When home life is different
I have two step children. A 9 year old boy and 8 year old girl. I'm at my wits end because their bio mom raises them completely differently than what I raise my own 8 year old daughter.
They have missed almost 40 days of school because she doesn't make them go if they don't want to. They have lice all the time because she won't take the time to get rid of it. The 9 year old is finishing 3rd grade at a 1st grade reading level and she doesn't do anything to help him. No extra reading time at home, no tutoring...nothing. All they eat is fast food and hot dogs. She puts them in clothes that don't fit them.
We only have the allotted Wednesday and every other weekend with them, so when we try to combat the issues, it's not really doing anything. When we try to talk to bio mom, she just gets defensive, insults us, and makes excuses.
I just don't know what to do. I love my step children and it's so hard for me to feel like there is nothing I can do to help them. She is setting them up to fail in life. Also, I don't want them to feel resentful towards my daughter since their father and I are raising her much differently. My heart is broken for them.
If your step kids have missed
If your step kids have missed so many unexcused days, I would think your husband could possibly petition for full custody.
The fact that together your daughter is excelling while his are floundering.. the absences etc.. a judge might do that.
Then he can be the primary influence.
We have discussed this. It's
We have discussed this. It's scary to think about involving them in a huge custody battle.
Not sure it would be a huge
Not sure it would be a huge custody battle if you can prove that she is unfit.
Poor kids! Have you tried
Poor kids! Have you tried treating the lice while they are at your house? It is almost summer..will they be with you more than every other weekend? I know its not your job but maybe you can work on reading skills during the summer and weekends? We buy my SD13 school clothes because BM buys her clothes from the thrift shop and she was getting made fun of. Maybe you could do that next year?
Yes, we treat the lice when
Yes, we treat the lice when they are at our house. We think their mother has it because even when we treat it and comb out their hair they always have it when they come back. We shave my SS hair every couple months to avoid him getting it again. My poor SD hates that we have to deal with lice every time she's with us. She feels like we are punishing her. We have been buying clothes for them to wear when they are with us, but I guess we will have to start buying school clothes, too.
And we work on reading with them both...it just feels so defeating and that nothing we are doing is helping because we have them so little.
I don't mind going out of my way for them and doing things that normally wouldn't be expected. I feel useless. I'm hoping as they get older they will recognize the effort we are putting in.
Gah, can you imagine what
Gah, can you imagine what else is going on in the home if the mom is continuing to walk around with lice? Yuck!
Have you seen the inside of the house? Did she live like this when DH was with her? I would call CPS and ask what your options are.
I've not seen the inside of
I've not seen the inside of their house. She will not even allow me to be in the car for pick up and drop offs! He said she is a terrible house keeper and just last weekend we had to replace a bunch of SS baseball equipment because their dog had peed on it and they couldn't find other parts of his uniform.
First off though it may annoy
First off though it may annoy mom if you two are married and he has custody right's to the children then what she say's about you being in the car doesn't matter. It could cause fights though so up to you if you want to stir up that bee's nest. Second call CPS. If a dog peed on his baseball equipment and they constantly have lice I'd be very worried about what the home environment is right. Children should not have to live in filth.
Have you considered reporting
Have you considered reporting her neglect to CPS? If you do, be sure to include school attendance records as well.
Yeah, we already found out
Yeah, we already found out that nobody cares about the lice. Once we realized it was such an issue, we made a ton of phone calls and basically were told it doesn't matter.
He has been more involved
He has been more involved lately and that is why all this has been coming to light. We have been together a little over a year and prior to us being together, he always just took their mother's word for how they were doing in school and how they were at home. Once I started questioning things, then he started also questioning and now he is seeing what is really going on.
He did start being more involved with the teachers and their bio mom flipped out. She tried to get the teachers not to talk to him and also told him that he needs to get all his info from her and not to talk to the teachers.
If he has joint legal custody
If he has joint legal custody then there is nothing she can do about him talking to the teachers. If she continues to try and block his ability to communicate it could be considered a violation for their custody orders.
I can totally understand what
I can totally understand what you’re going through. Not the exact same but some similar issues here.
My SO has two children. We live an hour away due to BM being pretty high conflict. He moved in with me after she basically started to randomly leave the kids at his door causing him to have to call into work while she went out to party or whatever.
His youngest is in preschool and is having some major issues. The kid bites, kicks, and bullies his peers. He’s smaller so I’m surprised no one’s knocked him out yet. He flat out lies to adults and in general just won’t listen. We don’t know what to do since dad only gets them every other weekend. The preschool teacher will tell him what’s been going on. We’ll talk in the car on the way home and let him know his behavior is unacceptable but what else can we do.
When they are with us they have a completely different set of rules. My SO thinks that BM is demanding too much of daughter. She’s only in first grade and it seems like she is expected to completely take care of brother down to even bathing him. When she’s with us that’s not the case. She doesn’t have to do anything for him. He will scream and yell demanding she help but we don’t make her.
She does however show signs of extreme anxiety. Whenever she thinks she’s in trouble or makes a mistake she shuts down though I’ve never seen my SO get physical with her or degrade her. We both talk with the kids and will use time out. We’re trying to teach empathy. We’ll ask why they did something, would they like it done to them, what should they do next time. We have reason to believe BM either doesn’t discipline or loses her temper and spanks.
It’s hard because when the kids are with us for the most part they are pretty well behaved but we know as soon as they leave their going back to the same old stuff. Son’s behavior has only gotten worse and daughter seems more on edge.
We hope to one day get full custody of the children. We are keeping school records and if son’s behavior continues we’re hoping to use them as an example of why he should change to our home. On top of that daughter already makes statements that make us feel she will one day ask to live with us which again we hope to present.
We’ve talked about getting the kids in with a therapist. BM did talk to the school but they can’t do anything for son since he’s in preschool and daughter doesn’t have any trouble at school, so that was the end of that. BM has made zero attempts to get them in with someone else, making excuses. So we’re taking the initiative. We don’t want to pry and make the kids feel like they have to hide something from us so we’d rather a professional talk to them. Unless we see something or they directly tell us something there’s nothing we can do. If we had any sort of real evidence we’d be at a police station in seconds.
We’ve talked about having a child together in the distant future and sometimes I’ll start to say what I will do with “my child”. I realize that at this time when these two are in our care they are in a way my children so if I’d do it with my own I do it with them. That's why we now have story time every night. Me and their father talk about what we want so yeah our home is vastly different from their mothers but we feel it’s what it should be to help the children grow and learn while feeling safe and loved.
If your DH won't jerk a knot
If your DH won't jerk a knot in BM's tail and keep his foot up her butt regarding these issues with the kids then there is little you can do about it with only 8days a month Skid time.
DH needs to immediately get this to court and do what he can to protect the best interests of his kids.
IMHO of course. Good luck.
Familiar story. Over several
Familiar story.
Over several years we've dealt with head lice (going on for 7 years now), athletes foot, veruccas, nappy rash, fleas, ringworm, dirty far too small and inappropriate for the weather clothes & shoes, not doing homework, signs of extreme anxiety in both sds, etc. The only difference is very little non attendance at school as they are often sent even when very ill as BM thinks it's too much of an "interference" in her life if they stay at home (she only works a few hours a week..).
We've talked to all available social services, lawyers, doctor and therapists. They're all horrified, but then won't take any action as they don't want to "get in the middle of anything" (if I had £ for every time we've heard that phrase..). We've been told court proceedings would be a massive waste of time as unless she's actually stubbing cigarettes out on them a judge won't do anything in this country.
Awful as it is we just had to resign to treating them and caring for them when they're with us, and letting go of what we can't do anything about. It sounds callous but after years of this stuff and having exhausted all available avenues of help, there's not much we can do.