I am sorry for your loss

Some hurts are just too deep to heal. Even when the source of the problem (skid) is gone, the pain lingers. I hope you find some peace, but unfortunately, I have no answers.

And this is why I put her right out if my life. Should DH pass before me,. I will not tell her. She has made my life a misery, my husbands life a misery. She has not spoken to him in months because he said something she didn't like so now she is punishing him. Still it is all his own fault, he should've put her in her place. He failed to do so, now he is in counselling and on antidepressants. Hell will freeze over before I allow that evil back into my life. She has no rights without responsibilities. She wanted to break her father and she's come very close. She in the end will be the biggest loser.

I am so very sorry for your loss and for that final insult from her. No one deserves that. If it helps, In trying to cut you out and make a fool of you, she made a bigger fool of herself. Let it go. You have enough grief right now, she doesn't need to be adding to it. Again, i am so very sorry fir your loss and also for the hell your life was with your stepdaughters jealousy.

Lucky momee, she went far to far too many times, Then her boyfriend started on me and my FIL actually supported this evil cow. That in itself was odd, she hadnt spoken to him in 10 years. I was in counselling last year, it almost drove me insane, and the stress had compromised my immune system. Physically and emotionally I was a basket case.

This piece of work gave daddy an ultimatum 2 years ago when she had her first child. If he wanted to se it, he had to leave me.

DH being his usual self just kept trying to get me to "understand". He even then didn't put her in her place. So I did. Her place was in her home, not mine. I reached a point where I told her to go and DH to go with her. She will NEVER be in my life again, not even through him. He knows its over. His daughter told him for years she would never accept me as part of her family, now I will never accept her in mine. She is not normal. There is a personality disorder right through DHs family. Dealing with it in him is enough.

You are right if he thought for one second he could get away with it, he'd have her back here in a heartbeat. But he knows it would be the end if the marriage. That is not an ultimatum or a threat. That is sadly just how it has to be. This woman is full of hatred and happy to be that way.

3 doctors, my counsellor and my husbands counsellor have all warned me to stay well away from her. My husband was there when the doctors said it, and when his counsellor said it. My husband knows it has to be this way or he leaves.

But again your right, he would have that evil back in his life today if he wasn't so busy protecting his own self. He knows should he leave me, she would have nothing to do with him, he'd be out on the street. She has told him she will break up our marriage and see him alone and lonely like her poor mother was. Mind you, he said she didn't mean it. See, still she can do no wrong.

NOPE. She will NEVER be in my life again. My husband will have to deal with his feelings over that, I'm done with the drama.

My dh says the door is always open to,his daughters, even after all the hell they put both of us through. Can you imagine getting a court motion from them on your wedding day? That was planned cruelty. I think many parents would have severed ties then and there. He as said not a word about it to any of them, except the youngest. Is that irrational? He has hope......well I have the resolve to not ever let them in my life again.. And yes if dh dies first, the first thing I do is change the locks on the house he holds onto.......and I will expect a huge fight, legally from them. I look forward to kicking their asses to the curb. It is long overdue!

And let dh had the nerve to chastise me for my "tirade" during our vacation a month ago in which he played phone and text tag with her for the first 4 days. It infuriated me, then and now, but yesterday when he mentioned it I said nothing. I did point out that this same daughter called when we were in Europe two years ago, and no calls in between? See the connection, he doesn't of course.. Always always gives them the benefit of the doubt. A true fence sitter! We have agreed to disagree when it comes to his daughters.. But realistically they will not be around, only if he is ever dying, and certainly when he does pass. The youngest daughter has an emotional neediness where he is concerned, it is interesting to watch.......he exists to soothe her, but she is a bottomless pit and is never satisfied, so she is always not speaking to him. Good....she can sulk for her lifetime..

My husband has three children. All in their thirties. When I banned the princess she banned her brothers. Gotta thank her for that. Then she remembered she had a grandfather. My husbands father. So, she worked her black magic there. Now he barely speaks to my DH and doesn't speak to me at all. Bargain, another gift from her to me. No more 4 hour trips to cook wash and clean for FIL while he and DH talk Italian all weekend. I am free from the madness and will stay that way. DH knows it. It was insanity. Everyone in that family was bitter and angry over nothing. Everyone wanted to be top dog. They each thought they were above the other. Nothing was ever good enough.

If my husband wants to be part of that and wants the door to be open to his daughter great, he can get his own door. To expect anyone to put up with what this woman was doing is absurd. Certainly not a sign of love and respect from my husband.

I now treat myself with some respect. I no longer feel like an unwanted unwelcome leper in my own home. I certainly feel no guilt as to how this all turned out. I bent over backwards to make that woman welcome in my home for 8 years. She wanted nothing to do with me. All that has happened is I have come to accept that and moved away from it. She didn't think it through. It never occurred to the special child that I would draw a line one day, no one has ever stood up to her till now. My husband, well who knows what he will eventually do. He has admitted to the counsellor he knew what was happening. But he said nothing to her because she would stop talking to him. That hurt as for years he denied it all, said he didn't see it, hear it, I was making it up, I didn't like her,the usual stuff they go on with. But no matter at the moment things are peaceful in our home and I am using this time to find me again, to get back my confidence and some much needed self esteem.

I will never go back to that dark place in hell. To do so would mean I would still be here in 20 years having SD problems, because SD is never going to change. More to the point, I have changed, I will not be their whipping boy or the family doormat any longer. Yes I am second wife, but I will not be treated as second best.

Sorry for your loss and your POS SD. May you never have to set eyes on her or hear her voice ever again.

I too am sorry for your loss and to hear about your SD's obnoxious behavior at the funeral. Your friends must have been so stupified by her actions they were at a loss to step in. Skids seem to play on the times we are totally unprepared for their smallness and narcissism to come out. Were you disengaged from Daisy before your DH died?

I agree with EBU, the relatives will be informing SD of her Father's death and I will immmediately get a restraining order so she will not have access to our home. SD has demonstrated several times that she is not to be trusted when it comes to hostility toward me.

You asked why there are no melodramas where typical problems with skids are portrayed. I've been asking this same question for decades. If there have been, they are few and far between. I agree with you that narcissism of both SD and the enabler has a big role in this whole senario. But I have to say if some of the true horror stories I've read on this site (including my own) were to be presented in a movie or on TV the average person wouldn't believe or be able to grasp it.

I still can not believe some of the truly sadistic things dh's daughters have willfully done to him and dh has never addressed it. He says nothing in return to their countless rants about they have been victims. I too wish I had never heard of them.. I wish I could hit the delete button. I can not imagine the true joy that would come with them being forever out of my life and head. So yes, I can empathize with your feelings.. In the meantime, dh is free to engage, but interestingly, he is not. I think that is the most of a stand that he is comfortable with. It really is a very dysfunctional arrangement. God help the poor spouses and children of these emotionally stunted witches!

I'm so sorry for your loss and everything that has happened to you at the hands of your SD.

My DH actually warned me that when he dies,if it's before me what I should expect from SD. There will be drama, their will be tears and their will be a show for all to see. SD loves being the center of attention and if she's got an audience she'll be the loudest, the rudest and most obnoxious person in the room, even at a funeral. She has no manners or no shame. We were told that when BM's Mother was in the hospital on her death bed, SD was out in the hallway picking up the security guard, how's that for class.

I don't think you can prepare for that moment, I'd like to think I could be graceful and strong under the circumstances, but there's still my whole redneck side and it would probably show thru.

I think I have been blessed to get this lit out of my life before anything happens. I would hate to go though over 20 years of marriage then lose my husband and still be harbouring anger and resentment towards my husbands daughter. His family and my husband himself who without doubt played a leading role in all of this. Without his complacency, it could not have happened

I have been pretty much off the radar the last few months dealing with what I believe to be the last of DHs performances that hurt me.

He is a narcissist, yes, but there is more to it. Is he Borderline personality disorder or perhaps a sociopath. I am not qualified to label him. His psychologist says its hard to put a label on it. He says it is culture it is upbringing. But again it is more than that. Those things only served to make whatever personality disorder he has worse.

However as I said, I am truly blessed because it is just about out of my system now. SD means nothing, as does her boyfriend. When I think of them now I smile, well laugh actually. Never thought it would be possible to look back and laugh at any of this, but it is. You see the last time I was put in my place was by SDs boyfriend. He told me something FIL had said about me and it all blew up. I returned jewellery (by post) to FIL, spoke to SIL and told her everything including I will never set foot in Swan Hill again. I was finished with this family. That was the beginning of my recovery. Sure it actually got worse before it got better, DH showed his immature, nasty arrogant I will pay you back side in January. That turned out to be a blessing in disguise too. After what he did to "show me" the switch of power he had over me went off.

I can honestly say he cannot hurt me anymore. If he were to go before me, well no one in his family is talking to him or me, so I don't have to deal with them, and I won't be. I will be looking after me, not inviting that back into my life. So they can't hurt me anymore.

There are no winners in these situations only losers. I lost my health and almost had a nervous breakdown over this. My husband was the love of my life, my soul mate, the man of my dreams. Then his daughter came into our lives and he became my worst nightmare. The wonderful special spark of love and light he brought into my life was snuffed out, he allowed all of this to happen to me. That is not love, but then again a narcissist cannot truly love anyone, they have only love of self. My husband does not love his daughter. She played him like a fiddle, she manipulated him, sucked up to him big time, pretended his opinion was important to her, acted the helpless little girl for him, she needed daddy. When her mother died almost three years ago, well, she had been handed a gift from heaven so she thought. She got to play the my mummy died and I only have you daddy card. He was lapping up all of the attention, she was making him feel special,, she was building up his ego, she was feeding the narcissist what he needed to grow even stronger. That was her sirens song. She knew what she had to do to win daddy back. Or so she thought. Her gift from heaven turned out to be a poisoned chalice. You see, while daddy loved her making him feel special with her words. He knows she cannot cook, clean, wash or iron fir him. He knows she cannot manage the finances, she cannot open the garage door to put her car away, or take out the trash. A life with her would mean going from being taken care off, to being the care taker and he's not giving up his creature comforts to take care of her. He sees himself far more special than that.

But, out of everyone in this family I at least got something from the experience. I did not lose everything. Sure I lost the special spark, but having that kind of love for a narcissist while wonderful for them, is life sucking for the person who loves them. I lost the spark and GOT MY LIFE BACK. I have a new found respect for myself. I like myself. I actually don't see myself as an unworthy low life anymore, I find myself kinda neat. Smart, intelligent actually. Kind, compassionate, understanding and empathetic. I have all the qualities of a good person, something my husband and his family don't have. I have love in my life, I have 4 wonderful grandchildren and 3,wonderful kids. My husband has what. I have friends and I can laugh. I have so very much to smile about. I am not the loser in this. I am the winner. I survived the narcissist.

I am so sorry for your loss. What your exSD did was horrible.

Dunwiththem,

I am so sorry for your loss, but glad you are finding peace now. I am so happy you came here to share your experiences. You are a strong and kind woman.

I am only 4 years into this step mess, but compared to a lot of women here, I have it easy. Although my DH's adult daughter and 2 sons are horrible, hateful people who show no love for him, my DH sticks up for me and has set firm boundaries. It has been very hard for him, because the 3 of them are so manipulative and nasty. My family thinks I am exaggerating when I say how bad they are, but they are really monsters. DH made the awful mistake of having 3 children with a horrible woman. I think he was too young and too into being her "prince coming to the rescue" to see what she was really like. His kids are not normal. They almost seem to have no souls. But they know right from wrong, and always choose wrong.

Right now, I feel ok, but in the back of my mind I sometimes wonder....being that these adult babies refuse to work, I see them being homeless someday. I do not know how that will affect my DH. I also have a terribly naive and interfering MIL.

I made DH promise, before we married, that we will never support them or allow them to move in. I saw how bad they were, but they have just continued to get worse, and my MIL has way too much to say.

Thank you again for sharing your journey.

And we share dh's exes as well. She is real piece of work. I understand she wanted out of her family and town, and saw dh as her savior. She got herself pregnant with door prize number one! That sounds so mean, but they really are! Lol

I am so sorry for your loss -- and so sorry you had to deal with that monster of a step daughter, but glad to hear that you are surrounded by good family and friends who support you.

When I read all of our stories, I wonder "what the hell am I doing?" I've been married for 6 1/2 years, been together 7 1/2 -- and knew him a year prior to that. Things are not getting any better. And all the stories I read here make me think that things will never get better, but probably worse!

There have been times lately that I have been re-thinking this whole "till death do us part". I hate his four kids. HATE.

That is not who I am!!! I'm going to see my counselor tomorrow for the first time in months -- also considering joining a support group with actual people in person also. I don't know how to deal with all this anger, frustration, hate, etc. anymore.

Life is too short for all this angst. No one, no one allows someone they love to be abused, bullied, humiliated, isolated, ignored and disrespected. Simple as that. Men like my DH pick their mark. They don't choose a wife, they choose a victim. They marry caring, compassionate, understanding and empathetic women, women who will tolerate this crap, women whose self esteem is not what it should be, probably because we spent our lives caring and putting others first. We unknowingly became victims, but once we open our eyes and see we are victims of emotional abuse, we do have choices. Stay and accept your role as a victim, leave and start a life free of abuse, or change things. Stay in your marriage but choose NOT to accept this treatment anymore. If your DH finds it impossible to treat you with the respect you deserve because his off spring don't like you, or hate him and take it out in you, then you don't allow these people in your life. The onus is then placed back on your husband to sort it out. If he doesn't, if he continues to berate you and blame you for the mess, if he refuses to play a role in saving the marriage, then you have the decision made for you LEAVE. But in order for change to begin, the first step is to recognise you are being abused.

Our OP has lived all her married life with this, right up until the day her DH was buried. It's too late now for her to resolve this with her DH and get some satisfaction from that. She loved him, she put up with it, and his daughters thanks for looking after dad was that.

We are all different, but I would rather sort this out with the living than hold anger and resentment towards a dead DH. I think we can all learn a valuable lesson from her horrible ending. No one deserves this, no one. But a lot of us could very easily follow in her footsteps. Her grief will be twice as difficult with all the anger and hurt she has on top of the loss of her husband. This is cruel and unfair, don't let it happen to you. Take charge of your life and make your home a place of peace, your sanctuary, instead of the war zone your husband and his children have made it.

Ah! Dunwiththem, I see you are yet another one here my husband appears to have been cheating on me with..you have described him to a T, and yes like you, I am in the later category.

I am glad you are feeling a little better. It is true what they say isn't it. No good deed goes unpunished. You went back to him and nursed him till he died, and this is how you were thanked. Oh well, there is nothing you can do now to change that ugly day, but you can be thankful you are now FREE, you no longer have to have anything to do with her. Perhaps, if you feel like it, you could write to her and express your thoughts and feelings about her behaviour, on the day and during your marriage. Even if you never send it, it can be cathartic to get it out.

I am your age. What the hell were we thinking putting up with it. When I saw my 60th birthday coming I made up my mind not to take the crap into yet another decade. I haven't. My plan was just to remove SD from my life. However, thankfully she was so frantic to get back her stranglehold on daddy, she involved my FIL, and obviously was making her boyfriend miserable instead of me, so he decided to bail me up at the shops and tell me my FIL told him and the princess of darkness to take NO notice of me, he told them to come to my house and just ignore me. WHALLA! The key to freedom had been handed to me. I was desperately hurt for a couple of months, but then I saw the beauty in it. I could now bow totally out of DHs entire family, not just her, but the whole lot of them. Oh happy days.

So from the depths of despair, I have emerged a stronger, happier, HEALTHIER woman. Sure I should have done it years ago, but it is absolutely better late than never.

Grow up please. Wanna get a few of us to help you bring that day forward so you can find out whether you will or won't go. LOL. }:)

Thank you Dunwiththem, I am good. Of course it requires vigilance, and marriage shouldn't be like that. But karma is real. No one in his family, not kids, siblings, cousins or his dad bother to speak to him. He has been wiped, though he doesn't believe it, the silence from his family is deafening and his solution is to stick his head in the sand and pretend its not happening. He has no love or laughter in his life. He knows he is struggling to keep me. He comments every day now, I want you to love me, I can't feel the love. Really. Shit, why not.

I on the other hand have real lasting unselfish, unconditional love in my life. I have friends, I smile and I laugh. Yes, the karma bus finally arrived in the form of her boyfriend and we all got what we had been giving out returned to us.

It does end when we allow it to. That is something we all attain in our own time if we are open to it. An end to the trauma and emotional abuse.

Duneiththem, it is heartbreaking to hear that in the two years you nursed him he gave her every penny he could lay his hands on to his daughter, and didn't even bother to ask if you would be ok. Guess he passed on his lack of gratitude and compassion to his daughter.

I guess step aside what we have learnt, and can hopefully pass on is. Deal with it before we become worn out.

So many of us put up with it for years and years. We should not have tolerated it for a second, let alone years. But we wanted to keep our husbands happy. We should've released that they should have been concerned about our happiness too. Not their daughters. Certainly not to the extend that their marriages were in jeopardy.

This does not change until we ourselves change it. It is better to lose your husband than yourself.

Brilliant question. I too would be interested in the answer. However wowthisishard, I am adamant I will not tell them. If I ended up in court over any inheritance the only people who would end up looking bad would be them, especially the spawn of Satan daughter of my husband. I would open up and let fly with class and dignity, without having to worry about causing problems between my husband and myself, which thankfully I don't worry about anymore anyway, I wouldn't worry about upsetting FIL if he were still alive or anyone else in that family. I and you too I'm sure have good reason not to put ourselves through the drama of dealing with their "what about me, look at me, I want my money" crap at such a time. I think any court would understand that. But I couldn't care less how I looked regardless. Lets be honest, worrying about how we looked, and what our husband and others thought and wanted over the years is partly how we ended up in this nightmare. If DH goes first, my only care will be WHAT DO I THINK, HOW DO I FEEL, WHAT DO I WANT. Finally I am strong enough to know its not all about DH or them, I'm important too. My thoughts, my feelings, my wants needs and desires matter as well. I can do that comfortably because although I have grown enough to know that I matter as much as the next person, I haven't turned into a selfish, heartless,.self centred cow. I still care about others, but I now care about myself too and that's not only okay, it's a good thing and its the right thing.
I am not thinking this way to hurt or punish them. I am only doing this to take care of me. It is not being done out of spite to hurt them, but out of love to protect me.

Dunwithem you silly woman. Think about it, in all the years you knew this woman, did you ever hear her use the word OUR.

She like all narcissists only know the words me, myself, I, mine and gimme.

How else did she ever in her entire life refer to her father but as MY dad. He was in her eyes, never YOUR HUSBAND or HER brother's father, nope, he was and in her mind still is MY dad.

When these women have children they are called my baby or my kids. Never our.

And that is what he has done to his daughter, this woman he held above you. He created a pathetic, selfish, socially inept, useless creature who will struggle to get through life now. No one wants to raise a full grown woman. No one will put up with this adult leech for long. Well done daddy, well done. Wherever he is, I wonder if he knows what he did to the two women in his life he professed to love. Does he know he destroyed his daughter, and all but destroyed you. Do these men ever learn, even in the after life. Maybe he does, this may be his hell.

As so many of us here have. The sad part is nothing we say to younger women coming through behind us will stop them from making our mistakes. Their love is different, they love him more than we could ever know, he really loves them, the ex or the kids are the problem. Then before you know it, their in their sixties and looking back think WTF was I thinking, why didn't I get out when I was thirty or forty even 50. They have no idea and they will have to learn in their own time. It really is a shame we cannot stop them from the hell of a life we lived. They will just have to go through it themselves unfortunately.

You have to laugh though. Because you have truly had the last laugh here. Daddy loved her more did he. Well she is the one he hurt the most in the end. He has doomed her to be emotionally crippled for life. You on the other hand are financially secure, and independent. You are FREE to be happy and you will be. She will never be happy, she, thanks to daddy needs someone to lean on. There is never going to be another daddy for her. He went to his grave destroying his daughter and building up your independence and strength. You won, and rightly so, you deserved to win.

Okay, I take back what I wrote. Because after reading what sandy wrote I realise I was wrong, I was thinking we cannot stop women from jumping on this same going to hell train, they will always think "their love is different, more special, it will be different for them" and they will get on the train. But yes, as sandy says, our stories will go a long way to waking them up a lot sooner than we ourselves woke up. Hopefully our stories will help them to get off the train sooner, or give them the strength to change their destination on this trip. Hopefully it won't take them till their 60 to become the driver. In that regard hopefully we can make change. Must have been having a very pessimistic moment there, have smacked myself about the head for that ladies.

Oops, your right dunwiththem. Guess I was just missing the abuse and decided to attack myself LOL.
Sandy makes an excellent point,. We never had the resources to help us deal with this. Even if we did I guess we came up in a different generation where we made our bed so had to lie in it, took the everyone has a cross to bear attitude and so forth. Younger women don't as a rule put up with quite so much for so long. And more importantly they do have the Internet they have forums like this to make them see its not them, it's him. Now just to prize off the blinders of love Thanks girls.

I too think this site makes a tremendous difference.
Love really is blind and dumb. However, those of us who really thought we married the nicest most wonderful person in the world and don't want to believe their spouses have this one major character flaw ,(blinders on about their children) at least come here knowing they are not alone.

I didn't know what disengaging was, but I had already done it with the suggestion of my counselor and my pastor.

I thought I was crazy . My DH and I thought we were the only ones in the world with this problem. We went through sheer hell for years.

I stumbled on this site by accident one day and whew! I was not alone, I was not crazy,their behavior in the coming years will now be predictable so it lessens the blow.

Once in a while, I read something to my DH but not often. When I have, you can see the relief flood over his face that there are alot of sick SD's out here in the world and he doesn't feel so much like a failure.

About 3 months ago, his youngest daughter demanded they reconcile on her snotty terms, on her snotty time, and proceded with the same snotty ass attitude. At first, DH bought into it and told me we should go to counseling with her. Well, world war III erupted. There is no way in hell I am ever going back to that way of life again. I took our grandchildren's picture off the wall , stuffed it into his face and said "she threw our hearts in the blender and diced them into a million pieces. I want no part of it." The arguement lasted 2 days. He finally came to his senses. We made a little game out of it. We guessed what she was going to fire off in a text next to insult the living hell out of him. BOOM! We were dead on. She is very predictable.

My point was, I don't think I ever would have had the courage or the wisdom to say I was never going back to the way things were before if I hadn't joined this site. No one here advised me what to do, I just learned from others experiences.

It is not a subject you want your friends and neighbors to hear about. Here, you can confide anonymously and vent your guts out!