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Author Topic: Advice on a Relationship Please?  (Read 8891 times)

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Offline Tom Cat

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #50 on: November 18, 2015, 09:08:20 AM »
1Tomcat,
Keep in mind your stepson is only 18, and as he matures his attitude will get better.

The cultural difference does come into play here.
FSU children more often than not, take in their elderly parents and care for them.
You should take comfort in knowing your wife most likely will  care for you till your last day. From that day her son most likely will step up to look after his mother.

As difficult as it may seem now, one day you might see things differently.

From personal experience, my FSU wife insisted that my mother would live with us, parents don't belong in an old folks home
This is only a temporary bump in the road.
 divorce most likely will leave you bitter for the rest of your life. 
Don't shoot the messenger, links to articles posted, don't necessarily reflect my personal opinion.

Offline 1tomcat

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #51 on: November 23, 2015, 08:53:17 AM »
I thought of one other pet peeve of mine that maybe someone can clear up for me. My stepson insists on eating his meals in his bedroom. I was taught that the dining area was where we ate and I still do. I have asked on numerous occasions for him to do the same but when I am not at home or after I have gone to sleep he is continuing to take food to his bedroom and really make a mess with it. Is this a cultural thing?

Online andrewfi

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #52 on: November 23, 2015, 09:06:09 AM »
I thought of one other pet peeve of mine that maybe someone can clear up for me. My stepson insists on eating his meals in his bedroom. I was taught that the dining area was where we ate and I still do. I have asked on numerous occasions for him to do the same but when I am not at home or after I have gone to sleep he is continuing to take food to his bedroom and really make a mess with it. Is this a cultural thing?

Sounds like he is going through his nesting phase.

Withdrawn, untidy, not very sociable? Talk to parents, i bet that you find many of them will tell you some stories. BUT think of his perspective and case. I reckon he is there because he feels safest there.

How is he with is friends at school?
Would I be right in thinking that there are not (m)any?
How does he socialise at school? How well is he doing in his classes and assignments that depend upon cooperative work?
Is he being bullied? Does he think you are bullying him?
What are HIS plans for his time after school (not your plans or his mother's, but what does he want?) Do you even know?

Those are not questions for you to answer here in public, but maybe try to find some answers for yourself by talking to him and maybe chatting to his supervisors at school.

He ain't a happy camper.

...everything ends always well; if it’s still bad, then it’s not the end!


Offline yankee

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #53 on: November 23, 2015, 09:44:34 AM »
I thought of one other pet peeve of mine that maybe someone can clear up for me. My stepson insists on eating his meals in his bedroom. I was taught that the dining area was where we ate and I still do. I have asked on numerous occasions for him to do the same but when I am not at home or after I have gone to sleep he is continuing to take food to his bedroom and really make a mess with it. Is this a cultural thing?

He is a teenager.  Ask him to please keep his door closed.  and make sure it is always closed.
What is worse than not being able to get what you don't even want?

Online AvHdB

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #54 on: November 23, 2015, 03:39:58 PM »
While he is a teenager, and teenagers do things that must adults do not do. I suspect he will mature. Having said this the food issue is a bit weird and borders on anti-social. Does he use a computer in his bedroom. if yes are you aware what sites he visits.

Some of the questions asked by Andrew up thread are valid and worth considering.

You do not have to answer, but does the mother see the issues?

Also you mention your grown children; has your wife's son had any interaction with them? It might help if this happened in the big picture.
“If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?” T.S. Eliot

Offline 1tomcat

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #55 on: November 24, 2015, 12:56:41 PM »
Let me try to answer some of the questions that you guys have posed. He is much of a loner both at school and at home. We live in a very large community where other kids of his age live also. There is no interest in other boys or girls that I have seen. He has access to a computer but not in his room. In fact his mother spends much more time on the computer than he or I. She enjoys news and movies from the area of the world that she is from. He does seemingly get along well with my sons although there is a huge age difference. He plans to attend college and has ambitions of studying medicine(his father is a doctor). He does very well in school and has gotten good marks ever since enrolling in school here. His mother is very much aware of the time that he spends inside and has asked me on numerous occasions to give him something to do outside. When I do this he usually hurries through it making a mess in the process in order to not being asked to do it again.

Online AvHdB

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #56 on: November 24, 2015, 02:52:49 PM »
Sounds like a teenager, acts like a teenager - I guess he will pull his act together.

Patience is a virtue.
“If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?” T.S. Eliot

Online andrewfi

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #57 on: November 25, 2015, 05:29:13 AM »
Don't let him near guns or ammunition.

He reads like a kid who is going to go and take out a classroom of kids.
...everything ends always well; if it’s still bad, then it’s not the end!

Online AvHdB

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #58 on: November 25, 2015, 06:22:20 AM »
Don't let him near guns or ammunition.

He reads like a kid who is going to go and take out a classroom of kids.

TC looking at a coin Andrew has a point - on the other side I doubt Andrew has much interaction with teeners. Use common sense and try as you have in the past to steer the kid in the direction of a positive future. Try to involve the mother as much as possible, if you can agree on goals.

I suspect he will figure things out for him self.
“If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?” T.S. Eliot

Online andrewfi

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #59 on: November 25, 2015, 06:53:48 AM »
AvHdB, chances are that my interactions are more frequent and much more recent than most. However, stop being silly. insult deleted leslied. If you don't agree then share your wisdom and we can all learn something, eh?

In the meantime, go and look at the reports of recent classroom killers in the US and tell us just how this kid is different to them.

The point is not that this kid is likely to go round taking up weapons and shooting his classmates but that everything that we are being told tells us that this is an unhappy kid who is withdrawing, or has withdrawn from the normal social round. There's reasons for that, there always are. Sometimes bad things happen when kids don't get help dealing with the issues of growing up.

Just imagine how this kid feels knowing his step dad is blaming the likely breakup of his mother's marriage and life upon him. You think he doesn't know what is going on around him? Imagine how that feels, knowing that he was uprooted from his safe, secure life, without his agreement and now he knows that he faces having to uproot once again and go back to where he came. He expects that he has to deal with the embarrassment of a return from 'The Promised Land' among his peers and with his mother's anguish at home.

Time for some bloke here to do some serious parenting and stop finding ways to blame his inability to manage the family he chose to put together upon the youngest and least capable of the three of them.
...everything ends always well; if it’s still bad, then it’s not the end!

Online AvHdB

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #60 on: November 25, 2015, 08:56:43 AM »
AvHdB, chances are that my interactions are more frequent and much more recent than most. However, stop being silly. insult deleted leslied. If you don't agree then share your wisdom and we can all learn something, eh?

In the meantime, go and look at the reports of recent classroom killers in the US and tell us just how this kid is different to them.

The point is not that this kid is likely to go round taking up weapons and shooting his classmates but that everything that we are being told tells us that this is an unhappy kid who is withdrawing, or has withdrawn from the normal social round. There's reasons for that, there always are. Sometimes bad things happen when kids don't get help dealing with the issues of growing up.

Just imagine how this kid feels knowing his step dad is blaming the likely breakup of his mother's marriage and life upon him. You think he doesn't know what is going on around him? Imagine how that feels, knowing that he was uprooted from his safe, secure life, without his agreement and now he knows that he faces having to uproot once again and go back to where he came. He expects that he has to deal with the embarrassment of a return from 'The Promised Land' among his peers and with his mother's anguish at home.

Time for some bloke here to do some serious parenting and stop finding ways to blame his inability to manage the family he chose to put together upon the youngest and least capable of the three of them.

Tell us Andrew how many children (teenagers) you have raised to be functioning adults?

Please let us know what number of young adults you have mentored?

You assume that TC1 is planning the breakup of his relationship. Sounds like your retarded comment concerning another posters sexuality.
“If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?” T.S. Eliot

Offline 1tomcat

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #61 on: November 28, 2015, 07:59:04 AM »
Apparently some of the advice that I have received has helped. My stepson and I have been getting along better recently although there is still much room for improvement. His mother is still pretty po'd at me but that is nothing new. Thanks to all of you for taking the time to remark about my postings whether good or bad.

Online andrewfi

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #62 on: November 29, 2015, 01:20:21 PM »
Glad to hear that things might be turning a corner!

======================================

AvHdB, you need the coffee ...again; please go and read the earlier posts by 1tomcat.

If there is a specific point with which you disagree why not, in the interest of constructive discourse, as opposed to what seem to be your unthinking rants, not raise the point and share why you disagree and what you think is a better approach. While doing so, please remember to be consistent and to not countervail your own agreement with my points up thread.

I dunno about you, but I learn all the time, from you though, since the past few months, not so much. What is the matter with you?

AvHdB, its the details, man, watch the details, they get you every time!
...everything ends always well; if it’s still bad, then it’s not the end!

Online AvHdB

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Re: Advice on a Relationship Please?
« Reply #63 on: November 29, 2015, 06:35:59 PM »
Don't let him near guns or ammunition.

He reads like a kid who is going to go and take out a classroom of kids.

Do I need too quote more?

Andy, we may have our differences, but this is not "our" thread. Try to man up and answer to the best of your abilities the question of 1TC. Most of the members in one way or the other have given insights that might help 1TC.

I assume that is not to challenging for you to move forward?
“If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?” T.S. Eliot


 

 

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