Amazing reading everyone else's issues and difficulties with Skids. Everyone seems to have the same problems. I Posted about a month ago about co-sleeping. Advice was really helpful, and so reassuring to know I am not the only one dealing with the same crap. Made me Changed my tactics on the co-sleeping. Not fixed it yet, but determined to do this, for my SD, otherwise she will grow up with a unhealthy idea of relationships. I reward the SD when she goes to bed on time, I tell her that if daddy keeps her up no treat, we have a bed time bag, In the morning if she goes to bed on time with no messing there is a treat, things like an agreement to make buns or play a game of her choice. Next step is encouraging her to not need her dad. 

anyway to get to the main point, why can't these men just grow a pair, they are bloody pathetic, a child loves you because you are there for them not cause you have no boundaries, I genuinely believe the behaviour issues stem from the parents insecurities not the child's. I think they need the child to Constantly give affirmation that they want them,  it's a total fear of abondonment from the parent not the child that causes the issues. It seems to me that we are all dealing with spineless idiots that couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery let alone raise a child, I also think the reason they don't let you make the rules is cause a child respects and loves a parent that has clear boundaries and makes them feel safe, so when that is the stepparent it undermines them as the biological parent and feeds there abandonment issues. They all need to go to Councelling to address their own problems, then they might have a fighting chance of behaving like a parent.