Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is it your responsibility to be these teens' chauffeurs to the extent that they think they can't spend an hour in the library studying?

How easy is their school that they don't have at least an hour of homework to do??

Tell them to do their homework for an hour.

No one forced the OP to have kids. Or to remarry and add kids.

that does not mean it is HER job to drive around her step kids. they still have bio parents. and she IS driving the stepkid around. There is NOTHING wrong with telling the kid to study for an hour at the library. the kid is a brat. OP is not her chauffeur.

Yes, by remarrying (or at least cohabiting) it did become her job.

And if she doesn't see that, no wonder everyone hates her.

Oh HELL no.

It is NOT the STEPMOM'S job to do MORE parenting than the bio parents.

OP, it is TOTALLY reasonable to have a teen wait at a library for an hour, bio or step.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well, you're basically saying they should wait around for an hour because you've decided to marry and push a stepsibling into their household. That's what it boils down to. I don't know why you would expect a teen to be happy about that. Teens like autonomy and will perceive a stepfamily, or really any family, as a loss of autonomy for them. Not saying you were wrong to remarry but realistically you did this because it's good for you and the teens are just stuck with it.

Um, if OP was not in the picture, who would be picking up her stepkid? Why can't that person pick up the kid?

If i wasn’t in the picture today, and he had asked to go to this activity, his parent would probably have said no, because he wouldn’t have had a way to transport him. Or maybe he would have had him to take the metro there and then ubered to activity #2, which still would have involved waiting.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is it your responsibility to be these teens' chauffeurs to the extent that they think they can't spend an hour in the library studying?

How easy is their school that they don't have at least an hour of homework to do??

Tell them to do their homework for an hour.

No one forced the OP to have kids. Or to remarry and add kids.

that does not mean it is HER job to drive around her step kids. they still have bio parents. and she IS driving the stepkid around. There is NOTHING wrong with telling the kid to study for an hour at the library. the kid is a brat. OP is not her chauffeur.

Yes, by remarrying (or at least cohabiting) it did become her job.

And if she doesn't see that, no wonder everyone hates her.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is it your responsibility to be these teens' chauffeurs to the extent that they think they can't spend an hour in the library studying?

How easy is their school that they don't have at least an hour of homework to do??

Tell them to do their homework for an hour.

No one forced the OP to have kids. Or to remarry and add kids.

that does not mean it is HER job to drive around her step kids. they still have bio parents. and she IS driving the stepkid around. There is NOTHING wrong with telling the kid to study for an hour at the library. the kid is a brat. OP is not her chauffeur.

Anonymous wrote:Why is it your responsibility to be these teens' chauffeurs to the extent that they think they can't spend an hour in the library studying?

How easy is their school that they don't have at least an hour of homework to do??

Tell them to do their homework for an hour.

No one forced the OP to have kids. Or to remarry and add kids.

Anonymous wrote:Well, you're basically saying they should wait around for an hour because you've decided to marry and push a stepsibling into their household. That's what it boils down to. I don't know why you would expect a teen to be happy about that. Teens like autonomy and will perceive a stepfamily, or really any family, as a loss of autonomy for them. Not saying you were wrong to remarry but realistically you did this because it's good for you and the teens are just stuck with it.

Um, if OP was not in the picture, who would be picking up her stepkid? Why can't that person pick up the kid?

Why is it your responsibility to be these teens' chauffeurs to the extent that they think they can't spend an hour in the library studying?

How easy is their school that they don't have at least an hour of homework to do??

Tell them to do their homework for an hour.

Anonymous wrote:An hour is a little long. What was the alternative in that situation?

A teenager should absolutely be able to study in a library for an hour in between activities.

OP, it's fine. And if teens' parents think its not, they can pick him up.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are a blended family with 2 teens who are close in age.

The teen that is not mine often alleges that I favor the one I gave birth to. I try hard not to, but sometimes I want reality checks.

If one kid has an activity at the library that ends at 3:00, and the other kid has an activity 5 minutes away from him that ends at 4:00, it is reasonable for me to ask library kid to chill at the library for 55 minutes, doing homework or whatever.

We all, including both kids, have somewhere to be at 4:30 so metro isn’t an option. Other parent is taking another kid somewhere, so isn’t available for pick up.

Wait. You said you have 2 teens. You're picking up one at 3:55 and one at 4. Other parent is taking another kid somewhere? What kid is that? And why do you have to be somewhere at 4:30? It sounds like you are overscheduling your family. If that 55 minutes were the kid's only down time at home, or if not coming home means the day is harder or more complicated, then yes I can see why they would be unhappy with it.

It's unrealistic to expect a teen to make sacrifices for stepsiblings. Sorry, you can try to coerce them, but the bottom line is their "sibling" relationship ends when your marriage does, and they know it. It just isn't the same no matter how hard you insist it is.

They aren’t step siblings, but he’s not sacrificing for my kid. If we weren’t in the picture he wouldn’t be able to do both activities (which are both things he wants to do) because he wouldn’t have transportation.

We live far enough from the library that if he came home it would be 10 minutes max at home.

Maybe he doesn't like you because your writing style is unclear. What are they, half siblings?.Some sort of cutesy euphemism because you aren't married? Who is the third kid?

Again, it sounds like your family is overscheduled and I do not actually believe this child wants both of these activities.

I don’t know what to say to the idea that you think you know better than I do what activities the kids in my household want to do.

The younger child is his younger sibling.

Ok but who is the child with the 4 pm pickup? Stepsibling, right?

Look, sometimes teenagers say they want an activity but then their behavior says otherwise. It sounds like you have overscheduled this kid even if the kid does say they want both activities. And I don't believe you because divorced and remarried parents are notorious for believing whatever makes them feel okay about what they are putting their children through.

I would not think this is unreasonable for a bio kid, but I think you know it's not really about this, it's about the big picture. Look at this as an act of protest about the entire scenario, the entire lifestyle of having a stepparent and stepsibling. If you expected this kind of family to go smoothly and teenagers not to be occasionally unreasonable, that's on you.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are a blended family with 2 teens who are close in age.

The teen that is not mine often alleges that I favor the one I gave birth to. I try hard not to, but sometimes I want reality checks.

If one kid has an activity at the library that ends at 3:00, and the other kid has an activity 5 minutes away from him that ends at 4:00, it is reasonable for me to ask library kid to chill at the library for 55 minutes, doing homework or whatever.

We all, including both kids, have somewhere to be at 4:30 so metro isn’t an option. Other parent is taking another kid somewhere, so isn’t available for pick up.

Wait. You said you have 2 teens. You're picking up one at 3:55 and one at 4. Other parent is taking another kid somewhere? What kid is that? And why do you have to be somewhere at 4:30? It sounds like you are overscheduling your family. If that 55 minutes were the kid's only down time at home, or if not coming home means the day is harder or more complicated, then yes I can see why they would be unhappy with it.

It's unrealistic to expect a teen to make sacrifices for stepsiblings. Sorry, you can try to coerce them, but the bottom line is their "sibling" relationship ends when your marriage does, and they know it. It just isn't the same no matter how hard you insist it is.

They aren’t step siblings, but he’s not sacrificing for my kid. If we weren’t in the picture he wouldn’t be able to do both activities (which are both things he wants to do) because he wouldn’t have transportation.

We live far enough from the library that if he came home it would be 10 minutes max at home.

Maybe he doesn't like you because your writing style is unclear. What are they, half siblings?.Some sort of cutesy euphemism because you aren't married? Who is the third kid?

Again, it sounds like your family is overscheduled and I do not actually believe this child wants both of these activities.

I don’t know what to say to the idea that you think you know better than I do what activities the kids in my household want to do.

The younger child is his younger sibling.

You sound like a treat. Amazing that the kids don't seem to like you.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are a blended family with 2 teens who are close in age.

The teen that is not mine often alleges that I favor the one I gave birth to. I try hard not to, but sometimes I want reality checks.

If one kid has an activity at the library that ends at 3:00, and the other kid has an activity 5 minutes away from him that ends at 4:00, it is reasonable for me to ask library kid to chill at the library for 55 minutes, doing homework or whatever.

We all, including both kids, have somewhere to be at 4:30 so metro isn’t an option. Other parent is taking another kid somewhere, so isn’t available for pick up.

Wait. You said you have 2 teens. You're picking up one at 3:55 and one at 4. Other parent is taking another kid somewhere? What kid is that? And why do you have to be somewhere at 4:30? It sounds like you are overscheduling your family. If that 55 minutes were the kid's only down time at home, or if not coming home means the day is harder or more complicated, then yes I can see why they would be unhappy with it.

It's unrealistic to expect a teen to make sacrifices for stepsiblings. Sorry, you can try to coerce them, but the bottom line is their "sibling" relationship ends when your marriage does, and they know it. It just isn't the same no matter how hard you insist it is.

They aren’t step siblings, but he’s not sacrificing for my kid. If we weren’t in the picture he wouldn’t be able to do both activities (which are both things he wants to do) because he wouldn’t have transportation.

We live far enough from the library that if he came home it would be 10 minutes max at home.

Maybe he doesn't like you because your writing style is unclear. What are they, half siblings?.Some sort of cutesy euphemism because you aren't married? Who is the third kid?

Again, it sounds like your family is overscheduled and I do not actually believe this child wants both of these activities.

I don’t know what to say to the idea that you think you know better than I do what activities the kids in my household want to do.

The younger child is his younger sibling.

Anonymous wrote:Why on earth did you marry someone with a kid close in age to your own? All the step sibling pairs I went to high school with who were close in age pretty much resented the he11 out of each other.

You need to treat your non-bio child the same way you would treat your bio child or you are going to be miserable until they are all off in college.

This isn’t something I would think twice about doing with my bio child. As I said I have had him wait till it’s convenient for me to pick him up plenty of times, just not at the library because he hasn’t happened to choose a library activity.

Are you a blended family? It does not sound like it. Sounds like you are a married couple who has coerced your teens to reside together. It's not the same.

I think you know it's not really about the pickup time. It's probably that the teen does not like having a stepparent and stepsibling or whatever you actually are.

A real shocker the OP is divorced...

Why on earth did you marry someone with a kid close in age to your own? All the step sibling pairs I went to high school with who were close in age pretty much resented the he11 out of each other.

You need to treat your non-bio child the same way you would treat your bio child or you are going to be miserable until they are all off in college.