To prioritise myself over my daughter here?

GenXandtired · 2026-08-04T17:11:20+00:00

I was planning to stop contact with my mother and to take the last step with the rest of my family. DD16 is fine with this with my mother, but not the rest of the family. She specifically still wants to go to an annual family Christmas dinner, which everyone always attends. I'm VERY torn. I want to support my daughter above all. Her father is dead and we have lost touch with his family. She is autistic and very anti-social. She has no siblings and nor do I. So it seems right to encourage relationships with her similar age family members. My daughter is not in contact with any of them any other way. I want her to feel supported even if that's all she gets from it - that I ALWAYS have her back. She doesn't want to go alone (which I get. And my mother is not above attempting communication through her). But realistically, this is holding onto a token which will have no real benefit, and it has very real negative impact on both of us. This has been years coming and I am totally sure. I'm not interested in any sort of apology, explanation or reconciliation, whatever the reasons. I just want to quietly move on. We live very close to my mother and some others, but are moving further away and it feels like the right time to make the final break cleanly. If I could trust my mother to just be superficially polite or ignore me, I would be OK to still go. She won't. So I'd have to stay low contact. That fills me with anger, sorrow, dread and fatigue. What's the right thing to do here? (happy to post the backstory, but it just gets so long and involved)

Multiplepillows · 06/08/2026 20:24

I am expecting her banging on my new door as soon as she finds out.

I think that is what you hope will happen.

When in actual fact it looks like no one is pushing you to go to the family Christmas lunch aside from your daughter. Who sees this family once a year. And you say your family are always doing stuff together without you anyway.

i really think the only person who is making this a big deal is you

LittlePetitePsychopath · 05/08/2026 22:48

There’s a chance you are worrying about this prematurely. She wants to move for a new start, socially, in a bigger and a busier place. Right now the annual performance feels important to her but it will feel a lot less important when she has other friends and plans; and if you cut your mother off and have to get an injunction, you may not be invited to the meal and you probably can’t go.

I’d focus on helping her to settle properly and not protecting her from your mother so much - not in a way that might damage her, but just not completely hiding it, so she has a chance of understanding what behaviour is wrong and why this is necessary. And then I’d hope to make other plans with her for the meal date, and my back up plan would be just declining to go. I’d really hope it wouldn’t come to that but sometimes you do just have to make the best decision and she can’t assess all the facts for this one. Could she take a friend, if she made one who wanted to go? It’s irrelevant anyway. It doesn’t sound healthy for her to go there, nor you. It’s not a healthy environment.

Enjoy your new home! I hope all goes well with the move and settling in.

TheBlueKoala · 05/08/2026 19:07

@GenXandtired Why would you go? So that your DD can maintain an illusion of having close family? That she sees once every year? Fuck that. Find people that you can call family ; friends that you see regularly and not just once every year.

Ilikealltings · 05/08/2026 18:44

Honestly, cant see an issue. You will not let her go alone and will not say no for the both of you (not being mean). So what other option is there? You go, no?

BMW58 · 05/08/2026 18:40

That will impact on our relationship, which I want to preserve at all costs, because I WILL be there for her for life.

OP - you are not immortal. At a hopefully distant date she will have to live without you.
She's 16 now, and nearly an adult. You need to start getting her to stand on her own and not rely on you 100%.

Surely this would be a place to start. You need to be absent from this meeting. If she can't go alone she's just going to have to break contact with them - which was miniscule anyway.

Stopfolding · 05/08/2026 18:37

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Likeiloveyou · 05/08/2026 18:36

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Oh!

I am no longer confused. Thank you.

Stopfolding · 05/08/2026 18:22

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Likeiloveyou · 05/08/2026 18:18

GenXandtired · 05/08/2026 18:13

She can't go if she 'wants'. She can go with support. She has disability that affects her socially. Me throwing her in there alone is no different to leaving a wheelchair user at the bottom of a set of steps and saying it's perfectly possible to climb stairs in a wheelchair if you want to attend an event at the top enough. (It IS But you need a lot of practice, even more upper body strength, someone to show you how it's done and someone to spot you while you learn. And you still fall sometimes and not every wheelchair user has the potential to achieve it). Wanting to isn't enough if you are disabled. It is if you just don't want to.

The very fact that she wants to go suggests she isn't capable of recognising this is a social performance, not authentic connection.

For example, it hasn't even occurred to her that my mother might abuse or try to manipulate her. Or that I will spend the entire time watching them both like a hawk while performing happy. Or that it will cost us £100 out of my Christmas budget that we could spend on ourselves. Let alone the real long term drain on my (and therefore her) resources managing my mother is for another two years. or that if I go NC, I will likely need an court ordered injunction and then we can't go. (or mother can't. And how do I manage THAT?!)

I don't think it is the simple non-issue people conceive it to be. It certainly isn't the simple non-issue it would be for a regular family. But thats the point, isn't it? If we were a regular family, I wouldn't be facing this choice.

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Yeah but I still don’t understand why you can’t just say no and that’s the end of it? I have one ND child and one who is NT.

They both got told no sometimes and had to get on with it. Are you reluctant to be “the bad guy” to DD? It’s obvious you feel really defensive but most posters just aren’t getting your thought process here and genuinely want to understand and help you unpick this.

No way should you break NC. You preserve that at all costs. Does that help?

Original poster

GenXandtired · 05/08/2026 18:13

Likeiloveyou · 05/08/2026 17:23

But you aren’t cutting her off from family. She can go if she wants.

I agree with PP you are making this way more complicated than it needs to be.

You aren’t going.

DD makes her own choices.

She can't go if she 'wants'. She can go with support. She has disability that affects her socially. Me throwing her in there alone is no different to leaving a wheelchair user at the bottom of a set of steps and saying it's perfectly possible to climb stairs in a wheelchair if you want to attend an event at the top enough. (It IS But you need a lot of practice, even more upper body strength, someone to show you how it's done and someone to spot you while you learn. And you still fall sometimes and not every wheelchair user has the potential to achieve it). Wanting to isn't enough if you are disabled. It is if you just don't want to.

The very fact that she wants to go suggests she isn't capable of recognising this is a social performance, not authentic connection.

For example, it hasn't even occurred to her that my mother might abuse or try to manipulate her. Or that I will spend the entire time watching them both like a hawk while performing happy. Or that it will cost us £100 out of my Christmas budget that we could spend on ourselves. Let alone the real long term drain on my (and therefore her) resources managing my mother is for another two years. or that if I go NC, I will likely need an court ordered injunction and then we can't go. (or mother can't. And how do I manage THAT?!)

I don't think it is the simple non-issue people conceive it to be. It certainly isn't the simple non-issue it would be for a regular family. But thats the point, isn't it? If we were a regular family, I wouldn't be facing this choice.

OP posts:

NattyKnitter116 · 05/08/2026 18:05

SandrenaIsMyBloodType · 05/08/2026 15:16

This actually is now a question of whether or not you are prepared to draw a boundary with your daughter, as well as with your mother.
I have 2 DDs with AuDHD and I do understand that this is not the same as drawing a boundary with a neurotypical teen - but that doesn’t mean that you should not.
She has decided that she wants to go to the annual family dinner, which is fine.
She has decided that she wants you to go too, which is not fine.
She is becoming an adult and needs to start to see her role as distinct from yours.
She won’t like it if you say “I will not be going anymore. It is the right decision for me. You can make your own choice but you do not get to choose for me” but actually it’s a powerful lesson and important example to set. She needs to understand that you and she will not always agree. She has agency over her own actions but not yours.
Rigid autistic thinking and fear of change may well have her maintaining that she “cannot” go without you but that doesn’t make it true. It will be uncomfortable. You will get push back and maybe meltdowns but it’s also important for us to learn to be comfortable with our autistic adult children’s discomfort. We cannot fix everything and they need to internalise that.

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Very wise words.

I do understand this wanting to attend -my son is an only child and autistic and he was obsessed with families - his, other people’s , tv families (loved only fools and horses!).
In Your scenario I think he’d be the same and as I have a problematic family I can see your dilemma. Also my son wouldn’t have been able to do this alone at 16, although he may have been ok being dropped off as long as there was one trusted person he could latch on to.
If you don’t feel she’s ready for that boundary to be enforced yet then go with her and accept you’ll hate the day, but also bear in mind that young people change and she might make some connections. (Probably not but never say never).

As they say, you can’t choose your family but you can choose your friends so good luck with the new start.

many people have to start from
scratch without any blood relations, including autistic people.

The best thing you can do is support her to find her tribe while you are still around.

Original poster

GenXandtired · 05/08/2026 17:49

SandrenaIsMyBloodType · 05/08/2026 15:16

This actually is now a question of whether or not you are prepared to draw a boundary with your daughter, as well as with your mother.
I have 2 DDs with AuDHD and I do understand that this is not the same as drawing a boundary with a neurotypical teen - but that doesn’t mean that you should not.
She has decided that she wants to go to the annual family dinner, which is fine.
She has decided that she wants you to go too, which is not fine.
She is becoming an adult and needs to start to see her role as distinct from yours.
She won’t like it if you say “I will not be going anymore. It is the right decision for me. You can make your own choice but you do not get to choose for me” but actually it’s a powerful lesson and important example to set. She needs to understand that you and she will not always agree. She has agency over her own actions but not yours.
Rigid autistic thinking and fear of change may well have her maintaining that she “cannot” go without you but that doesn’t make it true. It will be uncomfortable. You will get push back and maybe meltdowns but it’s also important for us to learn to be comfortable with our autistic adult children’s discomfort. We cannot fix everything and they need to internalise that.

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I am absolutely prepared to set not just boundaries, but limits for my daughter if they are in her best interest. She won't push back or meltdown, because we manage them respectfully. She literally cannot perceive the consequences here, because I have shielded her from my mother's abuse as much as possible, and because her disability prevents her from distinguishing authentic connection from a performance out of social obligation. I was very surprised she wanted to go, so I was unprepared to discuss it and have said I will give it some thought.

If it is unreasonable to ask her to go alone, that's not a boundary issue. I think it is an unreasonable ask of a child with autism to walk into a room alone expecting to be social with people she hardly knows. Hell, I find it bloody hard.

If my mother may be abusive to her, it's unreasonable to ask her to go alone. I'm about 80 percent certain she won't be. That's a safeguarding responsibility.

If my mother may attempt to manipulate or use her to communicate in my absence, it's unreasonable to ask her to go alone. I'm about 80 percent certain she will do. That's still my responsibility.

So I need to balance what it actually will cost me (that she is unaware of) to keep managing my mother and go, and what is feels like it will cost her (but in reality won't). Sometimes there is more to gain by her feeling that I'm on her side, than whatever the actual issue is. I often think when she's forty and in therapy, is this going to come up? And I think this will. Even though I am certain there are no meaningful relationships to come from this. I think she will perceive it as a loss of belonging. That's a tough loss, real or not.

OP posts:

HelenHywater · 05/08/2026 17:27

does your daughter want to go to the dinner OP? I have an autistic daughter and that would be the last thing she'd want to do.

I'm in low (was previously no-) contact with my mother and my children are in touch with her separately. As it happens, as they've got older they've witnessed her behaviours themselves so they aren't very keen on her.

Likeiloveyou · 05/08/2026 17:23

But you aren’t cutting her off from family. She can go if she wants.

I agree with PP you are making this way more complicated than it needs to be.

You aren’t going.

DD makes her own choices.

Original poster

GenXandtired · 05/08/2026 17:09

BMW58 · 05/08/2026 14:31

Well if DD refuses to go to the once a year dinner (weird in itself as no contact at all the rest of the year.....) then im afraid its too bad.

Keep away from your horrible mother. Don't go to this ridiculous "get together".

Time DD made efforts to make new friends - you won't live forever so she needs to start standing on her own 2 feet.

I don't think she has any future relationships with the kids in the extended family. I don't think a dinner once a year will make the blindest bit of difference when there is no other inclusion already. But if it's a place where people perform support for her because they feel they have to, she may well grow up feeling this is the time that I deprived her of genuine acceptance that was never there - because she's autistic and she can't tell the difference. (Oh, and sixteen!). That will impact on our relationship, which I want to preserve at all costs, because I WILL be there for her for life. And I actually think her seeing this as belonging could be very damaging. Learning what love is and isn't as an autistic child is VERY protective for adult relationships. And I can't necessarily model healthy belonging. But I can absolutely model rejection of being required to perform and fit in for crumbs. And as someone who had to unlearn this after an a lifetime of toxic relationships, learning it in your teens is a better that learning it in your fifties.

I think she is capable of standing on her two feet one day. And the whole move is her idea in order to make new friends etc. I'm very proud of her. But I do think she is socially delayed and vulnerable. It is my responsibility to shield her from this. But it won't feel like that to her. It will feel to her as though I am cutting her off from a family. That's not something I want her to hold on to. But I also need my mother out of my life for good.

OP posts:

Cooooold · 05/08/2026 17:07

Protect your daughter by not going if its just going to be abusive and potentially traumatising. You just sometimes have to say no to kids doing something they want because you can see the consequences they can't. Its simple really, theres no need to agonise about it imo, you already know what you need to model to her. I'm sorry for both of you and good luck 💐

Curleywoo · 05/08/2026 17:07

OP, you are making a fresh start and leaving the dinner behind will be part of it.
As an adult your daughter may make a different choice.
But for now you want to make this choice which is best at this time.
Make the decision and stand by it.

Original poster

GenXandtired · 05/08/2026 16:58

ohyesiseethatnow · 05/08/2026 15:58

But you’ve kind of answered your own question here?

They don’t initiate contact at any other time and neither do you.

So go to the dinner and forget about them the rest of the year?

why is that not an option?

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Because I then can't cut my mother off. She will not respect it. I am expecting her banging on my new door as soon as she finds out. And I will simply call the police and they can explain that adults get to have to their autonomy respected. Yes, even to their mothers. Yes, even you. And I expect to her to ignore that too, and try to contact me in other sly ways. And I expect to need to take out a civil injunction.

So I can't go for a bloody dinner she will be at! And even if I could, she would use the opportunity to harass me, and would not care about causing a scene. (I am genuinely unsure if she would harass my daughter. I was surprised she wanted to go)

She isn't a spoilt brat trying to dictate my actions. She's an autistic child trying manage adults who should be supporting her. And she deserves to feel supported, but the only adult doing that is me. So sometimes I will make a decision that makes her FEEL supported, because it's important when she is so deprived of support. That's my call. This one feels like it could go either way and I'm unsure what the least worst option is. It's taking a lot of resource to keep my mother at bay and I think a dinner is not worth it. I've already lost a business opportunity and a relationship over it. And it uses emotional bandwidth that I could do so much more with.

OP posts:

Isitevensummer · 05/08/2026 16:51

If you can grit your teeth and get through it I would do this last one and then cut ties. Is your daughter able to know something without sharing it with everyone? If you told her that this would be the last time you attend, would she be able to keep that to herself? Could you explain she needs to think how she will stay in touch with her cousins if you can’t go one year? I think clear expectations with a long lead time would be the best policy here.

Original poster

GenXandtired · 05/08/2026 16:47

BMW58 · 05/08/2026 14:47

Then she doesn't go. Too bad.

Edited

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Walking into a room full of people you barely know is pretty bloody daunting for a NT adult. I think it's a deeply unfair expectation of an autistic child with social difficulties. That's not a boundary issue with my daughter in my opinion. She has never seen most of these people in any other time. And the handful she has, she hasn't seen any other time for the last five or six years. They are strangers to her. But for one day a year, because they will look bad if they don't, they will perform inclusion. Because she's autistic, it feels real to her.

OP posts:

graceinspace999 · 05/08/2026 16:26

Your daughter can decide to go or not - she is old enough to know that her mother’s feelings are important too.

Tell her how bad this abuse has been for you. Autism or not she needs to learn that it’s not all about her.

Feel glad that you have modelled how important it is to safeguard your mental health from abusers.

Some people don’t understand how toxic some families can be and will encourage you to put yourself in harms way in service to a fantasy idea of how families should be.

You know how bad it is and it’s clear enough from your posts that you are doing the right thing in an extremely difficult situation.

All the best to you 💐

Ponderingwindow · 05/08/2026 16:25

Your dd is likely to become busy with other things over the next few years. Even those of us who are pretty anti-social tend to find our people when we are away from the constraints of childhood.

can you go now with the knowledge that she will probably naturally taper off naturally very soon.

Likeiloveyou · 05/08/2026 16:14

Can you explain why you can’t just tell DD you aren’t going but she can go if she wants?

We know she doesn’t want to go alone but that’s not your problem.

You are describing this as a boundary issue with your mother, but actually it’s a boundary issue with your daughter.

Buthomenow · 05/08/2026 16:06

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