[red-beard]

My Personal experience. Wife #2. Her third marriage. 1 child from each previous marriage. One was 19 and the other was 9. My wife foolishly lost custody of the 9 yrd old and was unable to re-gain custody. When we went to court over all of this, the court let the 10 yr old have a say (which is not supposed to be allowed for children under 12, in Massachusetts). When interviewed, she was obviously coached, etc.

Any-hoo, my wife and I agreed that consistency was the most import thing, and that she was in charge of disciplining her daughter. I had few rules for her, but table manner were one of them. Using the right tool for the job, and not chewing with the mouth open, especially in public.

Remember the consistency thing? Well wife was not consistent. Neither was her family. We were out to dinner one evening and she was chewing like a cow. I looked at her and quietly said "Erin...". The kid blew up. We were out with my wifes parents and a whole bunch of people. The grandmother looks at her and says: "You don't have to listen to him." refering to me. Yep.

My wife and I split when Erin was 17, about the time we actually were starting to be able to discuss things. I expected Erin to end up pregnant before the end of high School. Didn't happen until 2nd semester of college. She started seeing a guy about 13 years older than her (about 4 years younger than I was at the time), she quits school and ended up pregnant and not talking to the rest of the family...