So, my step daughter is 26 my wifes daughter. She has three kids, 1, 2 and 4. One girl and two boys.
She decided to have these children with a guy who already had a daughter with a different woman. Baby Daddy, we will call him VA for violent asshole, doesn’t really do shit for his other daughter. So, have kids with the deadbeat Dad! What could possibly go wrong?
VA is 30 something, worked part time washing dishes in a pizza joint, sold pot on the side and basically has no real goals (except to become a rap star, somehow).
Well, VA got arrested for domestic assault on step daughter. His forth arrest which should mean a year in jail, automatically. Yet somehow he is out
Step daughter had no job, no money and was living with VA. Once VA got thrown in jail, well she lost her place to live cause VA didn’t pay the rent. Step daughter ended up moving in with her step Mom, who we will call Bitch because she is one (for reasons not related to this little fuckaroo), who happened to be separated from Step daughters Dad. How’d that happen? No fucking idea. I do know that Bitch wanted step daughter the hell out.
We had step daughter out a few years ago, when she only had one kid, in an effort to help her get her shit together. That didn’t go well as she didn’t look for a job, didn’t take care her own shit, didn’t do much of anything other than try and hook up with the guys at the gas station down the street. It ended badly and we shipped her back to South Carolina with a ‘good luck!’.
Fast forward to now, step daughter has no where to live, no job, no car, no money and is living on Bitches couch while Bitch doesn’t want her there.
My wife, falling into Mom mode, decides we need to get step daughter out here and get her into a women’s shelter. Wife takes the money that she had saved to buy our twins a playground set and buys three tickets.
We talk to the women’s shelter and they will take her in, get her welfare setup, get her in classes, etc. So we are good to go, right?
Wait for it…
Step daughter knows about the flight. She decides that she is going to have the guy she is banging while VA is in jail give her and her kids a ride to the airport. Of course, the guy she is banging think to himself ‘I am bangin this woman. If I take her to the airport I don’t get to bang her anymore’ and refuses to take her to the airport.
And step daughter misses the flight. The tickets, bought cheap and in a hurry, are non refundable so we are out ~$1,000.
So step daughter ends up going to a shelter in S.C.
Some time passes and step daughter wants to come out here. See, it turns out that the prosecutors in S.C. want to go after step daughter for exposing her kids to domestic violence. Suddenly, there is a bit of motivation, if she goes to the shelter out here she won’t get prosecuted. The shelter somehow scrapes together enough money to buy her and her kids tickets out here. The shelter in S.C. talks to the prosecutors and step daughter won’t be hauled into court.
So she gets out here. We let her and her kids stay the first night at our place as the flight came in late. The next morning, we take her and the kids to the shelter.
Things sorta seem fine the first week. We have her and her kids over on Saturdays. The first Saturday step daughter tells my wife she is uncomfortable having her youngest (a girl) at the shelter. So wife agrees to we can watch the girl until step daughter is setup in a place to live, 30 days max. (I wasn’t very happy about this but so it goes).
The girl, we will call her Screamy, screamed a lot. And within a day my twin boys were sick. We take Screamy and the twins into the doc and find that Screamy has probably been sick for weeks. Since step daughter hasn’t signed up for medicare, that is $120 out of my pocket plus the meds. Oh, and none of her kids have shots. More on that in a moment.
Of course, my wife and I both end up sick. I miss three days work which I haven’t done in years.
Screamy, well, screams. If she isn’t being held she just screams. She mellows out a bit after the meds kick in but not much. For some reason, I am the only one who can get her to stop. If I tell her ‘You are fine. You are clean, you are fed. You are fine and screaming isn’t acceptable.’ she stops. Might take a couple times but it works. Kinda odd, but whatever. After a couple weeks, she only screams like 20% of the time. She is sweet and adorable the rest of the time.
My wife is going a bit nuts, taking care of twin 20 month old boys and now a 1 year old girl who screams all the time. However, after a few days Screamy is much better behaved. Still screams some but she is now acting like a normal 1 year old.
Step daughter comes over a second time, her boys run amok and she doesn’t seem to care. Step daughter asks if we can watch her oldest boy. We say no.
Some more time passes and I have a conversation with step daughter. I tell her that she needs to get all her kids shots or her kids will not be allowed around our kids. Step daughter starts in with ‘You can’t control me.’. I say ‘I am not controlling you. I am telling you what will happen. The choice is yours, if your kids don’t get their shots, they will not be around my kids. Plus, the pediatrician will take on your kids if they get shots and he is very hard to get as a doc because he is the best in town’. Step daughter tries with ‘Well, the woman at the shelter said…’. I say ‘Don’t care.’. She tries ‘Well, if your kids have their shots it doesn’t matter that mine don’t…’. I tell her she is full of shit and, once again, it doesn’t matter. No shots, no visits.
This last Sunday step daughter calls. Her youngest son is sick. Step daughter still hasn’t managed to get her medicare setup even though the shelter helps with this kind of stuff.
So I go pick up step daughter and the two boys and slog over the the only hospital that will take her with no insurance. Turns out the youngest boy has strep throat. We go to two pharmacies to get the prescription filled, but all they are closed. It is 8 pm and I have spent roughly 7 hours on this. Step daughter says that she will get the prescription filled first thing in the morning.
Wait for it…
So, last night I am on my way home and step daughter calls. I ask if she got the prescription filled, she says no, but she got her medicare card. She asks if I am around the T.I. casino, that is where she is at. ‘Oh,’ says I, ‘applying for a job?’. No, sez step daughter, ‘I took the boys to the pool’.
Me: ‘You took your boys to the pool? And you didn’t get the meds?’
SD: ‘Yeah, but I got the medicare card. I can get the medicine tomorrow.’
Me: ‘I cannot pick you up, I am not in the area’. <disconnect>
So I ponder this on my way home. My wife is way beyond stressed and I don’t want to tell her. But I must. This is not going to be pleasant.
So I get home and tell my wife. Wife is beyond livid. Wife calls step daughter, and, no answer. This isn’t surprising as step daughter has real problems answering the phone, which is odd considering that she doesn’t have a fucking thing to do. But, of course, we found out a while ago that step daughter has been talking to VA again. Now the plan is that VA will come out here in two years and they will live a happy wonderful life!
So we pack up Screamy and drive down the shelter. You see, my wife and I are done. Every single time we try and help, step daughter fucks around. She is, it seems, absolutely incapable of being responsible. We bought the kids clothes, diapers, food. We paid for their medical care. And she takes a 2 year old kid with strep throat to a goddamned casino pool so she could flirt with guys and get knocked up again.
We get to the shelter. I pull in to the parking area and my wife takes Screamy and her things inside. Since it is a womans shelter, I can’t really get out of the car.
While I am sitting there, step daughter walks up with the stroller and the two boys. She has her makeup done like she is trolling for dick. She asks me what is up and I tell her that her Mom is inside and roll up the window.
My wife comes out a few minutes later. She told step daughter that we are done. She also let the staff of the shelter know that step daughters youngest has strep and that step daughter decided going to the pool was more important than getting meds.
This morning step daughter calls. She is mad. You see, my wife should ‘let her raise her kids her way and just do grandma things’. This, from a woman with three kids, no job, no car, no place to live who stayed with a physically and mentally abusive Baby Daddy whose greatest accomplishment so far is that he hasn’t been busted for selling drugs.
I expected something like this to happen. My wife was guardedly hopeful. I wasn’t. My wife is beyond pissed but we both decided that we are done. We cannot help the kids, we cannot afford it and we don’t have the rights even if we tried. We let the shelter know what is going on. We don’t have the tools to make step daughter understand that she really, really needs to change her thinking and behavior. So, we are done. We both feel horrid for the kids but there is nothing else to do.
I expect that step daughter will try and find a way back to S.C. Once there, I suspect she will hook back up with Baby Daddy and I expect that she will end up in jail, lose custody of her kids and blame everyone in the world for her problems.
Slee