*SORRY FOR THE RANT.....First of all, like all of you, I am doing the best I know how. I am not perfect, nor do I expect perfection. I have been a parent for 29 years, co-parented (in my opinion) successfully since my oldest was 10. My daughters are both married with children of their own. Independent, financially not dependent on me in any way shape or form, happy and moving forward. I see them both at least once weekly and they go out of their way to include me in all kinds of activities and visits. I feel like my humans are cool. That even though I might not have made the best decisions every single time, that I must have done most things close to good enough. EH and I still to this day have family holiday celebrations and we both have respect and friendly feeling for each other but beyond that, nothing. No drama, issues, weird control or jealousy.

     Fast forward to 2 years ago. I remet someone who I have known since the 7th grade. We instantly knew we were each others person and naively thought that since we were so perfect with each other, the rest would just fall into place. Umm.....well, as everyone on here knows, step parenting has so many layers of difficulty that one doesn't consider. I feel like I am drowning. I feel so alone. I feel so angry and no matter what I do, I can not make this right. 

     My SS is 23 next month. When I moved in he was working a little, had his girlfriend living here and paid for nothing. Spent all of his free time smoking weed and just leaving all of his personal junk wherever it landed when he got home. I couldn't take a bath before bed because he used all the water. It got to the point that I thought I was going to come unglued and jump off my roof. When I would point out to my husband that we were doing him a big disservice by allowing this behavior to go on, I was met with "well, I told him he could move back home and save money". I have always done better with very clear expectations and I work at an elementary school so my practice of that has shown to be successful for year. I slowly became more and more resentful until I had to be very honest. He needs a time limit set for moving out and that it needed to not be forever away. Of course, this made me the bad guy right? Oh, new rule, must be that bitch sort of behavior. He got all agro, moved out to his grandmas house in a fit of anger and refused to speak to me, just speak crap about me. His Mom who has a miserable, jealous, entitled existence was so excited to get on that wagon, let me tell you! All I can say is the move has been a huge relief to me and I wanted to not fall into that trap with the SD who is 18. 

     SD......well this is where stuff got crazy recently. She is manipulative, cries to get her way, is helpless when it suits her and uses her Dads guilt for the divorce to get her way. She has never worked, done dishes, cleaned her bathroom or done any meal prep. She is overweight and blames her Dad for that. Blames him for choosing to leave her psycho Mom after 15 years of a horrible marriage. Her last year of high school she went to school 2 days a week and took yoga and ceramics. I became the bad guy when I suggested that with all that free time having a part time job to help pay for the 2017 car her Dad is buying, along with her car insurance and cell phone-might be something good. Shot down immediately by her and her Mom. "It's her last year to be a kid" type of responses. I hate paying $600/month on top of the $500 we still pay the ex, and it looks like it will never end. All we hear is "She's working on it" when we mention a job. I have explained to DH that there is zero percent chance that she will get a job with the current expectations. He just thinks that his perfect golden daughter is going to just grow up magically.....

     Two weekends ago, she announced she was moving out to her Mothers house. I did a happy dance in my head and thought, as horrible as it sounds, good riddance! I know that her Mom had sparked this whole thing, trying to punish DH for bringing up a job. Whatever. I hate feeling manipulated and the BM is constantly in my business and in the beginning, I had made attempts to befriend her, which back fired something fierce. I am still struggling with the lack of control in my financial life and I know my DH hears me but I don't think he understands. Having my kids be non issues makes it easy for him in a way I think. His kids have always been this way so for him it's just normal. I am tried of having to be the Wicked Step Mom, I love my husband so much and am trying to protect what we have. Thank you all for the support, kind words and glimmers of hope.