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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

AIBU to feel overwhelmed by my 19-year-old daughter’s dependence?

82 replies

MarieTheresa · 19/08/2026 07:43

My 19 year old dd has always been hard work. She’s very kind but also very demanding. I kind of wish she didn’t live with us but we live in a university town and she plans to attend this university in september so she’ll be staying with me for the foreseeable. I think she’s too attached to me but I don’t know what to do about this. She’s lonely and she’s bored. I don’t know why she doesn’t have many friendships but she doesn’t. It’s like I’m her main relationship. But I’m her mother and each conversation inevitably turns from a chat to a mother-to-daughter guidance. I just wish she had more friends and I wasn’t so important to her. I don’t know what to do. We have some really ugly arguments, mostly, I think, because she asks too much of me and I’m overwhelmed, too stressed from work and unable and unwilling to be her friend. Any advice?

OP posts:
menopausalmare · 19/08/2026 07:55

She will make friends at uni and may join a club or two. Can you make yourself less available in the evenings and join a class or meet friends?

MarieTheresa · 19/08/2026 07:54

She has friends @PastorG , they’re just not very deep friendships. Her best friend has gone away to college.

OP posts:
AmberSpy · 19/08/2026 07:54

Do you have hobbies and things you can go to by yourself? Like a yoga class or a book group or whatever that she can't or isn't interested in attending? I think gently making yourself unavailable because you're pursuing your own interests might be helpful.

Bringemout · 19/08/2026 07:54

Encourage her to join some special interest clubs at uni to see if she can make some friends. I’m really socially awkward and always struggled to make friends but my mum was also not an option.

KamikazePigeon · 19/08/2026 07:52

Can you gently encourage her to go to a university away from home? Sounds like she really needs to spread her wings a little and develop some independence.

Ohthatsabitshit · 19/08/2026 07:52

Well suggest she goes into halls at uni?

PastorG · 19/08/2026 07:50

She sounds very unhappy. 19 and no friends at all?