Why dont you do yourself and your child a favor and step up??

If he wants you to stay out of his business do it. Next time you have them dont prepare anything for dinner. Dont do his laundry. Dont do the dishes. Dont take the dog for a walk either. Let him do it all pack your child and leave the house for the day.How is he going to deal with his business then?

And dont let him yell at you. You are not deaf!

Have you told him that you are tired of this? Usually when men hear these words they get alerted.
How would he like it if he lived alone and had 3 homes to run around for? If you calmly explain to him that his kids are not the issue but HIS behavior is perhaps he will see things from another perspective? It is very important that you dont mention his children at all in that conversation though. Talk only about your relationship and your child. And take it from there.

I don't post often but figured i'd give my 2 cents on this one.
I was married for 4 years to a guy with 2 (5 & 13) kids from hell. I have 1 (10) and we had none together. It was a constant struggle with all boys. The kids coming every weekend harrassing, bullying and trashing the house while XH just looked on. I was asked to babysit more times than i can count so XH could take care of errands or a side job. I think he was afraid to have the kids without me there. Many times he'd wait for me to finish a long day at work before driving out to pick up his kids. Also XH would jump anytime his X called and was constantly mowing her lawn, fixing her plumbing and listening to her rants about the kids & her life. If this was our only issue i probably could have survived it but alas "normal" marriages are hard work.
We have been separated for 7 months now and are filing papers to divorce. I have started dating again and i constantly worry about my DS and how he will interact with another man in my life. So far it has not been good. People here have mentioned only dating a man without kids after being in the blended family situation. i'm not sure i agree. It must be hard to go from no kids to a 10 yr old asking a billion questions and wanting to be included. Life with kids is a constant struggle. My only advice is be very very careful who you choose to have kids with. You will be stuck with them in your life for a very long time.
Best of luck alwaysme. You need it.

We are a successful blended family. We each brought two kids into our marriage and had one together. Our oldest is away at college. Our youngest is 9.

I don't buy a lot of what I read on this site. There is so much anger and resentment. And then folks wonder why their marriages fall apart.

You asked for opinions.....

I don't believe in the whole "my kids" vs "your kids" crap. You are either a family or you are not. I've watched several stepfamilies fall apart. Every single one of them played the "my kids"/"your kids" game. All of the stepmothers were "disengaged". They were resentful. They focused on the ex-wife, child support, history, stuff like that...
And then they acted shocked when their husband's bailed. Several of these women were good friends. They weren't bad people. They just could not get past the "Me first". "What about my rights?". "Why do I have to do everything?" attitude.

Honestly, maybe it's not fair. Maybe they were "right". But would you rather be "right" all the time, or happily married?

Marriage is about putting other people first. That includes your husband and sometimes (a lot of the time) the kids. It sounds like you get a sucky deal, doesn't it? But if marriage is about putting your partner first...then your partner should be doing the same thing. If both parents are focused on others before themselves, you have a recipe for a happy marriage. And generally, if you have a happy marriage, it's much easier to have happy kids.

What if your husband won't do it? You can't control another person's behavior. But men aren't that complicated. When they feel respected, valued, and loved, they give that back.

Therapy! Family therapy really helped us. We started before we got married....before there were real issues. We learned to communicate our expectations and disappointments in a constructive way. Sometimes the therapist met with us individually. Sometimes DH and I were together. Sometimes it was just the kids. And sometimes it was all of us as a family.

Find a mentor. Find a blended family that has it right! Do what they did. Don't take advise from people who are angry and resentful about their situations. Misery really does love company. Seek out those who can help you move forward.

Insist that your family act like a real family. No more "your kids are coming this weekend...." type of talk. It should be "Hey sweetie! The kids are coming this weekend! What kind of fun stuff should we do? I'm really excited!" Fake it if you don't feel it! You are a family! Act like a family and you'll start to feel that way. It takes years. I think I read somewhere that it takes about 5 years to successfully blend. I think it took us about four. You need a shared history. Traditions. Silly things that only your family does. Memories. Those are the things that create families.

You can do it! Don't be afraid to ask for help!

How do you define success?

I don't know if we are a success story or not. Most of the time these days I'd say we are but some days we aren't. I guess if the good outweighs the bad it's a success. We have his, mine and ours and BM from hell.

We had lots of problems for a long time. SO was guilt parenting. We nearly split up several times. We've worked it out for the most part though.

I was surprised when reading stepmonster that a lot of what she advises are things we had figured out for ourselves.

Our relationship comes first. I totally disagree with the ones who say you have to be a martyr for your stepchildren(like above) or the ones like BF who I think are living in la la land and being somewhat less than honest about their situations - painting it a lot rosier and perfect than it is. We're very 'real' people, grounded, rational and definitely not living in a dream world. We still have problems now and then. I still overreact to some of BMs craziness and I still get irritated at his kids helplessness and manipulation but we deal with it pretty well most of the time now. He still slips up and does the guilty daddy thing from time to time but not as often. For the most part we are both on board with our relationship coming first with the idea that if that relationship is solid the rest will be easier. It works for us most of the time.