So I moved back to my hometown recently, and I am so happy! My SD is spending the summer with us and I was not looking forward to it but so far it is not too bad, of course it has only been a week... Well, here is my problem, my SD and I are not close but she is rather close to my family. She calls my sister "Aunty" amd my mother is like a grandmother. Thats all fine and dandy and makes me happy. However, my mother has been driving me crazy! She keeps getting on my case for stuff that have to do with my SD. Recently she got an ear infection and has to take antibiotics. She procrastinates and even though she is 14 years old, we have to keep track of when she gets them and making sure she eats before or after. I have been helping but i have not been breaking my back as i have learned this year (after almost 4 years of denial) that i dont have to do these things bc she is not my child. Period. I dont break my back to help out with little to no recognition anymore and certainly try my best not to let his ex wife's behavior affect me. I help at a minimum but it is my DHs responsibility. Well this approach seems to be really bothering my mother. She gets on me for not making sure she takes her meds, she gets upset over how my SD dresses, wants me to help fix her eating habits, she tries to get me to talk to her like i am her mother or bond with her. And the list goes on and on... She basically has been trying to get me to treat her like she is my child. I dont want to be rude, but i politely try to tell her that she has not been there for the past four years, she has no idea what i went through with all that. Its different when i tell someone what happened and when they actually experience it for themselves. The psychological toll this SM crap can take on someone is overwhelming. Its different if you have people who are cooperative and we can all be adults and work together, but i dont have that.

So has anyone else had a problem with their own family accepting the new way things are going to be? I am hoping that with time, my mother will start to understand that i just dont do things that way. I am new to the whole disengaging approach and i flub it up a lot but i am trying. I really need my family to understand that she is not my daughter and i no longer plan on pretending to be her mom. I just want to focus on our child together and let DH focus on his child on his own. My mother wants me to get it through my head that SD is a part of my family, and i get that. Thats why i make sure to include her and make her feel welcome, but i dont go an extra mile any more and i am not involved in trying to raise her. Help please! Does it get easier and has someone successfully gotten their own family to back off? I love that they love her but they dont know or dont realize how unbelievably cold and hateful she can be toward me and my husband. And they have no idea had crappy the backlash is when i try to help everyone. They just seem to think i should love her and be like a mom to her like there is something wrong with me. I am not close to her though and no longer care to be. I just want to hold on to my sanity and raise my actually child the best i can.