I cannot stand my adult step son

It's almost impossible to give context and keep things short but I'll try. Basically my wife had twins when she was in college, she and I met about six years ago and got married four years ago. The twins were 15 when we met and now they're almost 21. I've gotten along swimmingly with her daughter, she's a real sweetheart. Hard working, thoughtful, smart, and a good kid. Her son is the opposite. I believe he's dishonest, manipulative, lazy and entitled. He's so lazy that he physically moves slower than every other human being. He established himself as my adversary from the start because I disrupted his precious bubble. I took him aside two weeks before I proposed to offer him the courtesy of telling him man to man and giving him a chance to offer his blessing (I wasn't seeking it from him but it was welcome). Instead when I told him I intended to marry his mother, he just says "yeah that's not great" and that was the end of it.

Things never improved. For the first two years we were married I was optimistic that he and I could maybe develop some sort of friendship or at least a positive rapport with each other but that never manifested. I tried showing him how to play baseball when he randomly decided to play little league for the first time at 16, took him to all his games and practices and took him to the school down the street to play catch and practice hitting. I tried bonding with him over video games and movies. Nothing stuck. To this day he carries the same mopey attitude. At first I got it and tolerated it. I had relocated from CA to VA for a new job that I took specifically so I could be geographically closer to them and court his mom. Six months after we got engaged they moved from NY to VA into an apartment I rented for all of us but didn't move into myself until after the wedding. I never spent the night there to set a moral example for the kids but I was down there every chance I got (it was about an hours commute from DC where I was living and working). So I understood his mopey and resentful attitude at that point, at least a little. After we had been married five months events transpired in such a way that I was able to start working remotely for my job and they allowed me to move up to NY and in with my in-laws where my wife and her kids had been living all along until they left for VA. I thought this was doing my step son a favor by undoing a wrong and letting him finish out his high school years back home in his old bedroom and around his old friends (despite the fact the kids were pulled from public school and were now homeschooled, something my wife planned to do anyway whether they had moved or not).

Almost a year after moving to NY I got permission for the move I truly wanted to make and had been patiently waiting to request. Since my wife had just had our first child together I wanted to move back to my hometown in CA so my parents could be around their first grandchild. They're old and have no others, and her parents have had grandkids around them for 20 years. So they granted me permission and we made the move. Before that though we offered the twins the freedom to choose whether they went with us to CA or stayed in NY living with their grandparents. They were 18 so it was only fair. Her daughter joined us and her son stayed in NY. That was the outcome I was hoping for because I sensed that her daughter was kind of oppressed by her brother, living in his shadow, always deferring to his wants and never getting what she wanted.

So we moved, immediately her daughter thrived. She enrolled in community college and now she's about to transfer to a four year to finish her Mechanical Engineering degree. She's made friends here, compared to the first three years that I'd been around I never knew her to even leave the house to hangout with friends. Now she's a social butterfly. And she's dating a guy whom she apparently wants to marry. All great stuff. Contrast this with her brother who got into drugs, fired from his job, into at least two separate car accidents, and displayed such a stunning lack of judgment that he'd bring strangers over to his basement apartment in his grandparents house to get high. Then he dropped the bomb on my wife that he was going to move to TX to live with his deadbeat, absentee, loser father. That hurt my wife because he wouldn't leave NY for her but he would for the man who's never been there. Well, as I could've predicted, her son lasted 10 days in TX. They got into two physical altercations, one of which included a knife drawn, they did drugs together, and her son ended up in the hospital from a drug-induced psychotic break brought on by doing all kinds of psychedelics. My wife was a wreck and in spite of what I wanted, I let her invite him to stay with us.

My understanding was he'd come out for a month or two, detox, maybe get a little counseling help or something but then he'd either get a job and his own place or go back to NY. Well, here we are over 10 months later and he's still living with us in our house with no room for him. He got busted a month or two in smoking weed in our garage, and it took him about four months to get find a job at freakin McDonald's. But he barely works, he probably works 16-20 hours a week tops.

Otherwise he just loafs around all day, eating my food, using my electricity, TV, wifi. He just pays for his cell phone and his car expenses but paying rent is taboo in my wife's family (they're Hispanic and apparently kids can stick around as long as they want, forget about "failure to launch").

To add to it I just can't stand how he carries himself. He acts like some kind of black Spicoli (Sean Penn from Fast Times if you've never seen it). I thought the whole oblivious stoner motif died out in the 2000s. He walks, talks, acts, dresses like a drug dealer. He thinks cause his dad's 1/2 Haitian that makes him Malcolm X or something, and with two young sons of my own (3 and 1) I don't want them picking up any of his character traits, including those.

I just want him out of my house, but he's dragging his behind trying to find an apartment. He thinks he's going to join the Conservation Corps but they won't have an opening until August. Meanwhile he's continues to be lazy.

When I was his age and living at home my parents told me I had to either work full time, go to school full time, or do both part time. I want to establish that same rule but I don't know how. My wife is exceedingly protective of him because she feels so guilty about the fact that he didn't have a dad growing up. That problem is compounded by the fact that he knows how to manipulate her with his own emotions and keeps her wrapped around his little finger. So when I want to tell him that he shouldn't be home between 8 and 5 Monday thru Friday, she'd get defensive and say I just wanted to get rid of him. (Yeah I do want him out of the house but I wouldn't admit that).

For the record, I work two jobs, 62+ hours a week across seven days. I never have a day off. I work hard for what I have and what I provide my family, I DO NOT work hard to finance his laziness and that's what absolutely gets my goat.

What would you do?

Delvianna said:

That sounds like a tough situation. But since you asked, heres my 2 cents.

First, id come up with my boundaries. My personal boundaries of what I will absolutely, under no circumstances accept. So for example, I would 100% never accept anyone smoking weed in the house. If that rule is broken, they no longer live there.

After I made those boundaries, id sit with my wife and explain that im struggling and my mental health is taking a hit and ive come up with a list of boundaries that cannot be crossed under any circumstances. Which means, she is either going to put me first, or her child first and im willing to let the chips fall where they may because I cant live in a relationship where my primary boundaries are broken and I have no support from my spouse. After that conversation I will tell her to think things over and let me know where she stands.

At some point the adult child needs to be an adult and hes already not just hurting you, but your marriage. I can hear how there are seeds being planted of anger and resentment already at the way your wife is handling her son. Eventually this whole thing is just going to get worse. A marriage will only work if both spouses support eachother and at some point, the spouse needs to be chosen over the child. Hes not a teenager anymore and the excuses need to end. Accountability needs to be stuck to or this whole thing is going to eventually crash and burn anyway.

Again, im really sorry youre going through this. Praying God gives you clarity.

Click to expand...

Thank you for the thoughtful response, I really appreciate it. Of the many things that I want to do, I think establishing that one boundary you mentioned (no drug use) has been made clear: if it happens again he's gone that very hour. We haven't caught him since, and I put it that way because I don't trust him whatsoever and suspect he's smoking more discreetly away from the house. I just can't prove it. But if my suspicions are ever proven right then the hammer will be dropped.

He allegedly has been apartment hunting (specifically looking to sublet a room) but he's acting like he has all the time in the world like he does with everything else. The man doesn't know the meaning of the word "urgent" or "hustle".

Anyways, thank you for your prayers. They're absolutely appreciated.

Richard T said:

Sorry to hear all your pain. Some kids just won't take initiative or discipline. Good thing you probably will not have this problem front and center for too much longer.
My experience with kids from a divorce are somewhat similar. My approach was to let the mother deal with them. I would put in my two cents but I left the decisions about them up to her and most interaction on their life's were between them and her. I never had to finance them though other than some part of their food and housing. Refused to let the mom cosign on a new car with over 500 a month payments. Saved her too cause the daughter had to get a used vehicle with us only providing the down payment. Later, the daughter could not even make the 250 a month payments.
Hopefully it is not a choice between the son and you for your wife. I would suggest concentrating on what is really important to you and what God leads you to do. As to what the son does, possible refer more to let the mom handle him. I like the boundaries but just tell your wife, see how that stands and be as kind as possible. Hopefully this kid will move on. God bless your situation.

Click to expand...

Thanks Richard, I agree. I've actually by default had to let my wife handle everything with him cause I can barely stand to look at him let alone speak to him. He's so profoundly crossed my values that he's practically dead to me. And it kinda needs to stay that way cause I just learned last week from my doctor that my blood pressure is at "stroke levels", and I can say with certainty my stepson, my sister-in-law and my niece are major sources of stress that spike my readings, so the more I ignore them and try to pretend they're not there, the better.