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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To put my daughter before my husband?

158 replies

funnybones30 · 27/07/2015 21:38

My DD who is 14 got drunk a few months ago and engaged in sexual activity with a boy (not intercourse).

She told me about it as she felt guilty and was very upset. I told my husband who went crazy about it (to be expected) and called her all sorts of names, slag etc

Since then they don't appear to have much of a relationship. She says he doesn't like her. She will speak to him but he will be quite abrupt or ignore her. He loses his temper with her quite easily. He is quite moody anyway, well for the last three years or so.

He tells me she has no respect for anything or anyone. He says I spend too much time chauffeuring her about. I think she is being a normal teenager. She will snap on occasions plus have moods but she realises this and will apologise.

He doesn't think she should be out with her friends all the time even though it is the summer holidays and that she should stay in more.

He said to me he could easily kick her out if she was 16, he wouldn't though. I feel like I'm caught between our DD and husband.

I'm beginning to think maybe I should split with him and move out with our other child also. I'm really fed up with it and cant see any other way.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks

OP posts:
DontWorrryBaldrickHasACunningP · 27/07/2015 22:10

Your H is toxic for your DD. His attitude is both odd, inappropriate and archaic.

Personally I would be telling him to do one. If my DP spoke to my DD like that he would be out the door!

Original poster
funnybones30 · 27/07/2015 22:11

Not sure why he's become moody over the last few years. No, affair as he rarely goes out. He's turned into Victor Meldrew.

The children don't like going on holiday with him as he usually moans anyway. Everyone else thinks he's laid back and easy going.

I had cancer 5 years ago and he was really supportive while I was receiving treatment. He's now just a grumpy sod.

It just really upsets me that he can have just awful opinions on DD.

OP posts:
Ragusa · 27/07/2015 22:12

He's trying to blame you for his failings by saying it's all your fault, down to your childhood, etc etc etc. Absolutely no appreciation on his part that he might be in the wrong or that his parenting might be influenced by his upbringing. Why are you letting him make you and your daughter out to be the ones with the problem here? You're clearly worth so much more than this; you sound like a really good mum.

Penfold007 · 27/07/2015 22:14

How does he feel about the boy involved in the situation?

Original poster
funnybones30 · 27/07/2015 22:15

Piper - I bitterly regret breaking her confidence and wish I could turn back the clock. At the time I was shocked and felt I needed to confide in someone, unfortunately I chose husband, big mistake as I didn't expect the reaction I got.

OP posts:
Original poster
funnybones30 · 27/07/2015 22:17

Penfold - He wanted to go round the boys house. Said he was going to "rip his head off".

I stopped him from going round.

OP posts:
Ragusa · 27/07/2015 22:17

But you should be able to talk to your husband about issues that concern you. Don't feel bad about breaking her confidence. This isn't your problem. Don't absorb all the guilt.

Backforthis · 27/07/2015 22:18

How fucking dare he talk to her like that. I don't care if she shagged the entire town. If he is so screwed up that he thinks he somehow has the right to behave this way he needs professional help.

Why on earth did you tell him?

Backforthis · 27/07/2015 22:20

X posts.

This is seriously damaging for your DD. She needs to see you stand up for her and make it clear that he is in the wrong.

SpongeBobJudgeyPants · 27/07/2015 22:21

Don't understand why you were that shocked at a fairly usual teenage right of passage?

MilesHuntsWig · 27/07/2015 22:23

Sounds like your husband needs a reality check on what is normal. Please support your DD.

faceremovinghaircream · 27/07/2015 22:24

He sounds like my dad roughly 15 years ago. Still don't speak and still resent my mother for not getting involved.

TheOddity · 27/07/2015 22:24

You really need to start being a bit more forceful. For starters, the next time he brings it up, you very quickly and angrily shut him down that she told you this information in confidence, and you did the same with him, and he needs to respect that. Just tell him you don't want to ever hear about it again and if he wants to bring it up repeatedly, maybe this isn't a good environment for his daughter to be in. It isn't fair that she confided and trusted you and he is throwing it back at her. I would be telling your daughter some intimate secrets about him and see how he likes the feeling of it being publicly mentioned. Hmm, thought not.

And on your parenting, just tell him that he is the out of touch with the life of the average 14 year old, fabricate (if you need to, I wouldnt) about what you got up to at 14. He is the odd one out here. This is exactly the age many start to sexually experiment and if he doesn't know that he has been living in a bubble. Sorry, no one wants to think it, but if you actually cast your mind back to that age you may be shocked by your own memories!

Finally just because he is getting older doesn't give him the right to turn into a grumpy old man. I would be calling him on it every time he was grumpy and suggesting he get an early bedtime or stop drinking or whatever it is that brings on the grump.

magoria · 27/07/2015 22:30

You later posts explain it. He has been brought up by older parents with 'old fashioned' views to think that girls are either good or slags.

He needs educating that women are human beings in their own right, have the right to do what they want, when they want with their bodies and that there is nothing shameful or dirty about sexual activity.

What TheOddity posts is bloody good. Stamp on him every time he brings it up hard and fast. Show your DD what he is doing is wrong and unacceptable.

If it causes an arguement so be it.

LokiBear · 27/07/2015 22:38

He has no right to call her those names. Your dd is in danger of making some serious mistakes - you need to put steps in place to support her. Her behaviour is destructive. However your husband us not being helpful. I'd choose my dd on a heartbeat over anyone else on the planet- including my DH.

RosePetels · 27/07/2015 22:48

Your husband is very wrong calling her names but I don't understand why you told him. She told you in confidence and you went and told somebody she never gave you permission to spread her business.
My mum used to do this and it got to the point I didn't want to tell her anything about my life.

BertrandRussell · 27/07/2015 22:49

"Don't feel bad about breaking her confidence. This isn't your problem. Don't absorb all the guilt."
You should feel bad about breaking her confidence. That was wrong. But you most definitely shouldn't feel bad about his reaction- that is entirely his responsibility.

Iliveinalighthousewiththeghost · 27/07/2015 22:51

Of course YNBu. T thought it went without saying that every mother puts their child first.
He called his own dd a slag. That to me is abuse.

happy2bhomely · 27/07/2015 22:53

My dad called me a slag when I was 14 because I went out to walk the dog wearing jogging bottoms and a crop top in the summer.

I hadn't even kissed a boy at that point and it really creeped me out and upset me to hear my dad talk that way. I was quite naïve and didn't really understand what it meant. Sex was the last thing on my mind at 14.

Your daughter obviously trusts you. I would never have spoken to my mum about anything like this. I had my first boyfriend at 16 and started taking the pill. She found them and called my granddad round to call me a whore too.

I got pregnant and had a baby at 17. That went down well.

happy2bhomely · 27/07/2015 22:57

By the way, I love my DH with all of my heart, I really do. But he knows that if he ever puts me in a position to choose, I will choose my children every time without a second thought.

Mumoftwoyoungkids · 27/07/2015 22:58

I started some sexual activity at 14.

I didn't actually have sex until 18. I have a Cambridge degree. I have been married for 15 years. I have two lovely (planned) children. I have a good job. I was the annoying girl that everyone's parents said "why can't you be more like....", I'm really dull!

If I was doing it then I suspect practically everyone was....

silverglitterpisser · 27/07/2015 23:07

If anyone - ANYONE - called my teen DD a slag they'd b out of my life after a few choice words n home truths had been levelled at them at the very least.

Her own father? Sick. No anger, worry or disappointment alters that. Yanbu to put her first n show her that she should never tolerate being spoken to like that n that u won't tolerate it on her behalf.

WienerDiva · 27/07/2015 23:08

You sound like a wonderful mum, and it's wonderful that your dd can confide in you. I hope she hasn't lost your trust though. It may be worth talking to her about that and apologising for sharing her secret (although I understand why you wanted to tell someone).

Your DH needs to grow up and stop being so vile to his child.

You are completely right to be sticking up for your dd. She fucked yo and spoke to you about. She's a human like the rest of us and we all screw up from time to time.

Being labelled as a slag etc by your own dad will haunt you forever and possibly alter their relationship for the worse forever.

MiscellaneousAssortment · 27/07/2015 23:10

He sounds utterly foul. He truly hates women, no other way that he would be calling his own daughter a Slag. It's virgin or whore territory, and woman as object / possession thinking.

Her self esteem must be taking a hammering, being labelled as trash and sexually 'sullied' used goods.

He is telling her by his words and actions that she is ruined by her actions, and that men don't gave to treat her nicely now she's 'made herself' into trash.

This is not the behaviour of an over protective father who's lost control in the heat of the moment. This is a man who's angry and wants to be the king of his family, and one of his possessions/ loyal subjects has stepped out of line. He sounds like he's trying to punish his daughter, with no end in sight, and to grind down her self belief and teach her her body belongs to the dominant male, not herself. It's disgusting and misogynistic. He revolts me to the core of my being im afraid.

He is making her vulnerable to a life of male abuse and bad relationships, because he's teaching her she doesn't deserve better.

The man that should love, respect and protect her is treating her like she's scum, because she experimented, once, at a party.

I get the feeling you are being very non confrontational or letting him behave like this, and I'm trying to work out why? Is he a scary man? To you I mean, or does he have you trapped in some way? Or do you feel you owe him in some way?

I don't want to sound like I'm getting at you, as it's absolutely not my intention, just trying to work out the wider circumstances for this mans dreadful behaviour, and then what options you may want to explore.

Atenco · 27/07/2015 23:15

I second everyone else's opinion here and just wanted to add a poem by a 17th Century Mexican nun

www.poemhunter.com/poem/you-men/

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