I have visited Steptalk many times and learned many valuable things from you ladies and now it's time to open up and share the hard times that made me seek out this sanctuary in the first place.

I'm a mother of 4 grown sons, ages 21-27. I'm the stepmother of 2. The boy is 20, the girl child is 17. I met their dad 5 years ago and we got married last summer, after my youngest child left the nest. We waited to cohabit so we didn't have to mix children,and to keep things less complicated.

My SS is a wonderful, talented young man who is always respectful to me and has always been friendly and a joy to be around. His sister, not so much... The boy is in college out of state, so I don't see him except on school breaks and there is an EOW custody arrangement that was in place before I came onto the scene. However, the girl child comes and goes between houses at whim, chasing whatever material object that she may want and gravitating toward whichever parent is more likely to indulge her. She is there every day after school because she rides the bus and her GUBM will camp out in our driveway, waiting for her.

I came into her life when she was 12. Her parents were divorced for about 10 years at that point, and she was very used to being the center of the universe. Her parents compete against one another for her attention in a somewhat amicable Disneyland co-parenting situation and she always seems to manipulate them both into getting exactly what she wants, when she wants it. No is not part of either one of their their vocabularies and she is a monster because of it. She is used to having what she wants and the adults in her life just giving it to her with no questions asked.

Enter me. I was a single parent for many years prior to getting married and raised my boys alone with only minimal financial help and hardly any face time from their father. I had no issues with telling them no if it was something that I just did not have to give and I raised them humbly, with strong work ethics, life lessons and personal integrity. I'm very proud of the men they have become. They were taught to be honest, to own their mistakes and to think of others instead of just themselves. I worked for everything that I have and nothing was just handed over.

My DH was raised with a silver spoon in his mouth in Mr. Roger's Neighborhood while I came from the other side of the tracks... We come from 2 different worlds and our upbringings were completely opposite as well as the way our own children were parented.

The girl child has not spoken more than a dozen words in my presence in about 3 years and I'm fully disengaged. From the first time that I left anything at his house, the girl child has made it a habit to freely use or take possession of anything that she came across of mine that caught her eye, then when asked about it, would lie to cover her *ss. It started with hygiene products and electronics and soon evolved to include my clothing and pretty much anything else that she wanted and I had. Before I disengaged, I would bring it up to DH, he would 'ask' her, she'd say 'no, daddy' and he would tell me that I hate her and am picking on her and it would cause an argument between us. She would become golden to daddy for a few days while I ignored them and went about my business and inevitably, DH would seek me out, looking for my attention. Predictable and it got so old that it grew hair and after a while I wised up and saw her manipulation tactics for what they were. After that, I disengaged and completely ignore her the way that she does to me.

I installed a visible security camera against DH's blessing in our bedroom and while it has deterred her somewhat, her hands are still in my stuff...

I know she uses anything of mine that I leave in the bathroom. She thinks that because I don't SEE it, that I'm ignorant and won't know. The other adults in her life are push overs and she mistakenly believes that I am, too...

Knowing this, I have had to resort to some pretty underhanded things to get some silent passive aggressive satisfaction from this situation...

I started small, with clear rubber bands on my shampoo and conditioner flip tops so I knew if they were opened. I evolved to taking a big old whiz in a half full bottle of my high end salon shampoo and mixing Nair into the matching conditioner. (She dropped a lot of hair but did not go bald.) I know she has a habit of using my razor (judging from the razor bumps that I suddenly acquired after shaving when I showered after her), so I seeded a few Serrano peppers from my garden with a ladies' Schick Hydro, replaced the cap and waited. It was a few days later and I saw her blotchy legs and knew that she used it.

You'd think that would have deterred her but NO...

I bought some invisible UV anti theft powder so her hands will glow but being an immediate gratification kind of girl, upped the ante and bought visible powder that will stain her hands purple for days on contact. I'm waiting for her to return from her extended vacation in Florida with her GUBM ( who, btw, 'can't afford' to help with her son's college tuition, but that's another blog...) so I can wait & watch. DH doesn't believe that 'his child' would do such things as steal, so it'll be interesting hearing her explain her stained fingers...

I read on here about the rat trap in a paper bag that another poster had shared. She is my hero.