# What's next



## 6foot5 (Jun 15, 2011)

We have been married for 7 years , have wonderful 6year old son and 16 year old girl ( my wife’s daughter from previous marriage ) . Things started to go in the wrong direction about 3 years ago when our daughter turned 13 , she started dating , bringing home boys much older than she was 17 and 18 year olds , which didn’t really go well with me , on few occasions I had to show them the door after I found them sleeping in my stepdaughters room , which of course led to arguments with my SD and eventually with my wife who didn’t see anything wrong with those guys having a nap in our house . Then there were instances where SD would call my wife straight in her face " you f.....g ***** " then she openly call her that on Facebook which again didn’t go to well with me and I told her to stop this behavior or else ... But as SD put it " I hope you get f....d up the a.." . Since that point her behavior kept on deteriorating and troubles kept on piling up , she would ran away from home countless times , hanging out with the wrong people . Then I started to put some pressure on my wife to try getting her D under control since D didn’t care what I was saying .If I tried to tell my SD that she is not allowed to do something i.e. stay out until 11pm she would go to her mother and got her permission , and never once my wife stood by my decision regarding rules and what I thought was right for SD , my wife would always decide opposite to my decision …and that’s how its been going on for a couple of years , I would always end up being an a..hole in the house . My wife has never been an easy going person with me , she can not understand that I have my own personality and I don’t think the same way she does , other words if things are not done her way it is wrong .Compromise does not exist in her vocabulary . About 3 months ago I got really ,really pissed off when SD came home higher than a kite on the top of that she brought some beer in to her room and drank it without any consideration for me or her mother , my wife didn’t seem to be upset ,all she said was “ this is just teenage thing “ at that point I just gave up on our marriage .I stopped talking to my SD at all , I try to stay out of her way , I am trying to avoid any confrontations at all and believe it or not its been quiet up until last week when something hit me like a ton of bricks !!!! I go to pick up my son from school , then the principal asked to step into her office , she says that my son had a visitor from Children’s Aid Society and was interviewed by them , so I asked my son what happened , he says that the lady was asking him if he wants to change his home , if he wants to live somewhere else and what is going on between me and SD , right then I knew that it had something to do with SD . So we get home and I ask my wife if she knows why CSA was interviewing our son , she said that SD was talking to school counselor , because the way I am treating her and my wife . I asked my wife what to hell are you talking about , she got all defensive right away , started blaming me for the whole situation between us , me not being involved in this whole BS with her daughter etc. I just shook my head and went to work .Later that day I wrote an email to my wife from work , told her exactly how I feel , I told her that I will find out exactly what happened at SD school and I will not allow SD to get my 6 year old son dragged into her issues , shortly after that my wife replied that she was actually the one who went to SD school and decided to talk with school counselor – that really puzzled me ,why would parent go to their child’s school counselor and brag about marriage problems and then said that it is OK for Children’s Aid Society to interview their other child ?
Now after 3 years of crap my wife decided to fix our marriage , she already told me that she is going for counseling and if I don’t go with her she wants a divorce . 
I am not sure if I should go with her and try to get our marriage back on track ? I have a feeling that if I go with her to counseling it will somehow turn against me and will get kick on the balls again . 
What do you think?


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## onepotatotwo (May 17, 2011)

As a stepmother, I wanted to comment on your post.
I just posted something similar today about how my H doesn't actually parent his kids...he lets them run amok, and tells me to take care of discipline--which goes against every parenting book I've ever read, *but* do it because I've had a great relationship with H's kids. Normally I can be calm and rational, but there are incidents where the kids behavior is so *bad* that I can't react in any other way than I would if they were my own...intense! 

I really feel where you're coming from and how you're trying to do right by your W and SD... Teens are hard to parent even if they're you're own, let alone step. It sounds like you're trying to be a good husband and a good stepdad...kudos to you!!  It is a thankless, incredibly hard job, so good on you for trying.

I don't think though that your wife is being fair. Threatening divorce if you don't go to counseling is a bit extreme. It sounds like a manipulation... The counselor may be one that has already "taken sides" and is about confronting your issues instead of the stepfamily issues... We had that problem with a counselor the biomom chose for the kids--We were subjected to his telling us what's 'wrong' with the kids...and then he proceeded to tell me what's wrong with me that needs changing. Never mind that there are 4 adults in the picture here, *I* was the focus of his attention because he was being paid by biomom--biodad has to have a relationship with her of course, and biomom's boyfriend isn't involved in any kind of relationship with the kids... Needless to say, after months of going as individuals, couples, and all kinds of variations, I said no more. All he was doing was focusing on 1)kids are defective and in need of weekly counseling sessions and 2)I was in need of weekly individual counseling sessions so I could accept biomom's obsessive relationship with my H.

I hope that your situation works out for you... You sound like you've really tried your best to make a go of things.


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## RunningOnEmpty (Aug 29, 2010)

6foot5, sounds to me your wife is setting you up for divorce. She'll probably claim you abuse her and your SD. This way when the custody battle comes up, she can retain custody of your son. 

This is just a theory, and I may be off base.

Go to dadsdivorce.com, and follow "The List". Get a recorder and keep it on you 24/7.


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## 6foot5 (Jun 15, 2011)

Thank you both for your advice and words of encouragement .
There is more to my wife than just her being unfair , saying that she is unfair actually makes her look good comparing to how she actually behaves towards me .I don’t mean to be bragging but I have nobody to tell how I feel since I had to leave all my friends and best friends behind shortly after our marriage , so please just let me explain some of my problems and please don’t think that I am trying to blame her and make my self look good , I just want to tell how she is .
When our son was born we decided that she is not going to go to work until he starts SK , so she was at home taking care of the kids . That time we would go to see my friends , meet people , you know normal life , about a year into our marriage she started passing judgment regarding my friends and not because they did something bad to her or me or our kids but just because she couldn’t stand “sharing” me with other people .So she started judging people and one by one was labeled by her and shortly after that she told me its either her or my friends , why would she say that I will never know, but people I knew were always kind to her and our kids , we were always invited to their homes , she was always treated with highest respect .This is how she labeled some of my friends:
R- he is a drunk , and his face looks like a giant pimple. 
F- this guy didn’t even finish high school , why are you even talking to him?
J- you can see him , but only with me 
K- she is a dirty ***** , I don’t want to see her ever again 
All of those statements were not true , so I started asking her questions why is she calling them all those names ? She would never give me any answer beside one low blow statement : “ Its either me or your friends “ , so of course I chose my family , I love my son very much and even if I had to put up with my W for the rest of my life I will do it ,just to be close to him.
There were many more friends and people which I knew that I had to give up because of her , after a while we really didn’t have any friends we would not go anywhere except shopping and activities with the kids and that’s pretty much how its been for the past 6years . One more thing , just to make sure I wasn’t going to see anybody she started complaining about the city where we lived , she hated it for reasons that I don’t even want to mention as they were disgusting. So about 3 years ago we bought a house 30miles away in the small town where I can sneeze and everybody will hear me , it also tripled the distance to my work ,but it all doesn’t matter to her as my paychecks keep coming in every week into our joint account , keep in mind that her paychecks go into her account which I have no access to , and whenever Iam short money to pay bills I have to ask her for it , she however has no worries and takes money out of joint account anytime she wants . 
At this point Iam really pissed off and often times I ask myself why am I still putting up with all this BS ? I was never anti-social I always had people around me , now I have to go online to talk to people and hope that somebody will understand what I have been going through with this woman . 
What’s next?


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