In the scenario you describe I would say yes. They are an adult not a child and the course of nature is for grown children to leave the nest and lead their own lives. If they need to crash land back with a parent it should be a respectful arrangement. I say that as both a stepparent and a child whose moved home. We're actually moving in with my parents for a little bit- we have a written agreement with them so all know what's expected and pay normal rent rates for the months we'll be staying in addition to helping care for the home. Try honest kind communication but I believe you have a right to draw your line in the sand. 6 years is a long time.

SD60 moved back in 6 years ago because she had been evicted for the 3rd time for non-payment of rent and had nowhere to go.  DH made that decision without consulting me.  It was the 4th or 5th time she'd moved here in her life, always causing trouble between us.   This was the worst stay, a nightmare of lies, drama, theft and drugs. 

After 10 months and me suffering stress-related health problems,  I wanted her gone and DH wasn't happy, either, but unable to confront "Poor SD".  I knew she was incapable, mentally, physically and financially, of finding a place and moving. She's on disability but the waiting list for Section 8 housing  was long.  She and I looked at apartments and I realized we'd have to subsidize her.  I told DH my plan and how much I was willing to pay. He seemed relieved that I'd found a solution.  I told both of them what we'd pay for but that not one more dime of family money would go toward her.   I also separated our finances so that if he chooses to give her money, it's coming out of his own, not the family money. 

I'm not one for ultimatums, but I told him if he ever let her move in again, I'd leave him.   As an 84yo cancer patient, I think it put the fear in him.  She has lived in her place for 5 years now.  It's not glamorous and very basic, no cable or internet.  She still has problems that spill over onto us sometimes because she's burned bridges with her kids, siblings and former friends and has no one to call but DH.   Since then, I've grayrocked her as much as possible.

When DH84 passes, hopefully not for years, there will be a *hitshow because I won't be subsidizing any longer and plan to move out of town.  With her poor judgment and health issues, we might outlive her anyway.  Ours isn't a perfect solution but I've done what I can.  Good luck.

As long as you're prepared to follow through on the ultimatum no matter which way SO goes,  then it's perfectly OK.  I'd even say it's fair and kind, as it allows SO to clearly see the consequences his choices will have.

I would say it is absolutely OK to give an ultimatum in this situation, it should have been done before. Your SO is enabling his narcissistic adult child's abusive behaviour, sadly. The sooner he/she is shown the door, the better. The only thing with an ultimatum, you HAVE to be fully prepared to follow through, if it doesn't work - ie leave yourself.  There is nothing more ineffectual than an empty threat.   Say it once, is my advice, and give fair warning that if the step is not gone by a certain date, chosen by you, then you will be, and make preparations for that eventuality.  

Way past the time to launch. Six years is way too long to live in such a toxic mess. So, yep. She goes with a firm date or I'd leave. And to make it certain, I'd have all my ducks in a row (finances, especially) so when that date came, if she wasn't out, I'd just pack up and leave myself. No questions asked.

This is reasonable. When another adult lives in your marital home and they aint a friend of the marriage hell yes ultimatum away hun! Especially when all they contribute is turmoil and chaos. Yea time to go !

If your DH is more worried about an adult spawn and their tantrums than his marriage, well he can go too.

Good luck. 

This situation sounds like a horrible way to live.. for pretty much everybody.. up to and including the adult child in a way.. because having a ready foil to express your unhappiness with yourself and your life means that they are able to tantrum around as you see...  Sometimes miserable people make other people miserable as a coping mechanism.. that could be some of it.. but that is the least person that I would be feeling sorry for since the solution is clearly for them to stand on their own adult feet and gtfo of the house.. be independent.

And. I get it.. Covid and those restrictions made it tough.. and I actually understand rental markets these days can make it tough.. but TOUGH.. it's not impossible though they may have to compromise what they will get.

But, an ultimatum is only as good as your follow through.  What will the ultimatum be?  Are they willing to follow through on that... if it means leaving the relationship?  Because it is always entirely possible the bio parent will choose their child over their partner.  AND.. realistically.. what would it take for that adult to move out?  I know that's not supposed to matter because they are adults.. "they can figure it out".. but there can be real barriers to securing safe and affordable housing.  Does the person have a job.. is there a reason (real) why they are unable to work if they are not?  What is the rental market in the area? Is there any where else that the person could relocate to where they might have support to find a job and housing.. if it isn't possible in the current area.  Note, I'm thinking like if the family is living in San Fransisco.. that housing market is insane.. it's understandable why someone would have a hard time finding housing.. 

And.. is there any way that the person would be willing to help facilitate the "eviction".. would they be willing to have household funds.. or allow their partner to supplement the adult child's finances so that they could get into a place?  perhaps helping with security deposits.. first month rent. or even some of the rent for a time? Note.. there is no absolute requirement to for them to do it.. but when you have a situation like this.. sometimes looking at the long game is important.. what do you ultimately want?  They want that kid out of their house and sometimes paying to get that done is worth it!!!!

BUT.. I would say in this situation.. if someone has just been patient and pleasant.. with no requests or demands for 6 years???? I think it would be kind of unfair to blindside their partner when they have given no indication and had no discussions on the child moving out at some point.  Sure.. the parent should "know" that it's not a good environment.. but the partner's passiveness and acquiessance to the situation allows the child and the parent to have a giant blind spot to this issue.

So the first thing is that they should have a discussion with their partner.  They need to talk about the problems that are going on in the house and they need to as their partner to work up a plan with their child to move forward with their life and move out.  I don't think it has to be "ultimatum" time.. though it can be hinted that the partner does not know how much longer theywill be able to stand living in the current environment.. 6 years is "enough".. and it's time that the adult is set on a better path.. and maybe the "ultimatum now" is that the parent and child work on a plan and give them a few weeks to discuss what the plan would be for a reasonable launch in the next X months.. and then a return discussion with everyone to ensure that all three are on the same page with the developed plan and goals.. and if it nears the end of that time and the child has made no progress or effort?  THEN the ultimatum of "either your kid get's their head out of their a## or I am done and will be getting MY own housing and will no longer pay into this one!"

Your SO is constantly worried that you’re going to leave them because their stepchild is so nasty. SO is also terrified of the stepchild and because of that they probably won’t ever make them leave home. They make increasingly desperate excuses for why their child isn’t ready/able/willing to move out.

This is going to be your biggest hurdle. While I would have put my foot down LONG before 6 years, I would handle this in phases. Going in with my way or the highway after suffering in silence for so long is going to make your SO feel like he is being attacked on all fronts. 

You and SO need to sit down and develop a plan. Tell him you can't keep living like this. The Covid excuse is over, time to get back to real life. Stepkid has 60 days to find a job if they don't have one and get an apartment, roommate, whatever. If you are willing and able, I would even go as far as offering to help with some 2nd hand furniture and a deposit to get them out of the house- try to preemptively stop excuses for not moving. I would bring ad's for apartment complexes in the area, room for rent posts, etc.

If your SO doesn't agree to this, then go for the ultimatum. This is just a soften the blow step so that you can try not to make it a kid or me situation. Even though that is what it is, this might just be a slightly gentler way of doing things.  

As a kid, one of my favorite cartoons was G.I. Joe.  In one of the episodes, Destro was chastising Cobra Commander for failing to follow up on a threat, and said "Nothing undermines our credibility more than a failure to execute on our threats!" 

Destro was a cartoon character, but he was right.  If you give an ultimatum, you better be ready to actually leave.

SO is also terrified of the stepchild and because of that they probably won’t ever make them leave home.

^^^ That is your probelm. SO is not the adult in the house- your skid is. Both you and SO have every right to live your life. Boot his/her ass out.

If you're serious and plan to follow through, it's a boundary.

If you're making empty threats and being manipulative, it's an ultimatum.

I did it. I was prepared to divorce if I had to. I could no longer live with adults in their mid 20s. They showed no signs of launching whatsoever. I went on a viewing to buy a place and told my DH that since I'm buying it, it won't have room for adult SKs. I gave DH 48 hours to make his decision to either come with me or stay living with his adult kids forever if that's what he really felt he needed. I gave the deadline for a decision that can't be flip-flopped on because I felt I needed to prevent him from flip flopping on me to buy time, since I had endured the SKs long enough, and so that DH couldn't use the bullshit about "waiting for them to launch naturally." I had already waited years for them to launch naturally. It wasn't going to happen.

DH made his decision right away and in May, we're celebrating our 7th anniversary in our new house. 

After putting up with this for as long as you have and your SO unwilling to do anything about it in all this time, I would probably skip the ultimatum and just make plans to move out and let SO know that you are doing so.

Your SO knows that their offspring is a problem and a threat to the relationship, yet has done nothing to get said offpsring out on their own. Your SO just makes excuses and will continue to do so. There has been plenty of time for the adult child to become independent.

I totally agree with everyone that's saying and ultimatum is the way to go if you're prepared to follow through.

However it may be better for your marriage, if you'd like to preserve it, if you tell your husband that the step kid needs to go let's sit down and make a plan to make it happen. When an adult kid becomes this dependent on a parent it's not quite as simple as making them move out the instant that you tell them to go. Talk to your husband about a time frame for getting them out maybe 3 months from now. Make a plan and then make an ultimatum.

Not an ultimatum, just a clear statement of what the failed parent will do or suffer the consequences.

Time for the direct come to Jesus discussion.  "No more will your toxic failed family breeding experiment be a detriment to my life. If you want a life together with me, you will fix it. If you don't, you have made your choice and I will take appropriate action."

So many threaten to leave.  Rather than leave, re-key the locks, take it all, and put the failed family refugee on the curb with their failed family spawn.

IMHO or course.

I agree with the other posters, you need to rethink this situation and make some changes. 

This situation sounds very similar to mine.  I have a 21 year old step son who refuses to launch and daddy encourages his laziness.  This manchild has been out of highschool for 4 years and has done zippo with his life, even though he's been given plenty of opportunities to go to college or at least work full time so he can move out on his own.  He's done nothing.  He acts the same way now as he did when he was 13 when I first met him.  The main difference from your situation is that my stepson isn't outwardly scary or violent, he doesn't fight with his dad but is quietly hostile toward me, lazy, entitled, a pothead, barely works, does nothing around the house and his dad is the same way.  He is also competitive with me regarding his dad's attention.  Rather than looking for independence and starting his own life, my SS would prefer to be the perpetual baby.  It's absolutely sickening.  My stepson also complained to his daddy that I'm "negative" so I am censured on what I can say or talk about in my own home.  Needless to say, I am tired of my life being dictated by someone's manchild, so I am currently leaving this situation. 

The only ray of hope I see is that your SO wants stepchild to leave but is afraid to say that for fear of angering the SC (stepchild).  If you could get your SO on board to evict SC, things would likely return to normal in your house.  I'm not sure of the legalities of kicking stepchild out since they've lived there for so long.  I would investigate different options, such as eviction or maybe moving to a smaller place that has no room for SC.  You have some hard decisions to make.

My heart goes out to you and I hope you find a solution.  Please keep us posted!!  We are here for you!

your SO needs to choose who he will regret losing the most...you or his kid. In my case, my exdh chose his children over me and my safety and peace. You decide what YOU need and want. People rarely change. You don't need an ultimatum...just a plan. You can let your SO know (when you have a plan in place) that you will be moving out in X months, etc if his adult dependent is still living with you. That's just a fact of what you need...not manipulation.

Make sure you hold to your word, even prepare to move out as soon as you tell him this becuase the wrath of hell might come down upon you from him or SD. You deserve a peaceful life and only you can give that to you. SOs who are scared of their kids for any reason don't usually make good SOs, imho.

Do what it takes to take care of you. Even after you move out, if you do, if you like this SO, you can still date them...away from his kids. So for you it would be a win win without feeling like you have to try to make someone change....

I dont think id go with ultimatum.  this or that.  just go with this is whats happening.

if its your home you dont have to ask.  Just tell.  

SD needs a place of own.  end of. 

Ultimatum implies there is a choice.

or if their is an ultimatum sd goes or they both go.  you are staying put why should you leave ?.

This is just my suggestion, but make a plan for yourself.  You have taken step 1 and informed SO that SD needs to launch, it is not a livable environment for you.  He is making all sorts of excuses for her so that the relationship will just keep limping along, until either she leaves on her own or you do.  During this time you start saving as much money as you can and see a therapist.  You need to be confident and not feel guilty about thinking about yourself and what is emotionally healthy for you.  Step 2 is the ultimatum - determining a time limit that is right for you and firmly giving this information to SO.  It could be two months or as little as a few days.  If she is not out on the determined day then you leave or tell them both to leave.  Step 3 is the aftermath and another plan.  This means SD will be out of your everyday life one way or another.  It may mean you will be living on your own.  If so, make sure you do everything you can for your emotional growth so that next time a man comes into your life, wants to move into your home and bring his adult kid you will be able to say, "How about just dating."  If your SO DOES find the nerve to tell his daughter to leave and stays on, there must be a plan to ensure he will have your back, that you will be the top priority in his life.

I'd pack and leave. Life is too short and you've been paying for this wastrel for too long. See a lawyer first to be sure you don't get screwed over, find a nice place to live that is too small to accommodate freeloaders, give your DH the option of going with you (make sure he understands that the door is open for a brief time only), pack your bags and go.

If you were vindictive, you might call the police on your sk for their drugs and criminal activities. 

I am in a similar predicament. My SD doesn't live with us but my husband is being held hostage by her inability to care for herself. She is a long term drug addict and some kind of crazy. Two years ago she got walked in front of a train and lost an arm, leg and hand. It took him a year to arrange an apartment and a caregiver. It took her about a month to stop taking her meds, doing drugs and having her loser friends over. The person staying there finally quit because she was being screamed at and treated horribly. So DH has been down there for over a week trying to find another person, getting her back on meds, clearing out the creeps. It's just going to happen again, and again. It always has. He feels like he can't abandon her as she is incapable of caring for herself and no one else, including her mother who lives 10 minutes away, will help. Luckily she lives 150 miles from us, so I don't have her in my face, but I have to keep patching him up, watching all the joy drain out of him, seeing the stress hurt his health,, and knowing that at some point he is going to try to move her into our house. And that will be the end of our 44 year marriage. So I know the pain you are going thru, but don't keep doing it. It will suck all the joy out of your life. It sounds like it already is doing that. Cut your losses and like someone suggested, date him if you still want to have a relationship. 

I'd leave but if you want to stay you need to have a serious talk with your SO.  They are enabling their child.  Next time the skid threatens self harm, get you SO to take them for a phsyc evaluation.  If they are having a mental health crisis, they need medical intervention.  If they are being manipulative, they won't enjoy going through the process.

Then I'd sit down and look at your finances (yours and your SO's) and figure out how much you are prepared to subsidise the skid to get them out.  JRI has done it with her SD60 and I used to do it with my YSS.

If SO won't solve the problem, get the system involved and take it all out of both SO's hands and SD's hands.

Once SD is arrested, file an RO/PO and keep her away from your home.

At some point, this problem has to be put firmly on the shoulders of the miscreant adult SKid.

Take care of you.

instruction.

You will be out on MM/DD/YYYY.  No more than 2wks.  Not one minute more.

No discussion, no this or that ultimatum, just the demand/instruction. Then when that date hits, if they are not gone, have the locks re-keyed and have their shit boxed up and put on the curb. They can pick it up, or the garbage service will take it on garbage day.

Keep it simple.  

Tell the failed breeder that they spawned the toxic Skid Spawn and they failed to deal with it so it has been dealt with and it will stay dealt with or the failed breeder should start looking for a new place to live.

Keep it simple.

Good luck.

but there are other things you can do. First and foremost, your SO needs to get into counseling. Enabling bad behavior is NOT LOVE...it's simply enabling bad behavior. Actually, both of you need to be in counseling. For your SO to get out of the codependency and enabling mode. You to give clarity to the therapist about your home life with SK there. If that works, then you will develop your plan to get SK out of your home. That may be calling the police or on the next suicide threat, call for a 21 day psyche hold. And stick to it. Other than that, if your SO cannot come to terms with what they've let brew for this long and take action to fix, your only other option is to leave.

Technically, you are not safe with all the drug use and criminal activity you report. A drug arrest in your home could cause your possessions to be "confiscated" by police, other more dangerous people could come into your home (think robbery for their drug money) and your SS himself is dangerous. I know I'd not stay in this situation any longer without a major shift in SO's thinking and behaviors.

At this point your SO is as big a problem as skid.  He is allowing your peace and mental health to be very adversely affected. That is not what a loving  partner does.  It is past time to leave. 

Time to stop thinking and talking and start doing. Call the police and tell them he threatened you and you are afraid of him. He'll deny it but who are they going to believe and can he prove he didn't do anything? No, of course he can't. Add in that he does drugs in your home. They will have him out of there so fast his head will spin. Then get a permanent restraining order on him. 

Either you take your life and your future into your own hands and get rid of this parasite now or you leave. IF he threatens to kill himself tell him to go ahead. Tell your husband to shut up when he starts wittering about what ifs and let's not talk about its. 

Who does the home belong to? Is it a rental or do you own it?

SKid.

Even if it means severe damage to the marriage.

Do not discuss it with DH, have an attorney start the full court press against the Skid.

RO/PO, cease and decist orders, law suits... whatever it takes.

.. for an ultimatum. Your SO knows what's going on. Don't waste another second hoping he'll fix it. 

I'd say carry on with what you've been doing, meaning Just Say Nothing. Put their crap in bags on the curb and change the locks. Of course check with an attorney to verify that neither of them has a legal claim on the place. In that case, just get on the bus, Gus. 

Enough already with the silent suffering.

You can't do anything about SS. You SO has demonstrated that he won't do anything to solve this problem. What actions are YOU willing to take? That is the only way anything will change.

Find a good counselor who will help you sort through what you can and can't live with, then help you set boundaries with enforceable consequences.

If you do nothing, nothing changes.