Speaking from personal experience, sharing a bathroom with brothers is not fun. But one man might have been a little off base when he told off his stepdaughter for disposing of her period products in the bathroom she shares with her stepbrothers.
To be fair, the Original Poster (OP), his sons, and his stepdaughter have only been living together for the last six months.
The kids are all older, he explained on the Am I the A–hole forum. His three sons are 18, 16, and 15, and his new stepdaughter is almost 20.
"My stepdaughter's father isn't present in her life, nor is my sons’ mother," he explained. "All four children share a bathroom."
The problem is that his sons have never really lived with a woman.
Nor have they ever had long-term girlfriends.
"They had short visitation periods when they were younger but never longer than an hour, so living with two women has been unusual for them," he explained.
Recently, his eldest son came to him with a problem: His new stepsister was leaving her period products in their shared bathroom trash can.
According to the dad, she "doesn't use toilet roll or sandwich bags to disguise what they are, and it makes him uncomfortable which I think is reasonable."
"My sons are teenage boys and don't want to see their stepsister's period products on full display," he added.
He thought he'd approach her about her period product use when she was siting at the table doing some work for school.
His wife also clued him in that his stepdaughter was having her period, so the timing was perfect.
"I told her my sons were uncomfortable and asked her if she'd mind putting her used products in diaper bags or flushing them down the toilet," he recalled.
To her credit, his stepdaughter wasn't even remotely embarrassed.
In fact, she told the OP that "it was rich coming from a man who 'sheds like a gorilla' and has produced 'three skid marking sons' which I thought was just an unnecessary attack," he wrote.
He felt like he has been "nothing but nice" to his stepdaughter "and it's hardly a comparison."
"My sons shouldn't be subjected to her unhygienic products if it makes them uncomfortable," he wrote.
His stepdaughter set him straight.
One, you can't flush tampons, she informed him. And two, diaper bags are bad for the environment.
"Which I think is just an excuse," he wrote. "I called her a scruff and told her that this was my house and that what I say goes."
He later asked his wife to step in, thinking she would be on his side.
But she shut him down too.
"She told me I was being ridiculous and that her daughter has had her period for ten years and knows what she's doing," he explained. "When I told her it was making my sons uncomfortable she said my sons needed to get a grip and turned over and went to sleep."
The next morning, he again went to his stepdaughter to get her to understand how serious this issue was for him.
And again she "completely dismissed it."
"Both of them have told me to stop being so silly but I don't see how I’m being unreasonable when it makes my sons uncomfortable," he wrote. "Am I the A–hole?"
In short. Yes.
"You're The A–hole," one commenter wrote. "Sorry but what? I'm a guy and realize this is ridiculous. You need to help yourself and your son's become better men and accept that it's a natural process."
One commenter pointed out that the complain is even more ridiculous because the dad "said in his replies that she wraps the pads/tampons in the packaging before throwing them away. So the sons can't even see any blood! And the garbage bin has a lid. This is beyond ridiculous. I'm not surprised the stepdaughter snapped."
A third person agreed it shouldn't be an issue.
"I wrap my pads in the packaging and then wrap it in toilet roll so no blood is visible at all and my brother (17) has never complained about it. OP's sons need to get a grip if they ever plan on having serious girlfriends in the future," the person commented.
But don't worry too much about this, stepdad.
Not even two hours after he posted on Reddit, his stepdaughter and wife had things handled.
"My wife and stepdaughter gathered my sons and I and gave us a full intensive 'periods for pricks' course, Powerpoint and all," the OP wrote in an update. "It was a hoot, they made an interactive quiz and everything. My sons and I learned a lot and apologi[z]ed to my stepdaughter."
"Thank you for your input," he concluded.
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