Human life is like a puzzle, when year after year we try to assemble our happiness from various elements, and each time something new is obtained, and it is not a fact that the original version is better.

New people in our lives become such elements of the puzzle – new partners, their children and other family members… the only problem is that, unlike puzzles, each of us has our own form, which does not always fit with others. And if you want further confirmation, here’s a story from the user u/Series_Conscious.

The author of the post is married to a woman with three children from her previous marriage

Image credits: OPPO Find X5 Pro (not the actual image)

The two elder sons are almost adults and treat the stepdad with respect, which cannot be said about the 16 Y.O. stepdaughter

Image credits: u/Series_Conscious

The girl had been mistreating the stepfather for all these years and rejected all his attempts to make friends

Image credits: Andrea Piacquadio (not the actual image)

Image credits: u/Series_Conscious

Image credits: Karolina Grabowska (not the actual image)

Image credits: u/Series_Conscious

When the girl turned 16, she demanded the stepdad pay for dinner at a posh restaurant, despite him not being invited – and he refused

So, the Original poster (OP) is married to a woman who has three children from a previous marriage. And the older sons, 20 and 19 years old, although not close to their stepfather, at least treat him with due respect. But not his 16 Y.O. stepdaughter. No matter how hard the man tried to mend fences, nothing really helped.

According to the original poster, the biological father of his wife’s children used to be addicted, but has been clean for several years and maintains a relationship with them. However, the stepdaughter lives with the OP and her mom – but at the same time she emphatically tries to ignore him, defiantly throws away or re-gifts the gifts that her stepfather gives her, and in every possible way demonstrates that she dislikes him.

Well, the OP can’t blame himself for not trying to build bridges – but the recent story seems to have soured their relationship for good. The teen was about to celebrate her sixteenth birthday, and wanted to throw a party in an expensive restaurant on the occasion of such a memorable day – especially since she’d passed her tests at school with good grades. There were actually only two problems…

The first problem was that the OP’s wife and other relatives did not have enough money to celebrate the birthday on the scale that the girl wanted. The OP, however, had this money, but the second problem followed from here – she literally demanded that the man give this money to her mom and she arranged the dinner. Oh yeah, one more little touch to the picture – the teen said the stepdad will not be invited to this party!

Isn’t it true that now the perception of the situation is a tad bit different? So the original poster firmly answered that he was not going to pay for this dinner, and despite all the stepdaughter’s tears and accusations of ruining her birthday, remained adamant in his decision. By the way, we’re glad to pay tribute to the OP’s wife since she sided with her husband in this conflict, although, for example, the girl’s grandpa literally called the OP a jerk. But well, the celebration took place in a less expensive restaurant, and the stepfather was left alone with his thoughts on whether he did the right thing or not.

Image credits: Andrea Piacquadio (not the actual image)

“In fact, there is nothing surprising in this story, as such situations happen quite often,” says Irina Matveeva, a psychologist and certified NLP specialist, with whom Bored Panda got in touch for a comment on this case. “Here, several problems just overlapped one another at once. The crisis of growing up as a teenager, problems with the biological dad in childhood – and if the father did drugs, this is pretty inevitable… and even a new man in the family. It is likely that the girl simply projected onto her stepfather all her negative experiences – and here, most likely, therapy is needed, some communication with a specialist.”

“Moreover, in his attempts to improve relations with his stepdaughter with all these gifts described, the hero of this story may have ‘spoiled’ her to some extent himself – especially when he kept on attempting to appease the girl after she defiantly threw his gifts away. So thus, she could get the impression that he would do anything to make her happy. And when this turned out not to be the case, such a sharp reaction followed,” Irina states.

By the way, many experts also believe that stepparents should not overly impose themselves as a parent. “I’ve found that the best vision for stepparents is to see themselves as an uncle or aunt,” the psychotherapist M. Gary Neuman writes in his column for Today. “Those are relationships that have to be developed, and respect is earned. I think this kind of perspective helps a stepparent to recognize how important a role she can play in her stepchild’s life, yet helps the stepparent maintain respect for the biological parent’s role at the same time.” Who knows, maybe this is a good option for developing the situation with the OP and his stepdaughter…

However, most of the commenters supported the original poster anyway, arguing that his stepdaughter was behaving completely inappropriate – treating stepdad ‘like an empty place’, but at the same time demanding that he pay for her birthday dinner. As for the girl’s grandfather, according to people in the comments, instead of bashing his SIL, the old gentleman could have paid for the party of his beloved granddaughter himself. And as for the author of the post, here the commenters are almost unanimous. “You ruined nothing,” one of the folks wrote, and everyone is ready to sign off on that. And what about you, our dear readers?

People in the comments sided with the man, so did his wife, unanimously stating he actually ruined nothing for his stepchild

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