Towards the end of last fall my 16 year old son started bringing a friend over to our house.  He’s  a nice enough kid, but over the course of this winter he’s basically inserted himself into our family.  

Now he comes over every day after school and spends the night frequently on weekends.  He only has his mother in his life and she’s not home a lot.  She’s a whole other story of entitlement.  The second time we met her she asked us for money.  

Back to my son’s friend though, he’s always bringing his issues and dramas with him to our house.  Often I feel like his therapist.  It would be different if I didn’t also have two young children in addition to my son, but I do and adding an troubled teen to the mix has just been frustrating and mentally tiring.  

It’s all come to a head though.  He smokes although he denies it.  There have been multiple times I’ve smelled cigarette smoke on him.  Earlier in the week one of their teachers caught them both smoking in the dugout at their school.  

My punishment for my son was no going out and no friends over for a week.  I’m going to also ban this particular friend from coming over.  At least on week days.  I don’t know yet.  I’d like to ban him completely, but I do feel bad.  I haven’t fully made my mind up yet. 

My husband doesn’t usually come home until later on so he’s not as bothered by his presence as I am, but since I’m the one to deal with and feed the boy my husband is deferring to me on this.  I just have enough on my plate, I really don’t need all the problems he brings with him and now he’s becoming a bad influence on my son.  