SS does indeed seem to have a huge need to enmesh with your DH.  Getting joint tattoes is indeed a weird thing to want to do.  I have nothing against them and have two myself, but if he wants a tat, just get one, don't try and pressure his Dad to get the same - that's very strange.  I can also understand your unease with SS trying to take over the house.  

Last edited by Kes (12/17/2025 12:59 am)

I admit my BD and I have one matching tattoo and another tattoo that represents mother and daughter.  We also have a "family" tattoo for all the women, so we all have some variation of it in the same spot, and me and my BFF have a matching tattoo.  But we all chose these and had nothing to do with coercion.  Hopefully when SS comes to visit it goes by fast and you get your peace back.

How sick is it that young Skippy wants to brand daddy as his property. I get that for some; tattoos are a considered choice and have deep meaning.  

Skippy does not pass this smell test with his request to brand daddy.



I commend your DH for shutting down the tattoo crap being spewed by his noxious spawn.    I also commend DH for not entertaining taking Skippy on his business trip and the two of you making it a trip for the two of you.

The tendency for so many prior family breeders to subjugate their spouse to their failed marriage/family baggage is extremely foreign to my mind set.  It is mind boggling that this is even a thing.  Xs have zero standing or place beyond a need for coparenting when there are minor COD children.  Even then, they should be held firmly to the structure of the CO.  If they cannot be reasonable and comply with the CO, then they should feel the consequences of contempt motions, zero communication beyond hand off related topics.  And never should they get a single Cent beyond CS.  Kids, particularly CODs with a visitation schedule have to live with structure on both sides of their schedule.  Kids who are coddled in these situations are the poster children of toxicity and disfunction that so many in our community suffer through.

The second a mate attempts to make a move to get their spouse to abdicate any authority, position, or respect within the marriage to the spineless partners past, it is time to seriously consider taking a do over and moving on to leave the baggage dragging inadequate partner to wallow in the history of their poor choices.

Hopefully even in the blend world, this is a relative rarity.  Though considering the broad stats on failed relationships, it is far too frequent of a thing.  I am not one to tolerate this kind of stuff or to zip my lip wen it happens.  Maybe that is a lesson I should take to heart. 

Hmmm?  DH's guilt.  How about leveraging SS's strategy of using daddy's guilt to light your own fire of guilt under DH's tail feathers regarding how DH treats you and allows his failed family progeny to treat you?

You know that it is effective and you have years of material to stoke the flames of guilt with to keep DH's tail feathers singed to drive the outcomes that you want.

I would be direct.  Let him know that your tolerance of his and SS's drama is done, he will immediately have your back as your DH, and keep SS in his place. Period Dot! Then play the guilt card firmly and regularly for your own benefit when DH loses that message and the related plot.

Lather, rinse, repeat.   I cannot imagine living with that situation.  I am fortunate that my DW would never have expected me to. Nor would she have tolerated her son performing as your SS has, or tolerated me to be a spineless rump sniffer to her son or any children we may have had.  Though SS is an only in our marriage.  Which really simplifies things when considered from the perspective of our side being the CP side with full physical and legal custody and only a measured long distance visitation schedule for the opposition side. 

My ILs were not like that with DW and her sibs. My parents were not like that with their boys.  Just the opposite for my parents. On anything and everything. We had no choice but to honor and respect mom and dad as each other's spouse and behave respectfully toward them both, toward their marriage, and toward the home they provided.

My ILs, though far different than my own parents, were very clear on their commitment to each other and the position of superiority that their marriage held in their own family.  Though they certainly did not continue to hold the same standards of performance and standards of behavior for their three youngest children that they held their eldest to (my DW).  The outcomes from that shift are diametrically opposed to each other, DW is extremely successful. Her three younger sibs are not.

I know that these types of things are not easy. Particularly for conflict avoidant people. Which I am one BTW.  It has taken decades for me to learn to hold the spinal fortitude to adopt zero tolerance and to immediately address the perpetrators of this kind of thing.   Even then, my stomach tears me up when I have to do it.  Though once I have taken my stand, I generally do not have regrets or struggle for long with the stress of it all.  I am comfortable with discussing these things with those involved.  However, by the time it gets to the discussion point I have pretty much landed on my position with little room for wiggles or compromises.  Acceptable behavior is acceptable, unacceptable behavior is not acceptable.  I will not tolerate unacceptable regardless of how adamant the perpetrator may be about that being their position on a thing under discussion.

Yep, black/white. No gray.  My binary world view at work. 1/0.  It is, or it is not reasonable.  Though there is a scale on either side of the /.  Something falls on one side of the other.  Rarely does something straddle that boundary for me.

I truly hope that you can find a platform of confidence to care for yourself in all of this.

Rags wrote:

advice.only2 wrote:

I admit my BD and I have one matching tattoo and another tattoo that represents mother and daughter.  We also have a "family" tattoo for all the women, so we all have some variation of it in the same spot, and me and my BFF have a matching tattoo.  But we all chose these and had nothing to do with coercion.  Hopefully when SS comes to visit it goes by fast and you get your peace back.

I think that it is great that your family has this tradition. And that you, your family, and your BFF have that kind of bond. That is a special thing, and the family/friend tattoos are a symbol of that.

My SIL, her STBXH, BIL1's bovine bride and their eldest are all avid wearers of art. For SIL and her STBXH, it always baffled us over how people who were always on the ragged edge of losing their home, cars, and not being able to feed their children could always seem to regularly come up with $Hundreds to add to their artwork.  My SIL regularly badgers my DW about getting a "sisters" tattoo.  Nope. That is not happening.  My DW would not do it.  If she did, I would have a Herculean lifelong challenge to bite my tongue about it.   I don't think that my opinion on this is specifically about a tattoo. It would be more about my wife carrying a matching mark to someone she nor I have any respect for.

Neither BI1 nor BIL2 have any artwork.  I'm not sure if BIL2's bride has any.  

My aunt's eldest GK crashed and burned when she used $$$ my aunt and uncle provided for her college education to get more artwork. My aunt is rabidly anti tattoo. To the point that when my wife got some beautiful henna work done on a number of occasions in the middle East then when she was in a Moroccan wedding my aunt let her know that she was not happy about my beautiful wife having it done. Even when DW clarified that it was only henna, my aunt was irked with her.  My DW is a major favorite of my aunt's and my aunt is very complimentary of my DW regarding her career, beauty, etc...  The henna was after her eldest GK spent my aunt's and uncle's money on artwork and not on her university studies as it was intended.

My aunt and uncle cut that GK off completely for more than a decade after that.  The good news, she just graduated with her BS in Acctg last weekend.  It took a very long time, but my aunt did end up funding her GK's university education after she grew up and demonstrated a work ethic and focus for a decade or more after she was cut off.  Though most of that restored funding occurred after my uncle passed.

I find the not infrequent highly art covered individuals who go on social media rants about how it isn't fair that they can't get a job, or get fired, or, or, or, or, or to be interesting regarding their position on the topic and how it impacts their lives.

This story was well over 25yrs ago. We used to spend TG in BBNP every year.  We did this for half a dozen years in a row. On one of those trips we crossed the Rio Grande river in a steel boat made of cut up and welded oil drums to go for lunch in the village of Boquillas on the Mexican side of the river.  Boquillas is a nice little village with several cantinas, some local arts and crafts businesses, and some small sundry shops.   We were in a cantina having lunch, heavy on the cantina part of the lunch, when our son (my SS), who was then about 6yo got a shocked look on his face. He was seated at our table facing the door to the cantina.  When his mom and I noticed the look on his face we glanced toward the door.  There was a group of about 6 young adults, early to mid 20s in age, who had just walked in.  Our kid stood up, yelled a name "Miss (I don't remember her name)" and ran to the door to give a young woman a hug.   He was staring at her with a confused look after the hug.  She went ghost pale when he yelled her name.  She was heavily tattooed with art covering her legs, arms, midriff, back, sides, shoulders, etc.... All of the art stopped just above her wrists and ankles, and just below the collar line of her neck/chest/back/shoulders.  We asked them to join us for lunch and mas cervezas.  Which we of course paid for.  She was clearly uncomfortable.  After a few minutes she asked us not to say anything to the school. She was our kid's art teacher.  She was always dressed very appropriately for work, with long sleeves, a long skirt or slacks, and a modest collar.   Her employment contract with the district apparently did not allow for tattoos.  Since they were not visible at work, she apparently did not disclose that she had them.  No worries. Our kid loved her, she was great.  He was at her school for about 3 years. Apparently, she had no problems during that time.

Not tattoos, but at Military School there was a tradition that some Cadets followed where when promoted they would heat their new rank brass to red hot and brand themselves, or have someone brand them, with that rank.  There were some full meal deal Cadets who attended from 7th grade through JC-2 (8yrs) who had more than a dozen ranks branded in order somewhere on their body.  Not me.  I always found it nuckin futz.   

Pain is not my thing.  Though I am, aside from tattoo needles, likely one of the most perorated people on the planet after 45 years (If I recall 45yrs ago correctly, yesterday was my Dx anniversary) as a T-1 diabetic). Between MDIs (Multiple Daily Injections, countless lab draws, countless self-administered glucose test finger sticks.....  I'm pretty much leaky. 
 

I come from a very anti-tattoo family, I got my first tattoo when I turned 18 and my mom wouldn't talk to me for weeks after.  I got two more and hid them for years until she finally saw one by accident.  Fast forward to me being a full on grown arse adult with kids and my BFF and I got a matching tattoo on our wrist, very small hardly noticeable and my DH and mother were so ticked you would have thought I smoked crack in front of them.  Funnily enough now that my mother is in her 70's she has decided she might want to get a tattoo, what changed her mind?  My BD getting tattoos and giving zero fucks what anybody thinks.  

LittleTypeAmy wrote:

"I don't think DH quite understands how unnerving it is to be around someone who is trying so hard to get your husband's exclusive attention."

I am also chiming on by exclaiming I also felt THAT right there too!  I thought this kind of mini wife dynamic was already strange and unnerving between girls and their Daddyssss, In the scope of my experience with SD31 from the day I met her. seeming a bit on the clingy side to DH. I thought it was odd enough that when she was 13 or so, wearing and borrowing his fave sweater, literally latching onto him for dear life like Velcro to his side when I first entered the picture ( I found and old piic of the three of us that first Thankgiving DH and I started dating depicting that) Also still insisting on sleeping in the same bed with him as a teen girl. It felt like to me that she was acting more like a possessive Girlfriend staking some claim to him and keeping me "taking" her Daddyyyyy and getting in between them. It felt like some kind of controlling tactic like she was sending me some kind of message.. I had thought maybe I  was thinking that was a little beyond my perception of a typical father daughter relationship, because while I got along with my own dad, it was never on that kind of level. BUT pressuring someone to get a tattoo...something permanent that shouldn't be taken lightly is really going above and beyond , really overkill. Im shocked my SD didn't come up with that same scheme, for all know she has and I don't know about it yet. 
I would think it was especially expected from a teen , also a young adult like your SS, to crave some independence from your parents and start carving out YOUR own identity apart from them. NOT carrying on some obsession with coercing them to get matching INK. I agree its kind of creepy like its some symbolism for SS wanting to brand and claim DH as his property, That is exactly how I would take it if I were to find out SD were to ever think of asking for anything like that, 
The root of that matter, which we all know, is that these SKIDS are just lost little souls in this world who don't really have any sense of identity or self esteem to cultivate one that doesn't depend on drama and getting sympathy, and other peoples guilt, namely DH or anyone they can con into rescuing them from themselves 

MY SD (early 30s) was like this in adolescence as well. Literally climbing on DH. When we were out, she'd push in between us and grab his hand. Back then, she would also do her unnerving "baby talk" and what I called "the baby shuffle"--she would literally walk differently around him. I felt sorry for her back then. 

I'm surprised my skids haven't gone the tattoo route with Daddy, but then again, they don't want to ever acknowledge that their father exists, as it would destroy the public "abandonment" myth they've put out there. 

Amy, your last line is the quote of the day/quote of the week/quote of the month in my view! You have said it all right there. My SD especially has no identity, just like her mother. It's like they are empty vessels who cling to fanatical  religion, obsessive talk about God, drama, blame, meanness, and victimization in desperate attempts to define themselves or the world around them. 

Trying, hang in there this holiday season! 
 

@advice.only2

I have no issue with artwork in general. I take issue with the tendency for people who cannot afford it to invest heavilyin it while crying "Hep meeeeeee!" which in my IL clan is the main situation related to body art. Then when someonepoints it out, they get all butt hurt about being spotlighted for their demands for help. 

I understand that for some people and families it is a meaningful bonding connection.

Please excuse the underline above. I have no clue why I can't get rid of it.
 

Last edited by WarMachine13-Mod (1/05/2026 9:51 pm)