#honestly he might be limited to 2 of the easiest chores because u can't really fuck them up that bad

[eats-the-stars]

feeling pretty frustrated lately. i feel like my sister is in a "eat your cake and have it too" situation that is making me kind of resentful.

living situation is this: our dad, me, my sister, her boyfriend, their two kids (2 and 5).

the problem is that I think my sister is, without any malicious intent, using me as a replacement parent to her kids. because her boyfriend does jack shit and gets away with it because I'M picking up the slack.

he's not a bread-winner or a stay-at-home dad. he makes basically no money at his "hobby-job" as a martial arts instructor. like, barely breaks even, which i know because my sister does his taxes (and everything else). he does TWO chores. puts away clean laundry and unloads the dishwasher. he also watches the 2yo for a few hours 5 days a week. like 2-4 hours tops. nothing else.

i work Friday/Sat/Sun, sister is home sat/sun, and on Fridays, or if i work a Wednesday, he takes the 2yo to his mom's place so she can watch him.

in comparison, I watch the 2yo 4 days a week from the moment i wake up until my sister gets home at 4pm with the 5yo.

I do mealtimes, bath-times, brushing teeth, homework, bed-times, doctor/dentist appointments, outings, play-times and also contribute to rent, get groceries for the kids and my sister, cook for them (sister also buys groceries and cooks, boyfriend does not), and clean. with 2 toddlers the cleaning is intense and constant. especially in the kitchen. i'm sweeping, mopping, vacuuming, scrubbing, washing dishes, preparing meals, doing a ton of other random cleaning like wiping countertops, scrubbing down the stovetop, taking out the trash, crushing cans. you know, the stuff you do when you live somewhere.

my sister works as hard as i do. both in terms of making money at her job (I have two jobs, she has one, both with comparable pay). she cooks and cleans.

my issue is that her slacker boyfriend is doing jack shit and living the easy life on the back of the work I'M doing to raise his fucking kids. it's a hard place, because I love my nephews and I'm happy to get to make lunches and help with homework and play in the bath and the backyard and take them to the apple orchard and grocery shopping and play hide and seek and color and read them bed-time stories. it's amazing. BUT. it's also incredibly galling to see him sitting pretty with the title Dad and no effort put in to back it up.

Like, I do all this work, every day, because I love my nephews. I want to make them scrambled eggs and pancakes and keep them clean and happy and healthy. So I'm DOING things to feed them and clean them and make them happy.

He's just sitting on his ass occasionally changing a diaper and making sure they don't totally trash the house and does two chores. And that's it. Done. And somehow that's enough? Everyone else is fine with this?

Slowly losing my mind. Also pissed that my sister is too spineless to either force him to step up, or kick him out. But it makes sense, because the easiest option for her is to do nothing.

She gets me playing the role of Parent #2, and she gets to keep her boyfriend around and avoid the drama of a breakup or the effort of forcing him to do more.

The only one losing out here is me.

But it's hard because I love my nephews and I'll probably never have kids of my own. I would be perfectly fine stepping up to be Parent #2 for my nephews...if Parent #2 wasn't already right here doing fuck all with no pressure to step up his game.

I might need to have another serious talk with my sister about this (I had one before and she said she would make him do more, but "more" just seems to be...not a lot, so...).

If she does nothing, though, I'll just continue being cold to this waste of space and hope that the best reward will be his own fucking kids loving their Auntie more than him. Fingers crossed they get older and think back and realize he was all talk and no action.

Helps that he hates going on any kind of trips with the kids, so he literally hasn't even been there for like 85% of our family outings.

Also one of my nephews has apraxia that makes him incapable of speech, so he uses an AAC device and also ASL, but guess who isn't bothering to learn any sign language? Ding-ding! You are correct, deadbeat dad! all he knows are a handful of simple signs that would be really hard to avoid learning when u live w/someone who signs.

So yeah, sit there jamming out on the couch and sweet-talking my sis all you want, douchebag. I don't know if your kids will hate you for being "just some guy" who also lived in the same house, but they sure won't love you as much as they love me.