Quote:
Originally Posted by Detoxing
I've seen "tough love" work (for the kid) once in my life. And that kid came from a middle class, two parent household who had their shit together, and that kid went straight into the military.
Every other time ive seen it, it hasn't helped but make things worse. Destructive people don't become less destructive when there's no supervision. They just fall further into their own self-destruction.
Mecca's wife has to decide if she's willing to ride that wave or not. As Rainman said, maybe it's easier to deal with his issues from a distance than up close. Sometimes it's better to simply cut-bait to make your own quality of life improvements. But prepared to deal with that and what comes with it.
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It kinda worked with my stepsister, but part of that issue may have been that her getting tossed out of the house got her away from my whack-job, alcoholic step mother.
And even at that, it took about 10-12 years of trial/error and stops and starts. By her early 30s she'd finally rounded into form with a steady job and a couple of kids (has lived with her boyfriend for a decade or so; took her back and adopted her son after she cheated on him with...{sigh}...a drummer...as a waitress...jesus, be more of a cliche).
Someone mentioned previously that there's no an easy answer and that whatever path you (edit: now speaking to Mecca after remembering after I posted that I quoted Detox) choose, it's probably going to be a loooooooong road. Even if you try to cut him out altogether, you probably can't. And once it gets this far gone, it's just a real hard ship to turn. Unfortunately your runway there is always shorter than you realize. I can be a little hard on my kids on occasion and have insisted on the 'respect your elders' thing since they were 2 but that's because my step-sister was a bitchy little twat by the time she was 5. Her being a disaster was a foregone conclusion before she got to elementary school.
And you hear stories all the time about good kids who just meet the wrong person and within 6 months all hell breaks loose. Those can be easier to deal with than the long, slow slides. But they can also go to hell a bit more catastrophically. At the very least, it doesn't seem like your step-son presents a danger to himself or others.
My kids are too young for any great insights here other than my boy is a temperamental shit and I learned with him that I have to
talk to him. Direct action or obvious irritation just has him going over top of me. When he gets loud, I get quiet. If he gets more spun up, I get more monotone and measured in my delivery. If he gets more rambly, I get more succinct. And eventually we try to circle around into a conversation of some sort. He's nothing like the 2 girls and requires a far different approach to get through to him. It's possible that some of the suggestions made above will be useful - measured, deliberate, cool-headed responses and attempts to re-direct energy towards solutions.
The problem you face is that if your wife is at her wits end, you may struggle to get any momentum with her (and if she's not going to re-engage, you're drawing dead anyway, IMO).