Dad thinks son's GF is using him as vacation from her kids; want's her out. UPDATED

"AITAH for telling my son's GF she can't be in our house if he is not?"

My son and his girlfriend are 22. The son lives with us in his own room. The GF has been his GF for almost a year and she has never had a job, she also has two kids (who are not my son's) and she spends more time at our house than at hers with her kids.

She and her kids live with her mom in a two bedroom apartment without AC. Our house is much nicer and more comfortable. Before dating her he was working hard and trying to figure out his life. Since she came in the picture his full focus is her and she has him chasing his (or more accuratly her) tail and he spends most of his money on her.

They stay up all night and he goes to work late every day (his job gives him a lot of leeway). She often just stays in his room and sleeps all day until he gets back, then they do it again. They are both slobs and it's all I can do to keep the mess in his room. It's a constant argument between us.

Neither of them help out around the house. He is not paying rent right now, but we are fed up with his behavior and demanded he take school classes or start paying rent. School starts soon and I'm pretty sure he is dragging his feet and wont make it. I recently told him to show me proof of enrollment or start paying rent by this Friday.

I also want his GF out of the house permanently, but I am going to start with telling her she can't be here when he is not. Then when/if he drops school and gets behind in rent, I plan on telling him she can't come over at all anymore until he gets current.

My impression of her is that she is using him, and us through him, to have a vacation house from her life and responsibilities as a mother. I think she is working on ruining his life and he is so wrapped up between her legs he doesn't see it. In the past we have had issues when both of them being inconsiderate and keep us up late at night with various activities including loud [love making].

That has since got better, but we had to fight and threaten to kick him out before he took it seriously. I'm mostly looking for some outsider perspectives and possible pitfalls with my plan. "If" he is paying rent does anyone think he has a claim on allowing her over here on his terms? I know he will think so.

As a bonus, we know she has cheated on him at least once. He also knows and we thought that would break them up, but it didn't.

Info from OP:

I want to clarify a few things: He is actually my stepson. I originally said son because I thought it was easier than getting into the backstory, but it does change the dynamic some. I have been in his life since he was 8 and he is my son.

His father is in his life also, but he is an emotionally manipulative POS that always made our lives harder, never played fair, and always s%$t talked his mom and I. We let him be the Disneyland dad though because he had some money he wanted to spend it on the kids and we didn't want to deprive the kids or their father.

They can make their own decisions about him and when they grew up. I'm sure a therapist would root a lot of both kids' issues to their relationship with their dad. I could write multiple posts on issues we've had to deal with him.

Personally I thought I never wanted kids until I met them, and by then their mom was unable to have kids, so I made the decision to not have kids and raise them. To address some history on why he is here now in this situation, after graduating HS he moved back with his dad for a few years and that failed in grand fashion so we told him to get back here and get back on track, which he did and was until he met her.

Update from OP after reading the comments:

Thank you all for your advice and perspective, it really helped and gave me the confidence I needed to move forward. After some reading and discussion with you all, I realized that I have not been as direct with him as I probably should have.

Someone said have you had a "dude WTF are you doing" talk with him and I realized I had not. I had little talks but I had probably not got my feelings across to him like I should have. So I had a man to man with him.

At first he was defensive. We butt heads a lot, and I felt my emotions building up, but I pushed those back and made sure he heard me. I told him the reality of his situation and what his future will look like with her.

He eventually gave me the impression that he thinks he could be a step dad because I did it, so I had to explain how our situations were different and how he is completely unprepared to take that roll at this point in his life.

I built him up telling him how good of a boyfriend he is to her, and how much better he can do and how he deserves better. I told him that if he knocked her up then his future will would be working 60-80 hours a week while she sits at home, and asked is she someone you can trust to leave at home for 80 hours a week?

I explained my bills in our house and asked if he could make those same obligations now. I pointed out that he does make enough money to live on his own or with a partner who contributes, but that he could not support her and told him she will drop him so fast as soon as he can't provide what she wants.

I let him know I love him and that I never wanted kids until I met him and his brother. I have a lot of experience with women before his mom (not trying to brag, but I got around a lot). I talked about all the good and bad girls I have been with and how f^*$ing hard it is to put yourself first and move on from someone you love, but know is not right. You gotta live life or life will live you.

Now to the specific problem at hand. I told him he can date her all he wants, not my decision, but she can't be here when he is not here. Its weird, awkward, and no one here likes it. I pointed out that he wouldn't let his buddies do the same thing so why is it ok for her?

I gave him two options to tell her 1) he can tell her she can't be here 2) I can tell both of them and he can pretend that it's a big surprise. He is currently deciding which one he prefers. It ended up as a really good talk and I know I made him think, I'm not sure if it's enough to break up with her but it's a start.

The good news was when I went to talk with him he was logging onto his school account to finish registering. So I am currently cautiously optimistic. That's all you guys. Without your advice I would have played this situation very differently with probably worse results.

More info from OP after reading the comments:

Some have asked about his mom and my wife. She is a great woman who I love very much. She is very much on board with this operation, but since it's her offspring she finds it harder to lay down the law, so I am the backbone of the house and she supports me doing so.

I met her in highschool, then we went our own ways until early 30s when we reconnected. By that time I was once divorced and she had struggled though a hard life of having two kids herself by 22 and no support and many bad relationships. I had gone to school and worked a good job since I was 21 so I was stable and was able to provide her the stability for her to flourish.

I supported her going back to school, which she kicked a%$ doing, graduated with a degree in record time, and now she has a great career making more money than I do. We are not rich, but between us we live a comfortable life and I know his gf sees this. I think my son sees a lot of us in his relationship with his gf, I spent a lot of time telling him why that is misguided and how hard it was even with my position in life.

His mom is going to sit down with him tonight and have the same talk with him that I did but from her perspective. She will give him examples of how hard her life was and how she felt hopeless and cried nightly after she put them to bed. How she could only afford a one bedroom apartment and slept in the living room so the kids had a bedroom.

She'll explain how she struggled to feed everyone and went hungry herself sometimes. She is also going to specifically tell him how his gf is not the same as she was. She is going to tell him that his gf is dangerous and he can do better, but will be careful not make it personal against her.

She will hit some points that I didn't emphasize as much, like how her mothering now (or lack of) is a serious red flag to her overall character, and how unfair it will be to his future kids to subject them to her and her lifestyle.

I figure now is the time to double down on this and not hold back. He is being receptive and we need to take advantage of that before the gf has a chance to roll the progress back. I probably don't need to update how the conversation goes unless something really good or bad comes of it.

Here's what people had to say after the update:

NoEmphasis328 says:

First, telling your step son that you didn’t want kids until you met him and his sibling seems pretty emotionally manipulative. You met a woman with kids and made it seem like it was a deal breaker before but now it’s ok? Why would you tell him that? Being a person who has been in a similar convo it feels really f%$#in awful to hear that from an adult you “helped” raise you.

It also seems like you make a lot of assumptions and paint yourself as the hero. The dad was a f@*k up, the girlfriend is a leech. It seems like you talk a lot of s@#t behind people’s back as well, but then you finish it with a “but it’s your choice!” To absolve you of any blame.

It seems like you should have set a better boundary from the beginning on what you want in your household. And then laid that out with both of them before she even started staying the night. So I would say yes you are the ahole.

donktastic OP responded:

Believe it or not I appreciate your contrary opinion. Most people that think I am the a#$hole are not taking the time you did to explain themselves. I am here to crowd source information to help me deal with this situation. I am flawed in many ways that I will fully admit, but being emotionally manipulative is not one of them in my opinion, but I did reflect on your assessment.

He and I have really butted heads over the years, a lot because I was his step dad and he wanted his dad. We eventually had to take his dad to court to make our custody official and to keep him from telling the kids that they don't have to listen to us and should live with him instead and he will buy them everything they want.

He still did that and we had to be the bad guys and tell the kids we have a court order now so that won't happen. He undermined our discipline with his own kids every chance he got and viewed their love as a competition. We made a conscious effort to not s&^t talk his dad and just deal with the situation.

My step son always had a chip in his shoulder in regards to me and treated me like the step dad. My conversation last night was to tell him that he is my son and I view him like that and that I love him like my own blood. In no ways did I say I didn't want him and now I do, I was honest in feelings regarding kids and how they changed.

I would have never told him that as a child, but now that he is an adult making adult decisions I feel like he deserves honesty. When he lived with his dad for a few years after highschool things got really weird between them and now they barely talk. I know it hurts him a lot to finally see his dad in an adult light.

I realized this write up is from my perspective, and I don't care because I am not here to win internet points or stroke my ego, I am here to handle a problem that I see from my perspective. I do feel like your assessment is based on your feelings I am not being genuine, and potentially your own bias based on your experiences.

Which is totally fine, that's what I wanted to hear. You are absolutely right that I should have dealt with this earlier but I can't go back in time.

Azsura12 writes:

Holy crap you are one of the most emotionally healthy AITA posters I have ever seen. Like everything from the edits to your reasoning with other commenters is impeccable. In most of the AITA cases I think open communication solves alot of problems.

Like talking in clear and concise terms which you seemed to have done. Like if I had awards to give you would be getting all of them. (But me giving money to reddit is likely not gonna happen lol)

donktastic OP responded:

Thank you that is very kind of you and made my day. I try hard and reddit really helped me understand the urgency of this situation.