Find it really hard to show an interest in DDs hobbies

Op it is hard, my dd is formula 1 obsessed and I was devastated when she started into it two years ago. Growing up my step dad was obsessed and every Friday/Saturday/Sunday was dedicated to it on the tv. Same stories reworked again and again. I really resented it asa teen tbh .

but now my dd is just as obsessed and desperate to learn more and is studying engineering at T levels to be a racing engineer. She’s got a uni picked out and dreams and all of it centres around F1. Instead of resisting I’ve started trying to learn bits about out. I facilitate her going to her grandads to watch races etc. support him in taking her to museums/ expos about it. My DH enjoys watching but Is far from obsessive, he’s happy to watch it on recording/catch up but my dd gets up at 4am for some races 🤷🏼‍♀️🙀 . It is what it is. I love taking an interest in her life so despite e protesting that attending a race is out of the question I’ve taken it upon myself to book secret 4 day tickets to Silverstone in 2025 with glamping and we are taking her and her grandad. It cost an eye watering amount, around £4.8k for 4 for premium grandstand tickets but I am SO excited, not because I want to go myself but because I get a huge pleasure from seeing my 16 yo dd being happy. She hated our regular Greek beach holiday last year and begged to go home early with family so I’m saying that this trip is my DHs and her birthday present and our holiday for the year. Oddly , she’s struggled to make age appropriate female F1 friends but I accidentally found a new female best friend from Texas of all places, on a fb group dedicated to helping newbies sort out their first silverstone race. We are sitting together in the same grandstand ina group as she has a 17 yo son . It’s a very friendly community up to now and I’ve realised not everybody is a bellend like my step dad 😂

As you're so good at reading comprehension, where does the OP say she isn't impressed by her DD?

But that's just it: I don't think OP does enjoy watching her DD play tennis. It seems to me she's trying to 'show an interest' in DD's hobbies, not because she wants to necessarily but because, as a parent, she knows she should.

You have a very polarised view of your children. If DD likes something then Mum and DS have no interest in or understanding of it; if DS likes something then DD and Dad are ignorant and uncomprehending.
It could be that DS and DD are playing up to this division, rather than just enjoying chatting to everyone in the family about what they having going on, and sometimes going to events that may not be their first choice to support the others.
Reading your posts, I wondered if the next thing will be that DS will go to live with her dad and DS stay with you.

This is what you write about your DD

• She loves sports, F1 , Tennis, Football, Snowsports, Athletics.
• She loves trying new things
• She plays a little piano but now she is learning how to play the drums
• Shes good at maths and languages
• She wanted to go wake surfing on lake Geneva and to the olympics
• She is doing random tricks on boards designed for the water of some sort
• Her A-Levels are Maths, Biology, French and PE

I am very impressed! Aren't you impressed by her?

You sound pretty rubbish to be honest. It's not that hard to interact with people who like different things to you or to be interested in her interests. Do you only have friends who are the same as you?

What would you do if both your kids liied stuff you didn't. You just need to put the effort in.

My mum was always brilliant with this stuff. She learned all about football and the team my brother supports and watched them play on tv so she’d be able to chat to him about it when they spoke on the phone. She knows which player is which etc because she made the effort to learn it all. Similarly, she’s done the same for things I’m interested too. It’s just what a great parent does isn’t it?

Moving forward.
Lower sixth, forget a big holiday, do short breaks in potential uni cities.
So go to Birmingham/Bath/Sheffield wonder around, have a really good meal, stay in an interesting building or hotel, go rowing on a river, museum, escape room etc.
Tie a few in with actual uni open days.
You can stay in the college at Oxford where they filmed Harry potter.

Take both kids to something at Goodwood - festival atmosphere, cars, nostalgia, etc but not as tedious as a whole day of F1 or a living history museum, a mix of both.

I think you and ex have created a dynamic now, not really a healthy one. I would try and take her to competitions. Why does it have to be him? Why can't he bond with his son whilst you take her? It's going to take him getting on board with that.

Also a PP suggested reading her French text in translation. She will also be doing a film. Watch it together. There's a lot of art and culture in a language. Take her to Paris for her birthday if you have funds.

Also, be aware when you and DS are leaving her out. Sometimes my whole family start talking physics/ Maths and I feel really left out. If that's happens a lot with her then it's not surprising she pushed away. Have some conversations about her interests and hopefully DS will become a bit more 'expert' on them too.

Topics that interest my DD: Gaming, Korean Pop, Ice Hockey, Pictures of cute animals, Moo Deng etc etc

I have no interest in these things …. However, I know lots about them all, as it’s how I bond with her. A few “ooos” and “ahhs” and some well placed questions work wonders.

I have a DS of similar age. His interests are similar to your DD's, but I learned many years ago that I needed to make an effort to meet him somewhere in the middle between his world and mine. By the time he was 3, I could give you the make and model of any tractor we saws. In junior school, I went from 'WTF is a Pokemon?' to scouring the local parks with him for a Pikachu and taking 'his' phone (my friend's ancient one that only had Pokemon Go on it) round all the Pokestops on the school run, even though I had to secretly join a friendly Pokemon Go FB group to find out what the hell I was doing. Now that he's 17, I can have a fairly convincing conversation about F1, NASCAR or touring cars, and I've gone from being terrified of seeing him doing anything dangerous to cheering him on in go-karts. It's been a case of 'Fake it till you make it' but it's made a huge difference to our relationship.

It’s obvious that you prefer one child. Do better.

Could you take up a volunteer role in one of her hobbies? You could be a first aider or team secretary. This way you are there and contributing but have your own focus to help with the day.

You don’t take an interest in the hobbies themselves, you take an interest in your DD. How is she doing? What is her team like, what is she hoping for, can she study somewhere where she can continue without these, what’s she aiming for? How can you help her? What does she find easy and what is sh3 working on? Most parents who watch their children do gymnastics, some random sport, or art or theatre aren’t there because they’re interested in those subjects but because it’s their children doing them.

It will be sadly really clear that you have a prefered child.

I have two kids. One has interests closely aligned to mine. But I've spent endless hours learning about the intricacies of a sport I'd barely even heard of for my other child. Standing outside in the rain isn't nice but seeing my child's progress is absolutely work it.

It’s on you to take an interest in her and her interests, even if it means you fake it initially. Surely you can compromise and take an interest in her competitions etc? can you not still be her ‘cheerleader’ even if you find the sport dull?

I have a family member whose dad took no interest in his interests growing up.
They are very different people but are not close as adults.

Hmm it's a tricky one. Maybe because you have 2 very different children of the same age you find it more noticeable. I have 2 boys both of different ages and they're into sports that I've never really been that interested in, but I'm interested in them so I go along and I've never found it particularly hard to chat to them about it or say "you looked great out there"

Do you think that it's possible that you've allowed yourself to opt out a bit if your DDs interests because you had your son right there who wants to do the same things as you and it seemed easy enough for her dad to take her along ?

Do you also think it might be possible that you're put off by her activities because they remind you too much of your ex ?

I agree with all of this. Pp have been a bit harsh I think, implying that you haven't bothered and that your ds is your favourite. You could pick one of her interests and learn a bit about the basic rules and stuff as a starting point, but the main thing is show an interest in her and her life, love her unconditionally, and always be there for her.

And this stuck out to me:

'for a few days and did museums and galleries. While we were lounging by the pool DD was sending videos of her doing random tricks on boards designed for the water of some sort.
'

You know nothing about what she was doing or even the name of the sport she was doing, because you've never bothered to find out. So all her achievements are opaque to you, 'random tricks', 'of some sort'.

I think that can easily happen with twins. I know a friend of mine who had to consciously put more effort into bonding as an older baby with one of her twins, as it had just fallen into a habit that she spent more time with one and her DH with the other in the small baby stage, which meant that baby tended to ‘prefer’ that parent, and they absolutely both had to work on improving bonding with the other. I think you’re looking at a teenage version of the same thing. It’s rectifiable, though.

You fake it till you make it because she's your child and you have to take an interest in her. I think most parents have kids whose hobbies aren't stuff they know much about - DD1 is Pokemon mad so my Pokemon knowledge has increased exponentially as a result! Would I choose to do it? No, but it's important to her and that makes it important to me. So I have always shown interest, asked her to explain things to me, gone and looked things up that I don't understand, etc.

F1 is something where you could watch a few races together and have a much greater understanding or read some stuff on Wikipedia or just ask your daughter to explain some stuff to you. Instead of 'I've no idea what that means' try 'Oh does that mean X?' Or 'Could you explain that to me?' My husband is a massive F1 fan and I knew nothing about it, but I've picked up a lot because I'm interested in him and what he enjoys, same as he has picked up a lot of stuff about my hobbies.

You need to create common interests when they don't exist, but you've failed to do this over a long period of time because your son has naturally got interests that you already have and that require no work from you to show interest in.

My sons both play sport at a high level and I have no interest in rugby or cricket but I am there week in/week out supporting them and taxiing them because I am interested in my sons. I say to them I’m not a cricket fan but I am a DS fan. It also helps when they change teams etc as I’m not emotionally attached and can just follow their lead.

@XelaM my DM put up with vast quantities of horse talk from me as a child, despite her being scared of horses.

She must have been bored witless but she managed to fake it very well!

@XelaM I feel your pain - your life sounds very much like mine apart from competing!

And we are only at the very start of winter !

You don't have to share your child's hobbies to get along with them. She isn't 'slipping away' because she likes watching football with her dad. She's a normal teenager who doesn't need you being involved in every area of her life. Honestly, I would much rather watch football with someone who knew about and was enjoying football than someone who was only sitting there watching it with me to be polite.

Pretty sure if the situation was reversed, and your son was the sporty one, you wouldn't be worried about this and you would accept that he wasn't into the same things as you.

I understand that you mean well and that you want to support your daughter and so on, but provided you're kind and supportive and indulgent about her hobbies, and don't make her feel that you're disappointed in her for not sharing your interests, you really don't have to join in.

When I was a teenager I didn't expect my parents to be interested in my hobbies at all, to be honest. I was obsessed with horror films and goth/metal music. My parents were brilliant and happily bought me all the gothic fiction and books on the history of horror cinema and Hammer Horror VHS tapes and black clothing that I put on my Christmas list every year; they would give me and my friends lifts to gigs and what have you and tell me I looked great in my goth clothes and whatever. That was all that was necessary. They didn't have to understand it or be interested in my hobbies, simply to accept them and not make me feel weird for them. That's all you need to do with your daughter too.