@JRI Thanks for sharing your experience and knowledge. My DH is also a fantastic SF to my BS, and I always feel shame that I am not interested in cultivating a relationship with his son. I have opened up about my struggles before with SS’s personality and how I just don’t feel a bond, and he’s been understanding but I know it hurts. He hit me with “You could be a big part of his life, you know.” and it was like a dagger to my heart but every ounce of my body is rejecting a connection.

I will also echo the sentiment that when we are a family, we treat everyone with kindness and respect..even if he isn't "your kind of person".. he is a child in your  home and deserves to feel as if he is welcome and belongs.  Not that your feelings about him may not be valid, just that we can and should take the higher road and be kind to someone... especially if they are living with us and related to us (even if only by marriage).

I always had more of a bond with my husband's younger daughter.. the older one was also not so much "my kind of person".. would also probably have been considered a bit Eyore.. or as i said "tuesday Adams" kind of a flat personality.

I think what your therapist is trying to do is set up a "fake it till you make it" kind of dynamic.  Where you get to know the kid more one on one.. and possibly get more of a bond with them as a result.  Which is not entirely terrible advice... in the sense that if you try to look for the "best" in a person... and find things in common.. tolerance and even affection may grow from that.

You do seem to be able to pick out the good qualities in him... and it would be good to focus on those as much as possible.  If he has certain responses or behaviors that you find most grating.. you could try to gently help your partner work on those things... to make him a more pleasant person to be around.. for you.. for everyone.

With my DH, I would couch something as "I would hate for the girls to be embarassed by having bad table manners when the go out with friends... or when they act like mean girls.. they will have a hard time with others and their lives will be harder because of it.  Or, let's work on them making their beds every day when they are here to help them have good habits that will follow them in life etc.. 

Obviously.. don't pile on and try to improve EVERYTHING at once.. but well meaning.. suggestions framed at being helpful for the kid's life and ability to get along with people.... peppered in with praises about things he does well.. won't come off as "I hate your kid" and may, over time, result in him being more tolerable to be around.

 

Ohhhhhh....I had the Eyeore SS too...from the outside most everyone thinks it isn't that bad just a bit mopey. However as I unpeeled the onion to the fiber of his being I realized he was a victim of life- it's called a covert narcissist. They eat away in a subtle way and it over times does take its toll on the true victims. 
For me- we'd be on a very nice vacation and I'd ask "how'd you sleep?" His response young and old is "terrible, I don't sleep." We took him to specialists and ....guess what - no problem sleeping ! I used to ask "how are you?" He would grumble some complaint and so I simply stopped asking how he was. He was always unhappy, nervous, anxious, playing the victim in situations- giving up or on the basketball court pretending to have an extreme injury and limping off - only to have him up seconds later when everyone stopped paying attention. My mother called him an eeorye, I call him that too (not to him just under my breath when he's being a whiny victim) - over time it just erodes on you so be careful. They are a little tricky and less classic garden variety narcissist- most people don't pick up on them. The wimpy behavior would show up in all facets of life and it still does- he's chronically unhappy, tired, self-focused, and looking to obtain resources from us to make it better for himself. In his late teens and early 20s little "poor old me" stories showed up all over our small town, this brave boy with these horrendous parents and one time he actually admitted that he'd talked about SM abusing him. I literally stood to attention (knowing that stuff was happening behind the scenes) and straight up asked- "when did this happen?" Please share- if I (SM) need to be out of your life for you to feel physically and psychologically safe then we have to do what's best for you (he was 21 at the time). When trying to get details of the abuse he got caught up in his lie- I pretended that I was believing his story as we quietly unraveled the lie and there he was sitting in his own sh**. I am sure there are plenty of people he told a tale to that don't know it's fabricated but at this point he's so far out of my life I figure it's ok for folks to believe whatever he says because our worlds are fairly separate now. To be clear there was NO abuse whatsoever - I never swore, never even raised my voice, there was no physical altercations EVER and emotionally listened to alot of his victim stories - everyone was out to get him. Nowadays I just watch from afar and I stay away - he'll once and awhile ask a question or reach out and if it's within reason I will respond but otherwise I have fully distanced myself. You will probably have the same thing happen just get through this time while he's a kid with civility but if you hear any inkling that he's telling himself a lie about you - nip it in the bud and unravel the lie, don't let him convince himself of something that didn't happen.

Last edited by ImperfectlyPerfect (7/09/2026 1:16 pm)

It’s ok to admit to yourself how you feel. I’m echoing the other responses when I say just be fair and civil.
Teens are a bit of a mess sometimes.
  Full disclosure: my father passed away recently and my stepmother and her daughter acted like they could barely be bothered, and have cut off any more communication with my sister, who remained close to my father and is helpful and kind. I also think SM has finagled most of the money/accounts into her name. Long story short, it has always felt like my sister and I were “in the way”, and it pushed me away from the family almost entirely. I came to grips with it, but if she had just been civil and fair it would have been a much, much better life.