Idiot daughter has dumped lovely boyfriend

[Droves]

Today of all days FFs.

I'm so annoyed at her . He's lovely , nice family , supportive to her , not a rude bloke , not a waste of space just a nice respectful young man .

She's an idiot . She just wasn't getting enough excitement " he's too boring " ( read he's ran out of money and can't afford to take her out clubbing , as he bought her 6 Xmas gifts ) .

Yesterday , even though he's skint ( student ) he took her to pub for a few hours . She came home drunk , but had no money herself .

She was being vile , playing games , wanting attention . He's just left , I asked him if he's ok , he replied he will be fine , looked really upset .

Thing is daughter is in floods of tears now . Because she didn't expect him just to accept its finished so easy WTAF ? . ( He did say to begin with he didn't want to split up ) .

How did she think it ok to be so horrible ? .
I'm ashamed of her .

I'm worried she will end up with some "exciting" dickhead ( like her father ) .

Poor boyfriend , I am so hurt for him ...he's exactly who you'd wish for a son in law . Some girl will be lucky to have him , my dd is an idiot to do this .

It's heartbreaking ... All the dreams I had for them , gone . All the future grandchildren I'd been looking forward too in the distant future ...gone . Bless him , he was saving to buy her an engagement ring for when she had finished uni .

Where did I go wrong with her ? .

Oh bollocks OP, you don't want advice on how to help your daughter, you said yourself you just need to vent.

You seem to be projecting massively and have both unreasonably high (no 19 year old should fuck up) and unreasonably low (not hitting her is reason to stay FFS) expectations of relationships.

You don't know what your D is feeling as I doubt she can be honest with you. If she wants him back and he's not interested then she's learnt an important lesson. In all likilhood she doesn't want him back, she's just having the regret we all feel when we dump someone who's nice enough but not cooking it probably not helped me her DM implying she'll be lucky to meet anyone else.

From your later posts, it doesn't sound so bad. She messed him about; he took the opportunity to escape; she learned a lesson. That's what will teach her, not anything you can say now. Unless she's very stupid, she will have got the message!

However, your dreams and desires for them, and your liking for him are just too hair-raising, and that's why you've had a hard time. As long as you don't let her know this is how ylu feel , all will be well. The problem of "brattishness" is already being resolved, and you can love her whole-heartedly again (I hope) without feeling guilty "for condoning shitty behaviour".

I was your daughter too - I used to get bored v quickly, usually not too long after undying love had been declared.

I wanted things to be exciting and new all the time and it isn't, so I'd just move on (I had a nice upbringing too, not spoilt at all, but quite a bit of a twat in my teens).

In my mid 20s I met my husband and that was when I knew it was the 'one' as geeky as it sounds - I played no games with him and didn't feel stifled or bored like I had before.

There were some lovely boys I finished with along the way (and some wankers!) but my mum never interfered, if she had I'd have behaved even worse I think.

I read your post as a private rant fwiw, and that's the best thing to do IMO - I expect she's learned a lesson today though.

My mum and Dad loved my first proper boyfriend. He was a successful property developer and surveyor and I dumped him when we were 21. He was gutted and suicidal. Followed me around and was very, very weird. He just didn't float my boat.
My parents hated my now very, vert DH on sight but they now love him to pieces. He really floats my boat, even after 14 years together unlike boyfriend number 1. DH might not own the property, have the prospects or the money in the bank but he's a great dad, husband, lover and friend and we're great together. I am truly happy. Plus, it's not my mum waking up with him each and every morning is it?

Get grip. Trust your daughter. She does have instincts and should be encouraged to trust them.

I can remember being wound up by a boyfriend who was trying to make me jealous (which was easy at 17), anyway I called him a few names and he then finished with me.

I was heartbroken and in tears, but when I went to my Mum she just said "You deserve it you little bitch". I have never forgotten the double wound of him dumping me and her vitriolic response. I think that is why this thread upset me.

I was just too immature to handle all the emotions but was most hurt by my mum's rejection.

What specifically is this bratty behaviour.

Some men love a women with a bratty behaviour.

The relationship they did have was not perfect for her and she shouldn't suck it up because he doesn't hit it abuse her. Those are not the only reasons to stay in a relationship

What leaps out to me from your posts, OP, is less your daughter's behaviour than how low your standards are for what constitutes a desirable partner - 'not rude', 'nice family', doesn't hit her, 'not a waste of space'! Her boyfriend (now ex, presumably) ticked all those pretty minimal boxes, and you're planning their long term future and grandchildren...?

Maybe your daughter was being a spoilt brat, but he could be everything you say and still not be someone she wants to spend her life with - there's quite a continuum between the guy you describe and an 'exciting dickhead'!

Also, do you realise how few people spend their lives with their student boy/girlfriend? I met my now-husband at 19, which makes me very aware of how rare this is. You may well have years and years ahead during which your daughter rejects and is rejected by men who seem perfectly acceptable to you...

A lot of what you have said on this thread winds me up a great deal. I was in a "wonderful relationship with a lovely man" of course everyone adored him. How could I be so heartless and stupid as to break up with him, what a bitch, a cow, a user. I got the whole learn my lesson and make my own mistakes spiel which has permanently fractured my relationships with my family.

Maybe we should all stay in relationships that make us miserable just because the other person does not want to split up, I mean everyone else thinks they are wonderful so who am I to complain, after all it is only my life!

I doubted myself and cried a great deal when I split up with the most perfect man in existence, because Mr Wonderful had worn me down oh so subtly and always behind closed doors. He didn't like me making my own friends, he always went for drinks on a Friday after work and when I started going for drinks with my workmates he didn't like it. He'd persuade me to come home and he would come home early and we'd go for a meal and have a lovely evening. He'd ring me and tell me he was on the way home till about 8 at which point he'd turn his phone off, roll in at 2 hammered and I'd be the unreasonable one. This is just an example and the manipulation was normally a slow steady dripping tap, quiet enough that most don't notice but it becomes a steady drum beat when you hear it all the time.

Of course dignity gets you nowhere, I refused to slag him off and ended up ostracised as he played his helpless little injured lamb routine everywhere. I used him for money apparently as I let him buy me a coat just before we split up. Of course he was not going to tell anyone that he owed me thousands of pounds, none of which I've ever seen back. The story now is he supported me for the whole time together and I never offered a penny (I paid 2/3 of our bills and it took me 8 fucking years to pay off the debts he encouraged me to take on for him).

My family started to see my side after he got increasingly intrusive and aggressive over what I was doing. They finally saw him for what he was when he tried to bully and threaten details about my life out of them. They've damaged our relationship though by trusting him over me. It was my life no one else's and they should not have taken sides against me.

It's been 10 years and I wish I'd ended it sooner, I hear he is still dining out on my heartlessness, I wonder how his wife feels about that - nice to keep her in check I suppose, but he is a wonderful man and I'll come to regret what I lost....... Allegedly, highly fucking doubt it though.

Harking back to my post on the previous page (cos I'm sure everyone is entranced by my anecdotes of my teenage love life), there's one more point I wanted to make: my then boyfriend was wrong to do weird manipulative stuff rather than just talking to me honestly. But he was totally right to dump me. Thank god he did, because we weren't working well together and I was infatuated to see it. If we'd stayed together for years it would have been crap, despite both of us being basically nice kids with good intentions.

A really good relationship is one that tends to lead each person into being their best self. Me and DH bring out the best in each other. Me and ex-BF decidedly did not. OP, if this relationship was right for your DD then she wouldn't be bored and playing mind games, she'd be getting on with her happy life.

too infatuated, sorry

I've been in your daughter's situation and still remember how hurt I felt about my parents being so unsupportive of my decision. Better she ends it now than in 2 years when they are married with a child - bottom line is she clearly doesn't love him and thats all you should need to know.

She is an adult. As a teenager/adult I have made loads of relationship mistakes that I'm sure my mother would not be thrilled about if she knew, but some of them I learnt from, and some of them were made just because I'm a flawed human being like everyone else. You can't stop her from ever making a mistake in her life.

Either he really isn't what she wants and therefore she has done the right thing by dumping him (regardless of how wonderful you think he is), or this will be a mistake that she will learn from.

My daughter did this at 18 with her then boyfriend, who is now her husband and the father of their two daughter's, I felt how you feel at the time but had to let her do what she thought was the right thing then, you have to let them make their own mistakes in life and hope everything turns out right for them

So your daughter split up with a man she messed around because he wasn't right for her, instead of using him and continuing to mess him around? I can't see the problem. That's what you do when you're young.

Gad, these women who want to marry off their daughters to the first taker.

Make a fortune for divorce lawyers though.

I wasn't sure about marrying my boyfriend...I was a bit bullied into it by my mil and I have to say it was the wrong decision, I knew deep down he wasn't the person I was drawn to in a room, he was someone I " settled for "
I did both of us a disservice there, particularly myself.

You know, he could be a perfectly decent guy and still not be someone she wants to spend the next week with, far less the rest of her life! It isn't actually a rule that you should settle for the first guy who us vaguely acceptable or non-abusive. I ditched my first serious boyfriend just because, although he was decent, kind, sane etc, he bored me to death...

If she was genuinely trying to get him to beg to take him back (and you won't know unless and until she chooses to talk to you about it ) then it sounds as if she may have been trying to manufacture some 'romantic' high drama. Is that pretty brattish? Yup. If so, its also a good sign that in no way was she ready to settle down yet. Poor fella

Ocelot ... Your spot on.

Why are you not allowed to call your child's ( even teen/adult child) on bratty behaviour on here ?

A winge about a Toddler tantrum is acceptable , but a winge about a teen/adult tantrum isn't ? Where is the cut off point for bad behaviour in offspring ? I'm obviously confused on that point .

We can tell them not to pick their noses or call other rude names , but it's ok to let our offspring ( I'm not using child , she's not anymore ) manipulate someone ? .

If Dh was trying to manipulate me , you would be telling me rightly to leave he bastard , saying its abuse ... And it would be . So I'm confused , why is it ok for a late teen to do that , but not an adult ? . Perhaps if the late teen was called up on it , that behaviour would stop and no adults would abuse others that way . The behaviour pattern would be stopped at the first incident .

Regardless of what I think off the ex boyfriend .... She's learned the hard way not to fuck about with people's feelings , it's rebounded on her not the way she actually wanted .
Dd actually does love the boy , they've basically grew up together . Her friends at home are all his friends , they've got the same circle . It's going to be harder on her than she realises . Poor dd . I thought she'd matured a bit more than she has .

She will survive , grow up ( finally) and go on .

She is 19. Let her make her own decisions and mistakes. My gut feeling is that your feelings about her are all projections about your own mistakes. Maybe she will make the same ones. Maybe she will make different ones. Maybe you should butt out of another adults life and stop being so judgemental. Whatever you say, the fact you can vent these very mean feelings about your daughter makes me fear for how you treat her face to face.

She really hasn't done anything wrong. She tried to goad him into being less of a wet blanket and it backfired a bit.

Your problem, OP, is you and your desire to live through this poor teenager.

Dear oh dear. Let her live her own life.

And get your own.

And Maybe she should leave home. Then you won't know what she's doing, she can make her mistakes in private and she can work on coping with real life not just boyfriends.

And when she comes home crying just keep quiet and let her cry on your shoulder.

THAT is what mums are for.

I think you really need to back off here and leave your Dd to live her life, as many others have said.

She's 19, the same age my 2 DSs will be when they finish secondary school. She's so young - how do you know that 'she really loves him'.

I had the 'perfect' boyfriend and dumped him, and thank goodness I did.

You have been given good advice here. Please listen. This isn't about you.

Droves the more you post the worst you make yourself sound. She may well "love" this boy, and it will undoubtedly be very hard if they've been so entwinned. It doesn't mean she doesn't know deep down it's the right decision.

I really, really cannot see where or how the brattish behaviour has occured. She is struggling with the very common problem of being with someone who is great in many respects, you're attached to, but you know is not right for you. Leaving in these circumstances is always difficult, it's not often clean but it is the right thing to do.

I hope you have at least shielded your daughter from your most UR reactions.

I am pleased though that she doesn't seem to have inherited your low expectations of relationships.

OP why do you know so much about your daughter's life? All the things she does or doesn't do with her boyfriend, how she treats him, what their relationship is like, etc.? She's not a child, she's an adults trying to live her life. Maybe where you went wrong with her was trying to micromanage every aspect of her relationships with everyone such that she doesn't know how to behave without you looking over her shoulder all the time telling her what's right and wrong.

Can't believe she's not out the door and far away from you already... but I'm assuming you've got her fairly dependent on you? All your hopes and dreams for her, right? Sounds like a recipe for a disaster.

And as per your last post OP, you're hardly merely "whinging" about a teenager. You're in full-on strop mode because your DD failed to live her life exactly as you had it planned out for her.

Frankly good for her. She should probably break up with you too.