They finance deadbeat stepson’s lifestyle

Dear Annie: My 21-year-old stepson, “Sam,” is smart, strong, healthy, good-looking — and lazy. He dropped out of college after two years, and his life’s ambition appears to be never to work another day in his life. He’s had one job that lasted eight months and that’s it. He intended to live at his mother’s house, but his stepfather threatened to charge him rent, so he fled to our home instead.

Sam made straight A’s in high school, but in college he got D’s. He used to play football and basketball. Now he is up until the wee hours playing video games in our basement. He comes and goes as he pleases, sometimes walking in at dawn. He sleeps odd hours and eats all our food. He’s already asked if his girlfriend can move in. The implication is that he plans to live with us indefinitely.

My husband and I are on a tight budget, and our food bill has doubled. We already bought him a car and still pay for the insurance. We also pay for his cell phone. The worst part is that Sam doesn’t treat us like parents. He talks to us as if we’re his 20-something male friends, using cuss words liberally and trash-talking. I hate to make my husband choose between his son and me, but I can’t take much more. I don’t believe it is healthy to enable Sam’s deadbeat lifestyle, but my husband says I am blowing it all out of proportion. Am I? Stressed-Out Stepmom

Dear Stressed-Out: It doesn’t help Sam to indulge his worst habits, but your husband worries that setting rules will alienate his son — which could happen, but the current alternative is not an improvement. Sam should get a job and pay rent. If he wants to live with the girlfriend, they should find a place together somewhere else.

Because your husband cannot see the damage he is doing to his son, it will be difficult to convince him to change the dynamic. Suggest family counseling to work on the situation before it gets worse.

Dear Annie: I am 27 years old, and my mother is a raging alcoholic. I don’t remember a day in my life when she wasn’t drunk. My brother died 10 years ago, and this only made things worse. Now, she drinks a case and a half of beer a day.

My parents live an hour away from us, and it’s getting harder and harder to visit them. She demeans my father, and I have pretty much lost all respect for her. I think she needs treatment in a facility, but she would never go. I have a 5-year-old son and don’t want him around her. What do I do? Fed Up and Ticked Off

Dear Fed Up: Sometimes an intervention can help a person understand how damaging their drinking has become. But we suspect there is a great deal of depression underlying your mother’s drinking, and she might be more amenable to seeing a therapist about that rather than addressing the alcoholism. In the meantime, please contact Al-Anon (al-anon-alateen.org), for relatives and friends of alcoholics at (888) 4AL-ANON (888-425-2666).

Dear Annie: I have a follow-up question about “Not Interested, Never Was,” who no longer wants sex. You said sex once a week is not excessive. I would like sex every day, but my husband thinks two or three times a week is enough. (I know the situation is usually the other way around.) If once a week is not excessive, what is? What would be considered average? Wanting It More

Dear Wanting: We were bombarded with responses to that letter and will be printing more on the subject soon. As for your question, the national average is about twice a week (this incorporates couples who have sex twice a day and couples who have sex twice a year). “Normal” is what works. If you want sex every day and your husband prefers twice a week, find a compromise you can both live with.

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