Not sure how to help my stepson...LOST!! :(

[tiggerlila]

Ever since I have been with my boyfriend, his ex has done nothing but try to poison the kids to think I was the cause for their parents seperation. We began dating waaaaay after their seperation and the time I met my boyfriend she was already engaged and pregnant with another man. Its been over a year and a half and it seems that things are only getting worse. She is now pregnant again and engaged to another man.

We get the kids every other week for the entire week from Sunday to Sunday. Quite honestly I don't think this is the best schedule for the kids. The kids reset themselves every week for each home. We are much more strict and stern and their mother is laid back. We have tried motivating the kids with a star chart, rewards, trips and allowance but in the end it all has failed.  

I am mostly concerned with stepson because he is slacking off in school and lies continuously everday about any & everything. His mother doesn't make anything of it and thinks he is perfectly fine. However we get emails from his teacher almost daily if not everyother day that he has been kicked out of class, not paying attention, not doing his work & homework or got into a fight. Even his karate instructor is concerned for his attitude and well being. He has noticed the difference in our parenting from his mothers. As much as I know I am NOT his mother...I love him as if he were my own and I am willing to do any & everything for him. We are working on getting him to see a therapist, but his mother has told him and us that he doesn't need that....so of course now he feels he doesn't need that at all. We have tried getting him into karate...which he LOVES...but his mother was completely against it from the start. She refused to take him during her weeks and now has put into his head that he will play football instead. We have given her the opportunity to do as she has told him and enroll him into football team...but now she tells him she can't afford it with a new baby on the way. My boyfriend enrolled his daughter to preschool and she refused to help financially because she feels she does NOT need to go to school, yet she has been taking her on her weeks.

My step son told me the other night that his mom always interrogates him after we drop them off and that she tells him bad stuff about his father and I. He was teary eyed when he was telling me this. It completely breaks my heart because I can tell he feels so confused and lost.

What can I do to HELP him!?!?

[madre420]

My kids also had week on week off, it was hard on them also so when they asked us to change to two weeks on two weeks off we agreed and it was allot better for them.

As for helping your ss..It seems you're already doing the right thing. He obviously disagrees with his mom and confides in you, you allow him to take something that really upsets him and find a resolution, which means he trusts you and respects you. Keep up the good work half your battle is won.

[newstepmom61811]

I agree with Madre, SS has a shitty mom who isn't really making his emotional needs the priority and helping him deal with the divorced life. Sad, you can't change it. I deal with similar shit. You can't make his pain go any, be a safe place he can take it, an as he grows help him deal. In my case my SD11 "hates" her BM, her words, has asked not to see her anymore, has asked for her 12th b-day to go back to court to cut visitation with BM, in my state at 12 the child has a say and can petition the court. I sometimes don't know what to say. I realize emotionally she's just too young to process all the hurt from her mom and that she doesn't really hate her. I just tell her to keep contact, that no parent is perfect, as she gets older she will better understand the limits of what her mother emotionally can give her and will be able to deal with it, and that no matter what, DH and I are here, going no where, love her and will be steady here in her life no matter what happens in the other house, she can vent to us any time and nothing will be said or done. With the younger SS3 she does stuff like after one of her weekends he came back refusing to call me my name, he called me "stepmother", I asked him why are you calling me that, he said "mommy told me to". I kept it from being tense I said "kiddo I love you and it's ok and I like it better when you call me by my first name" he said "I love you too" and started calling me by my first name right away again. She plays all sorts of head games with the kids. I just make sure I am someone the kids trust, always honest, always follow through, reliable. Complete opposite of the BM, it speaks for itself. Just keep doing what you're doing. Your SS obviously already knows you are a safe place to go. You can't change te situation, you am be a safe place for him to take it...

[tiggerlila]

Thank you ladies. I can't help but sometimes feel like rather than helping I may be causing more problems. But issues continue to come up because BM refuses to work together to help SS. He is an amazing kid but has such low self esteem...breaks my heart.