A New Prespective

I met with a friend lately who gave me a new prespective on my relationship with Tilly. She said that I didn't make a bad mistake, that I didn't pick Alias and neither did Tilly. She said that Alias was my husband, Victor's problem. She also pointed out that if we agreed to take Tilly to Alias more often, then Tilly could see on a regular basis how Alias really doesn't care for Tilly much, instead of Alias telling her that she really cares. This would take the excuses away.



She also said that I was the stepmother. I never felt like the stepmother. When I came on board, Tilly was four and Alias was still not visiting with her. Tilly took it out on us, but I have always felt like I was Tilly's mother and that Alias didn't count. She was a non-entity. There are two ways to look at this new revelation. I could take the view, as stated by my friend, that I am not responsible for Tilly's good or bad traits. She is not my problem. She is Victor and Alias's problem and I should take a back seat to allow them to solve their problem. This is like we exist in a bubble, but I don't believe this to be true.

I still love Tilly and that love prevents me from allowing harm to come to her, if I can help it. If Tilly doesn't take her studies seriously then she won't be accepted to the veterinary school that she wants to go to. This can have life long consequences.

But maybe I need to take a step back and allow her to suffer some failure. This is a new thought for me. but maybe I need to let her grow up a little, even as my mother bear instincts say keep her safe. A different idea for me.

P.S. Tilly just came downstairs crying and shaking. Apparently someone came into class today screaming at her. She said the teacher was out of the room. I talked quietly to her and told her she had done the right thing (just looking at the girl and not saying or doing anything else). It seemed to work. I think we might be getting a better relationship, thanks to my friend.

Augumentative

I was talking to Tilly about going on an eighth grade field trip. The class is going to a local camp area for hot dogs and burgers and fun. The school is asking for chaperones, servers, etc. Tilly asked her older sister, who is married with children, to be a chaperone. Her sister, Samantha, only works a few days at a local fast food restaurant. Her sister's husband, Joe, has recently become unemployed, but I hope that by the time that this field trip occurs, he will be employed again. They have a three year old little boy. who Samantha watches during the day. I told Tilly that she should tell Samantha that she would love to have her as a chaperone, but that she would understand if Samantha couldn't commit to being a chaperone. A campground with approximately 300 eighth grade students running around, would create a difficult time for Samantha to keep a good eye on the toddler and hopefully her husband will have a job by then. This prompted an arguement. Tilly responded that EVERYONE loved Todd. I told her that even if everyone loved him, this was a time for the eighth grade to blow off steam and many would get tired of watching him and that Samantha would be harried trying to help and watch him at the same time. I was talking quitely and reasonably, but Tilly only wanted to see her side. She said she wasn't taking the offer away. I told her she shouldn't take it away, but tell Samantha that she understood that it might not be a good thing to have to find a babysitter or worry about the toddler and that if Samantha felt that she couldn't make it that Tilly would understand. I told Tilly since she had asked and since she wanted Sam to come that she should say something like that to give her sister an out without her sister thinking she was going to hurt her. Instead of reason I got an arguement. Anything that isn't what Tilly wants does not get any consideration. It is time for Tilly to grow up and think about others and not just herself. The more I tried to reason with her the more defensive she got. Sometimes I get tired of beating my head against this wall.

Prom or No Prom

Well tonight Tilly told us that her report card won't be home until Friday and that they will stop selling tickets to the prom on Friday, meaning we need to make a decision before we see her report card. The problem with that is that I can use Star Student to find out what her grades are now. She made one point above a D which makes it a C in math, but she only made a 73 (which is a D) on her Language Arts.

She appealed to her Dad that she had brought it up from an F and she should be allowed to go to prom. He thinks we should consider letting her go because she brought it up. My take is that this is not a high school prom, just a middle school dance they are calling a prom. If she hadn't slacked off in the first place she wouldn't have had to work to bring the grade up.

There were consequences to her actions and I think she should suffer the consequences. If she doesn't then when will we let her suffer the consequences? In high school? Maybe college? How about her first job? Isn't it kinder to let her suffer these consequences now in middle school, rather than college when it might impact her chances to become the veterinarian that she wants to be? What do you think? Please weigh in. We have a couple of days to decide.

Inconsistancy

I feel so frustrated. I feel like I am battling both Tilly and my husband. Last school year Tilly was out of control and into the drama. My husband tried to curb it by telling her if she got one more in school suspension he would send her to private school where they have to wear uniforms and they have more punishments they can institute. I asked him if we could afford that and he indicated yes. Well school was so fed up they gave her an out of school suspension the next time. You would have thought that she would be in private school now, but all of a sudden we couldn't afford it after all. Well that was when I took over. I told Tilly that any more problems from school OR if she made received any failing grades on her report card then she would be in uniforms. She told me that uniforms weren't required in her school and I told her SHE would be in uniforms anyway. Guess what? No failing grades and no more ISS. It worked.




So this year I raised the stakes a little. No ISS, no grades below a C and she could go to prom and no uniforms. It worked up to recently when she tried to push the limits. She started slacking off and the teachers let me know that she wasn't completing homework and was doing poorly on tests. When she was supposed to bring her interim report card home, she said she left it at school. It was the beginning of a four day weekend. I told her it was okay I could pull her grades up on the computer. That's when I found out she was failing math. When I met with her math teacher I found out that most days she didn't come back from lunch to the classroom; going to the office or the school nurse instead, so she was missing some of the lesson. This started the slide. When another teacher emailed me to tell me that she had failed to do her homework, had come to class without her book, paper, or pen, refused to borrow a book to go over the homework and had failed a test based upon the homework she didn't do, I called my husband who was picking her up to inform him. He fussed at her and then dropped her off at her work at the local stables. She called several of her friends and told her friends that she was being physically abused. She finally found one who agreed to let her spend the night, so she ran away.





When Tilly ran away my husband set her down and told her what abuse was. He was REALLY abused during his childhood. He then asked her what happened to make her think she was abused. The worst thing she came up with was when my husband apparently shut the door of his truck before her foot was completely cleared. There was no bruises, no swelling, and he didn't do it on purpose, but she considered that abuse. She also said that when he asked her if she was trying to stay stupid because she had not done her homework, that that was verbal abuse.





My husband told her what was real abuse and reiterated that even if she was to convince a jury that we abused her, that would just land her in the foster care system and not with her biological mother. He told her that we were going to take everything out of her room except her bed and dresser and that she would have to earn the privileges back. Well the next day he called me and told me that he thought he would try a different track, that this track would impose too much on us. He was going to make her independent and when she didn't like it he would then impose the punishment. I didn't like the idea and let him know, but he decided to try it anyway. Well it lasted about four days, and that was because she was out of touch. She got up and got ready for school Friday morning. On Friday evening she informed us she was spending the night with a friend. She took clothes for the weekend. My husband called her at her friend's house twice on Saturday and Sunday. When she came home Sunday evening he informed her the independence was over. (I was glad). She called her "Dear", which is what she calls her grandmother and told her that she would rather go to juvenile hall than live with us. My husband never imposed the taking everything away, just the cell phone, and her laptop. We have purchased two "uniforms" which consist of khaki pants and navy blue tops so when her attitude is not good she will be wearing those. But all the other stuff never happened. I have pointed out that there really isn't any consistancy in his punishments, which got him to realize that he needed to do what he says, but it is too much work to strip her room, so some thimgs will have to wait I guess. He did remind her that anything lower than a C on her report card meant that she didn't get to go to prom. I hope that she makes it, but I have my doubts. If she doesn't make it I look for there to be more drama. Stay tuned for new developments. I feel like I'm in a soap opera.

Hello

Well this is my first post. How many women do you know who are trying to raise a step child where the mother is only available sometimes on her phone? I have had the pleasure of raising Tilly since she was four. I am married to her father. Her mother is a drug addict and not available most of the time. Her mother has visitation, which she never uses and has not used since Tilly was six years old. Tilly is now fifteen and acting out. Tilly ran away from home last week and we involved the police in order to find her and get her back. Tilly says it was no big deal. She ran away because one of her teachers emailed me to let me know she wasn't doing her homework and that she had failed a test because of it. Her mother, who I will call Alias, helped a WHOLE bunch by telling Tilly when she called that "Of course you can come live with me". She then called my husband and told him "She can come to visit, but she can never live here. With her attitude she would be beat up within a week by the neighbors." Of course Tilly believes what her mother told her. In spite of the fact that Alias has lied repeatedly to Tilly, Tilly still believes her. And it is ALL my fault because I am trying to replace her mother and she doesn't need a replacement. At least my husband pointed out that "Yes I was trying to replace her mother because her mother was never around and without me she wouldn't have ANY mother."
Tilly is unconvinced. She has come up with a way to "help her get to her mom". She has been going around and telling everyone that we are physically abusing her. Of course there are no bruises because it is a lie. She follows it up with "And I want to go live with my biological mother". Even the policeperson that retrieved her asked me what was up. Once I told him that I thought it was a ploy to get to live with her mother, he knew she was lying. She had told him the same thing. I explained to him that even if she was to convince people that we were abusing her, she would never be allowed to live with her mother because Alias is a well documented drug addict and no judge in his right mind would allow her to be in harm's way. Tilly is still unconvinced. The school people say she has been telling them the same thing. It is interesting to the vice principal that she never refers to Alias in any way other than "my biological mother". I don't know if that means anything or not. She has taken to calling me by my first name in the past three days, instead of "Mama" which she has called me since her father and I became engaged.

I guess I started this blog to take out my frustration with this experience, because it wouldn't be conducive to tell Tilly that Alias is a lair, has always been a liar, and that actions speak larger than words. This will also help me keep a post of when things are happening, so that if we end up in court (the school people say we will) then I have a record.

Any thoughts?