Stepchildren Share Worst 'Evil Stepparent' Moments

From Redditor /u/AnonymousAdam555:

My father got engaged to a rich woman. She made me dread visiting my dad on weekends.

She once made my sister and me hand-pick grass clippings off the lawn because the mower leaked cut grass everywhere.

From Redditor /u/stealthxstar:

My stepdad was great, but every summer, he and my mom took a vacation to the British Virgin Islands with his daughter and a friend or boyfriend. They spent a week on the beach and boating. I was never invited—not even offered a chance to pay.

I was an angsty teenager then. I wanted to live in my room, so I told my mom I wanted to be left alone, though I would have liked the vacation. My mom did not mention it to him. He likely did not even think about it. I still feel a little bitter about it.

From Redditor /u/maddydactyl:

I had an evil stepparent growing up. My stepdad entered my life at age 10. He acted nice until he and my mom married. Then, he ignored me completely—he didn't speak to me until my brother was born. After that, things got much worse.

I love my little brother. My stepdad's views on me will not change that. But after my brother arrived, my stepdad basically decided I was not worth having in the house.

He planned to make my life miserable. First, he stopped cooking. He told me, at age 14, I should buy and cook all my own food, but I could not get a job until I was seventeen.

He threw my laundry onto the floor while it was halfway through a cycle. He screamed at me for using his washing machine but told me I had to do all the family's laundry as punishment.

He banned all my friends from the house. He told me I could not pursue higher studies. I wanted advanced classes in high school because of my good grades, but my stepdad said I was not worth the money.

One time, he entered my bedroom during school camp. He started using my book collection to start the fireplace. Two weeks later, I got home and found he had burned my whole collection.

From Redditor /u/fishingnomad:

My dad and stepmother married five years before. They had marital problems. Around age eleven, my stepmother took me for ice cream while my dad worked. After she bought me my cone, we sat inside, and she said she wanted to talk.

She stared at me coldly. "I think you should live with your mom full time. No one in our house loves you. Your father and I think you are just a bastard child that drains our money. You smell bad, you can't do anything for yourself, and make sure your dad always rescues you. You are a pathetic waste of life and destroy the love between your father and me."

She said that, then walked to her car and left. As an 11-year-old, I started crying nonstop.

From Redditor /u/asapstocky:

My stepmom canceled all my family dinners for my 21st birthday. She did not even wish me a happy birthday that day.

A month later, it was her birthday. I ignored it. She asked what was wrong, and I told her why. She said, "Get over it; it is just a day."

I replied, "I cannot say you are turning 52; you look 60 anyway."

From Redditor /u/MustangGuy:

He was not evil, just a jerk. He once blew cigar smoke in my face one summer while I was sleeping.

[He also] sold my Nintendo system. My mom gathered the money to get me after my dad left us. He would deliberately provoke me to anger because he thought it was funny...

From Redditor /u/thismaybemean:

I could write a whole novel about this...

Stepmom No. 1: My dad married [her] when I was in high school. I met her once before. On their wedding day, she told him to stop paying child support to my mom. He had to give her court documents showing it was an order.

Even without a driver's license, she demanded a car. Who was driving my dad's second car? Me. So then I had no car...

Stepmom No. 2 is only 32. I am 27. So yeah...

From Redditor /u/bmwillett1:

I owned a beautiful handmade dollhouse my dad made. It was huge. I had to move it through the window because the doorframe was too small. My mom put carpet squares and curtains in the rooms. The house held doll furniture, and I used it constantly with my Barbies.

When my mom remarried, my stepdad eventually sold or gave it away (I am still unsure) when I was at my grandma's house for the weekend.

I like my stepdad now. But I truly hated him for a long time because of that when I was younger.

From Redditor /u/StoryMcGee:

My sister and I did not get along with my stepfather. He knew he was marrying a woman with teenage twins. But he always made sure we knew his real daughter (six years younger) was the princess. One thing that sticks out is one time he wanted to teach two 14-year-olds about money.

He took us to a supermarket. He gave us five pounds each. He told us to buy enough food for a week, including lunches. We could not get school lunch money because the school food was bad, apparently.

My sister and I bought sausage rolls weekly to eat. He then got Indian takeout for my mother and himself after we returned from shopping. I cannot recall the duration; maybe a month, but it felt like years. He never taught his real daughter this way.

Redditor /u/demariv:

My stepdad was weird. He changed often. If I messed up, he would not speak to me for months. I needed to know exactly what I did wrong and when, then apologize. He could go months without talking to me.

He also got angry and stopped talking to me when he fought with my mom. He changed a lot in recent years.

I lived with my family until I moved out at 15. My mom says he changed and is good now, but I do not believe it.

From Redditor /u/ MzElenaLinda :

My evil stepmom entered my life as an adult but still caused harm.

My mom died at age 50. Dad was 52. He married his second wife two years later. She has two children younger than me and my sisters.

They have been married 20 years. She slowly took my dad away from me and my sisters. They live close enough to drive to, but we see them maybe once a year.

She did this:

• When my son was 4, she made no place for him at Thanksgiving. She said, "I figured he could eat before or after."

• She read my son the riot act every time we visited their home for not touching anything...

• When my nieces were small, they feared dogs. But she would not let her big dogs outside or in another room during visits. So the girls spent the whole visit on adults' laps.

• She never held either of my children, even though she married my dad before they were born. I thought she avoided babies—fine. But her grandchildren arrived—she kept them. She acted like a loving grandma in front of my kids.

• She never offered to babysit under any condition. My in-laws live overseas; sisters live in another state—I could have used that help. I stayed with my dad's parents while growing up. When her grandkids arrived, they watched them once a week plus weekends, "so those tired parents can get a break."

• The only photos she keeps in frames are their dog and her grandchildren. I stopped giving her annual school photos of my kids after I found out she was throwing the old ones away.

• They have taken her family to Hawaii and Disneyland more than once. I have not.

• I have not spent Father's Day with my dad since she appeared. One year I found out they had no Thanksgiving plans, and I was hosting. My dad said, "Oh no, we just want to stay home this year."

A few years ago, they moved near her sons. Now, it takes two hours for me to drive there. They drive there regularly for the dentist, my uncle, and their rental properties—but not for me. On my daughter's graduation day, they quit because "the traffic is too bad." This was not a five-mile backup; it was just slow on a weekday afternoon due to road work for a few miles. They still had ninety minutes to cover sixty highway miles for a two-hour ceremony and cake with us. But they turned around and drove an hour back home.

From a former Redditor:

She took my Gameboy Color and my Pokémon game. She pawned them. Then, she used that money to buy crack.

She is no longer in the picture.

From Redditor /u/meglayne:

One bad thing was probably when she sent me awful messages about how much of a failure I was and wished I did not exist, using my father's email as his.

I only noticed when she misspelled my name. I called my father about it, telling him he could not even remember how to spell his first child's name.

From Redditor /u/alter_ego77:

My stepdad thought children in the house must answer any phone call. I had my own line in my bedroom. If the main house line rang while I was in my room, I had to run downstairs to answer in the kitchen before the phone picked up.

My stepdad had to answer. I told him it was for him, and he picked up the call—it sat next to the couch he was on. That phone could answer the call.

From Redditor /u/Keyboard_Cowboys:

Whenever my stepbrother did something stupid and got grounded, I got grounded too, for some silly reason, even though I was a good kid.

My dumb stepbrother always got into trouble, so I missed many outings with friends as a kid.

From Redditor /u/Shadows23:

My mom and dad divorced when I was sixteen, the third time. I chose to live with my dad and his girlfriend. Many small things happened...

The real problem began when she refused to leave tissue in the bathroom. She kept the toothpaste, deodorant, and tissue locked in their bedroom. That room had a lock that needed a key.

From Redditor /u/Salacious:

When I was eight, my stepmom took all my stepsiblings to Disneyland. I was not invited.

I still have not forgiven her.

From Redditor /u/Miranda_Motionless:

My stepmom drove a wedge between my dad and me. I haven't spoken to him in about six years. She often picked up my calls, telling me my dad was busy and asking him to return the call. Years later, I confronted him. He claimed she never told him I called, so he assumed I never did, asking why he should.

When I saw him, he always treated my stepbrother better than me. If I wanted a day with my dad, my stepmom would tell him my stepbrother had to go too.

In my last talk with my stepmom, she first said, "So you're turning 18 soon, huh? That means your dad doesn't have to pay child support anymore."