 hour roundtrip to go get ss for visits. I told him that no, I couldnt commit to that. That I wasnt going to say that I would NEVER help just that I wasnt going to promise to do this on a regular basis. If I did I would be giving up my entire Friday night eowe. 3 hours roundtrip is to MY house-to dh's parents where he has agreed to visit-would probably add an additional hour.

I had told him specifically when I broached the subject of ss not visiting in the home that I felt like he would be expecting me to do this. So he already knew I didnt want to do this. I mean, if I dont want to visit him in our home, why would I want to give up 2 Friday evenings a month for him? Dh sees it as me doing something for him and not ss-I get that-but ss refuses to even acknowledge me-so these drives are tortorous. I feel like a chaffuer. Except I dont get paid.

Please help me be strong in sticking to my guns here.