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[Jay w]

Me and the wife have been together for 9 years, she was married before and had a son by this chap, right from the time we got together i have always treated him as part of the family.
He is now 18 and since he left school he has turned into a breakless layabout, his excuse is ' i don't know what i want to do for a job' so we suggested that he gets out into the marketplace and tries a few until he finds one that he will like, his answer 'but i don't know what i want to do so i don't know where to start'  

He is not the most outgoing person in the world, coupled with the usual teenager attitude, by his own admission he had no practical experience of doing a CV or dealing with interviews, so i have spent a lot of time coaching him on dealing with questions and interviews and putting together CV's and application form.

We finally got him an apprenticeship in the local Audi dealer, i knew the Dealer Principle quite well and pulled a few strings, i figured that once he was in there he would knuckle down and show them that he had commitment  :-/ he lasted 5 days and they let him go/sacked him due to his attitude and unwillingness to do what he was told
since then he has dossed, drifted from college course to college course, lied about where he is and made up countless excuses about why he didn't get the job he applied for.

I am away from mon-fri so i don't get to view the situation on a first hand basis, my wife had chronic ME and sometimes she can deal with the aggro, but i decided to 'follow up' on some interviews he has been to recently to try and get some feedback, the response was interesting.
1) can you send an interpreter next time please so we can understand what he was grunting about
2) I have never seen someone sit in a chair.....horizontally!!!
3) He didn't really seem interested, when we asked him why he applied he just shrugged his shoulders and grunted.

  So i faced him yesterday with this, now it was fair to say it didn't go down well, i was 'checking up' on him, which i admitted i was doing, his view is that the world owes him a favour, he is collecting it and his intention is not to get a job but to doss on the benefits, at this point it all kicked off in a monumental fashion and we squared up, i had him by the throat against a hot radiator and at that point he saw things from my prospective, either that or he was getting burnt

We have got to the point where he is affecting every single person in the house, we don't speak, my wife is tired of his attitutude/behavoiur and my daughter doesn't like the way he speaks to her (and he can be a spiteful little bas***d) and it does put a strain on our marrage

this weekend has been marred by this, i have decided that he is going to be sent back to his fathers, he has said that if i try this he will run away, so again i am in catch 22

any ideas/suggestions

[Marks DTM Calib]

Not easy dealing with thankless little scrotes and worse still when it impacts on the day to day life of everybody else.

Unfortunately its all to easy to do nothing in this day and age.

As for running away, hes 18, hes now his own responsability and he needs to realise that!

How much of his benefits do you get towards keeping him?

[Markjay]

None, sadly...

This description does not seem a million miles away from my nephew, my sister got remarried a few years ago and her eldest son (now 22) is a school drop-out and jobless, and not on speaking terms with his stepfather who resented his attitude all along and tried to put him right.

In comparison I guess I am lucky in that my family includes two girls from my wife's previous marriage, who are a godsend... well they do get up to all sort of thing being teenage girls, and while I 'officially' get upset and tell them off from time to time, I know in my time we did much worst things...  

But I guess some things just need time... young people do sometimes turn around and see the error of their ways. Though I understand your immediate problem, he is a bad influence on the rest of the family. Your priorities were correct IMO in that you first did your utmost to help him, and when it id not work you are now trying to protect the rest of the family from his influence.

As said, I have no practical advice to offer, but keep going and hopefully something good will come out of all this.

[Dazzler]

Thats a hard one Jay, i would be almost tempted to let him run away and see what he does.
By the sounds of things he will be back with his tail between his legs.
But a hard one to do and you both have to be in agreement about it first.

[MaxV6]

he's 18.


pack his suitcase, and tell him to break off, whether to his dad's or to parts unknown, doesn't matter....   and make that clear...  you no longer care because he's run out of last chances and parental patience.

and under NO circumstances take him back.

it's hard, but sometimes , you have to be a mean bastardo to do what's best for them....  we had a similar experience with our eldest...   resolved only by literally kicking her out......

and we're having a tough time right now with our middle one (out of 5)

but he's well aware i don't have limitless patience, and has already got himself a part time (2/3 days a week) job, and is beginning to pay us rent....   (70% of take home wage) ....   we're still trying to get his lazy-ish,  arse back to college for A levels....


the lass between them is at Uni, and working hard to get a decent degree in a field she wants to work in....    expensive, but worthwhile!

[Jay w]

thanks for the comments.

We get nothing in the way of benefits, he is 18 and out of full time education.

We have both come to the conclusion that sending him to his father is the best, my wife has now become so affected by this she has said that if he runs then the door will not be open for him in the future (that's how bad it has got with her)

what i don't want to do is give him ammo that he can use in the future, he is the sort of person who will throw this up time and time agaon, and is only too happy to shift the blame/focus onto someone else, he is not willing to see how is actions affect others.

Maybe i should let him go.....

[Marks DTM Calib]

he's 18.


pack his suitcase, and tell him to break off, whether to his dad's or to parts unknown, doesn't matter....   and make that clear...  you no longer care because he's run out of last chances and parental patience.

and under NO circumstances take him back.

it's hard, but sometimes , you have to be a mean bastardo to do what's best for them....  we had a similar experience with our eldest...   resolved only by literally kicking her out......

and we're having a tough time right now with our middle one (out of 5)

but he's well aware i don't have limitless patience, and has already got himself a part time (2/3 days a week) job, and is beginning to pay us rent....   (70% of take home wage) ....   we're still trying to get his lazy-ish,  arse back to college for A levels....


the lass between them is at Uni, and working hard to get a decent degree in a field she wants to work in....    expensive, but worthwhile!

Your lad seemed willing to graft at the cambelt meet......its amazing what you can tell from such events about a person!

[Dazzler]

Tough one Jay, but i think it would do him good just to see how lucky he really is.........

[Marks DTM Calib]

thanks for the comments.

We get nothing in the way of benefits, he is 18 and out of full time education.

We have both come to the conclusion that sending him to his father is the best, my wife has now become so affected by this she has said that if he runs then the door will not be open for him in the future (that's how bad it has got with her)

what i don't want to do is give him ammo that he can use in the future, he is the sort of person who will throw this up time and time agaon, and is only too happy to shift the blame/focus onto someone else, he is not willing to see how is actions affect others.

Maybe i should let him go.....

It may be what he needs.

He must be getting job seekers allowance etc, I hope you are getting your cut towards his living costs?

As a pointer, keep a diary. I know somebody in a similar situation and its helped her a lot as she can refer back to the day to day events of the difficult times which removes the doubt that can set in after. It can seem a pain to do sometimes but, its worth it!

It would also reduce his ability to throw things back at you.

[cem_devecioglu]

Hard problem to solve..

From my first marriage I had big boys around me over 18 as wifes brothers..No mother and father for them..And caused real disaster in the marriage.. I tried to help them..No way dont understand..

After we send them in cyprus for univercity...This helped ...

Second marriage wife have one daughter but stay with uncle ..

The best way I can think of is sending him away from home for a while to face real life..

In case he stays in home will break the peace anyway ..

[Gaffers]

In a word - ARMY    

[Marks DTM Calib]

In a word - ARMY    

Funnily enough, the armed services sprung to my mind to!

[cem_devecioglu]

In a word - ARMY    

Exactly..

[Kevin Wood]

In a word - ARMY    

 

I'm entirely unqualified to give parenting advice myself but my parents were very keen to send me away to university when I left school. I think "flying the nest" taught me that there is a balance between freedom and responsibility.

Although I then returned home to live with them afterwards, for an embarrasing number of years, before getting my own place, I never took anything for granted and pulled my weight.

It sounds like getting out of the home and fending for himself, in whatever shape or form that may take, is what  he needs, and that it certainly can't make matters any worse.

Kevin

[Marks DTM Calib]

And Plymouth is very convenient for a certain well known armed force....