Honestly…if you only have the kid 4 days a month…I would not be pressuring DH to do anything about it. He knows his kid is a screw up, and you trying to make him parent, makes DH defensive of his son.

Ignore, ignore, ignore. Try not to care about him failing or not going to school. Not your problem…worry about your kid.

My advice is to tell DH that you are leaving the raising of his son to him and you will raise your DD. …BUT make rules NOW for when the kids graduate or fail.

They cannot live with you, after 18, unless they PASS high school. They cannot live with you after 18 unless they go to college FULL time and work at least 20 hours per week. This way, when the little degenerate fails and mommy dearest kicks him out, he will have to find his own way AND not to your house.

I've been through your situation and I just told my children that I simply have higher expectations for them. I would not let my children get away with anything because I felt "it's not fair." they honestly DO understand, at times they didn't like it but having my children be productive citizens as young adults is proof enough that some things aren't fair in life but we have to be responsible for our own actions. Good luck and stay firm with your daughter. She's old enough to understand WHY she has different standards

Follow link below and print it out. Read it and insist your husband do the same. Tell him you are hands-off his kid and he is to do the same. He can report transgressins of your daughter to you if he wants to be the evil ogre but unless she is starting a fire in the living room he is to do nothing.

And she won't be backtalking him because he won't be chastizing her so that problem won't appear.

http://www.steptogether.org/disengaging.html

I totally understand how you feel. Everything is a double standard with my fiancee. His kids make horrible messes everywhere and don't lift a finger, he cleans up after them. My daughter on the other hand, is made to clean her room and the shared bathroom that his boys trash on the weekends. Anyways... I have to bite my tongue when he walks by her room and comments on how messy she is when 1) his kids are just as messy if not MESSIER, 2) she actually cleans up after herself on a regular basis, no questions asked. If you ask his children to do ANYTHING....they will scream and whine and cry and complain and throw a fit. And basically be never asks them to do anything. His daughter was getting mostly all f's and a few d's and then raised her grades to straight c's. Well, he was so FREAKING proud of her you would have thought she invented the internet. My daughter however went from a 3.5 to a 3.2 and all he could do was say," well she really needs to try harder and get back on track".

I totally feel for you. Some men are just clueless about their kids. They can do no wrong, they are the best, it will always be a double standard and you may as well forget it. Seriously. Just forget about it ever making sense or being fair, because it won't. Take comfort in the fact that your child is being raised properly and his child is not. It will take its toll.

Omg this is exactly what it was like with my ex bf. I only last a little less then 2 yrs. There was more to it, though, which affected my kids. Like him treating them differently when his kids were around. My kids aren't stupid, they see the differences in parenting, but him treating them differently they didn't get. One thing I would add to the advice already given is to make sure the crap you are dealing with isn't having negative consequences on your daughter. She is older than my 2, and maybe old enough to understand, but you might want to have a conversation with her. You never know what's up in their heads until you try to open it up...