I decided a few months before marrying DH that I had to disengage because I absolutely HATE his children and it was consuming me, changing my personality and spoiling my spirit. I even stopped buying their favorite groceries - cereal, waffles, etc - and I only buy necessities and DH and my favs. I don't feel guilty about it because I have allowed myself freedom from the hideous people they are, I didn't create this mess and it's beyond me to "fix" them. SS15 is a bumbling, awkward IDIOT, and practically everything out of his mouth is total nonsense. I am 99.9% sure that he has undiagnosed Asberger syndrome but DH becomes angry and defensive at the suggestion that something is "off" about the kid *insert eyeroll here* . SD10 is a brat and most annoying about her is that she behaves like a toddler most of the time. She eats like a toddler, ought to be wearing a bib and sitting in a highchair, she throws fits like a toddler, sucks her thumb (YES, 10 y.o. sucking her thumb still!!) and when she thinks it is cute, she baby talks. It is DISGUSTING. The worst part, is that if I point any of this out, try to embarrass her into stopping the behavior, DH steps in and gives excuses or defends her, so this will continue until she is ridiculed and/or bullied by her peers, thanks to DH. I know it may seem crazy that I went ahead and married DH with all this, but I couldn't deny or ignore that I love this man. We dated for 3 years prior, and even though his spawn are a total trainwreck, he has a big heart, the patience of Job, and tries so hard for his family. Disengaging really did change the dynamic for the better - caused him to have to step up and OWN the mess that they are, opened his eyes to them being messes, and as I said, freed me. BUT....here is my issue now. I have really been thinking about our future in the past couple of months because we have broken ground on building a house together and it has dug up some MAJOR concerns. First of all, DH has a son from 1st marriage, he is 22 and complete waste of space - he lives with his grandparents, has never held a job, just now finished his GED (who knows why  since he has no motivation to ever work), sits in his room and plays video games all day and night and on the rare occasion that he comes to visit, he is unshowered, greasy, smelly and wearing dirty clothes. Another prize child of DH....he must be so proud (sarcasm lol). My worry is this... we invest OUR hard-earned money into building this home, I sweat every interior decision and in the end, it's a beautiful reflection of us. Fast forward about 10 years. I can totally see SS22 (now 32) moving in on us, SS15 (now 25) STILL leaching off of us, because I can't imagine this idiot doing ANYYHING to have a future or life, he has ZERO common sense, zero initiative... and SD20 thinking it's HER domain, trying to run things. Meanwhile, my kids will probably keep their distance bc they can barely stomach any of them (because they're both NORMAL, productive members of society). I really feel that I need to seriously think of exiting this sh%# show before it goes this far. Even though I dearly love DH, thinking I need to cut my losses and get the heck outta here. Thoughts? Advice? Any ideas that would maybe help for me to stay and have a future with my DH?