I have three girls from previous marriage, 8, 12, and 14. They spent every other weekend with their dad, Thurs-Mon. My husband and I have a beautiful one year old baby boy. My husband has two teen sons who live with us 24/7. They are 17 & almost 19. They have not seen their bio mom since they were 4 & 5. We have been married 5 years. It has been a constant roller coaster ride dealing with his oldest son and all his emotional/mental problems. It's been exhausting, and we have been separated once when I honestly and as politely as possible told him I could not ever live with his oldest son full time again. That was two years ago. He found a really amazing boarding school for his son since he was flunking out of public school anyway. And so when he sent him to full time boarding school I agreed to move back in with my husband and buy a home with him. I made it very clear that I COULD NOT live with his oldest son full time. I trusted him to respect this. It seemed like he understood. I wasn't being mean or cruel. It was just incredibly difficult to live with him. He has ADHD and is very very messy, cluttery, has poor personal hygiene, and violated my trust in ways unforgivable as a parent of three young girls.

He went thru my lingerie drawer early in our first year of marriage, and he stole condoms. I found one on the floor in my little girls' room. I was furious, and he lied about it. I had private "items" in the drawer as well that he went and told my 9 year old daughter all about. She didn't even know what those things were, and I kept them hidden in what I thought was my own private space. I was highly disturbed and disgusted. I moved out about four months after that happened. My husband was devastated and followed me renting a house across the street. Our relationship was much more stress free when we lived across the street married. But it was quite an odd situation. Now I wonder why I didn't keep it the way it was.

My step son got kicked out of boarding school exactly one year ago and exactly three weeks after my baby boy was born. And so he came back to live with us in our home. I felt very stressed out and concerned but hoped he would go back after summer. I braced myself and did my best to cope with him here all summer long with a new born, all the while hoping he would respect my rules etc. Of course he didn't. He would go in my girls' rooms and take whatever he wanted. The younger boy stole things as well. It was stressful, and I prayed I could make it until the school year started again.

When it started again, my husband never told me his son was not going back to boaring school. When I put two and two together, he said..."Oh he is going to the alternative high school here. I thought you knew that." I was sickened. No, I did not know that, and he knew I didn't know that. He avoided explaining it to me even though I had been very honest with him when we bought our home. I wanted to crawl in a hole and puke. I felt like he thought I was this terrible person, but I kept telling myself I wasn't a terrible person and the stresses I couldn't deal with were the same ones most women would feel. I went directly to my counselor and dumped.

To make a long story short, I struggled through it. I tried my best to cope with it and tried to not dwell on it and made sure I kept a close eye on my girls and the house. There were various issues through the year, but I kept trying. Before Christmas both boys started getting steady girlfriends. They started trying to bring them into the house etc. This became too much for me. Everything else was already too much, but now they were trying to take girls down to their rooms etc. I could not deal with that. My husband said I needed to deal with it and that it was normal for them to get girlfriends. I had to put my foot down when the oldest boy hid his girlfriend in his room all day even after I told him no girls in the basement. I told him to get her the hell out of my house. When I told my husband what happened, he went and talked to his son but did nothing to him. He got zero punishment. I was furious. It made me feel like an idiot in my own home.

This type of behavior continued for quite some time untill I made it so miserable for my hsuband that he finally told his son the girl could not come over anymore. I was tired of finding them in my kitchen playing house. This is a boy who has never worked a day in his life, threatens suicide if things do not go his way, and really knows how to get what he wants from his dad's guilt and pity from the mother abandoning the boys. Instead of being a father and saying NO to them, he never enforces strict punishments or any punishments that I have seen. It's been very frustrating and lonely. It's important to me to keep order and rules with consequences because I do not want my girls thinking anything goes. It doesn't with me, not at all.

On to the present........the oldest boy actually graduated and hopefull will go into the military later this month, but I will believe it when I see it. My husband told him he didn't have to get a job this summer as long as he exercised and lost the weight the military told him he needed to lose before going to boot camp. And so this "guy" spends every waking moment with his girlfriend, who I just found out was 14 and just turned 15. My husband's son is two months shy of 19. I was very disgusted with this if I wasn't already grossed out and concerned enough already. The younger boy was the same, spending every waking moment with his girlfriend. And my husband said it was ok because she came from a religious family and that she wouldn't do anything immoral. I cannot believe the naivety of this man. Is he naive or does he just not care?

The icing on the cake....... My husband's family was going to Hawaii this month for vacation. He got tickets for everyone to go. He planned the trip out and told me about it after the fact. Two weeks for him and his boys with his family while I am here with our baby, my girls, and taking care of the dogs? And then when the boys come back, I am supposed to fly out with the girls and our baby. A bit odd, but who am I to say what is normal and what is not normal? I felt kind of weird about the whole thing.....a bit left out with his family etc since things were strained anyway. We had eloped without their approval, and apparently some of them had issues with that since we had not known each other very long. There were other family dramas involving my husband, the boys, and his sister as well as his bi-polar alcoholic brother going psycho on me. I tried to put it all behind me, but this trip left me feel more of an outsider than ever.

Wait there is more...... My husband announces to me that he is letting his younger son take his girlfriend with him. WHAT????? I was furious. FURIOUS. Once I made it clear I thought it was very inappropriate etc he said there was nothing he could do about it that her grandpa had already purchased her ticket and it was a lot more expensive than ours were. He said..."What do you want me to do tell her to eat her ticket?" I said...."the only way you can make this right with me is if you tell her family you did not talk with me about it and that I am very uncomfortable with it and her staying in a condo with you and her boyfriend and your other son. We decided it would be best if one or both of you could accompany your teenage daughter on this trip with her." I told him that would be fine with me but I did not want her staying in his condo. Why put everyone in that situation?? He said he would not do that because it might offend them. He said he would have her stay in his mother's condo. Well, his mother broke her knee cap and did not go on the trip. So my husband left on the trip on his birthday. I tried to fight back my emotions of hurt and anger. I did ok the first two days, but then he started talking about how he took an extra mattress a blow up one. Then it came out. I said...."AND HOW IS THE GIRLFRIEND STAYING IN YOUR MOM'S CONDO WHEN YOUR MOM IS NOT EVEN OVER THERE???" He said..."There was nothing I could do. She has her own room." As if that would make it better?

I've been furious since then. I can't control myself. I want to stand him up and not go over there, but I don't want to be rash. Why am I so angry and hurt??? I feel like he didn't even care what I thought of it or what I felt. He won't say he's sorry, and he won't admit he did anything wrong. I feel so resentful and like I want to teach him a lesson. To make matters worse I went into the basement to clean, and I found rubbers down there. My husband had nothing to say about it except that he was a bit concerned but it wasn't a good time to discuss it with them and that at least there were rubbers. I knew he would say that. First he tells me nobody is having sex. Then he tells me "at least there are rubbers." I know these are not my children. They are his, and my counselor tells me to let him own his choices with them, but I am concerned his choices with them will ultimately affect me and my children. I feel so angry and hurt towards my husband that I do not know how I can recover from this, and I am having a hard time imagining myself swallowing my pride and acting like everything is fine and heading off to Hawaii to be with him when I have been left here to swim in my storm of emotions.

And he asks me...."Have you ever been content with your life for any extended period of time?" As if there is something wrong with me for feeling upset. I am not a monotone emotion. I feel what I feel, and this does not feel good at all. Can you help me figure out how to stand up for what I believe is wrong and not be unfair? I do not understand my husband. Do you think he just does not care what I think or feel anymore? I don't know what to do, but in my gut I keep feeling so mad I want to pack and move out before he gets back. And I don't know if that's just my anger taking over me.