To push DD to apply to Cambridge?

[AllieinWonderland]

So I'm relatively new to posting on mumsnet, but have been a long time lurker, so if I mix up the lingo a bit then apologies!
DSS1 got 9As 3As at GCSE, 4 high As at AS level, and is on track to exceed his AAA offer for Oxford.
Oldest DD achieved 13A*s 2As and a B at GCSE (the B in music - she had a panic attack in the exam and it was on a tape so she was unable to get the time back) and is looking on track for 5 high As at AS level in French, English lit, history, physics, and art. She is seemingly good at almost everything (triathlons at county level and has previously played and trained younger children in cricket and basketball, plays the cello, the xylophone, and the clarinet, won a local photography competition, always gets lead roles in an amateur dramatics group and solos in choir) yet has always struggled severely with self esteem, and focuses on the things she is bad at: sees her B in music as the end of her chance of going to good universities, can't bake or cook to save her life despite much encouragement and teaching, is awful at tidying (she is happy to do it but ends up gradually making more of a mess and gets flustered. Again, I've tried forms of 'teaching' and noting has worked). These latter two issues have led her to thinking she needs to stay at home for university and she is driving me mad by saying she'll go to the local university, which is really not a very good one at all, and the only others she'll consider are those with offers of "BBC" or below.
She has finally settled on studying English literature, and I took charge and booked her on open days at Warwick, Edinburgh, Cambridge, and Durham, and her school took the 'Oxbridge' candidates to Oxford for a trip. She hated Durham, didn't like Edinburgh, thought Oxford and Warwick were okay, but loved Cambridge.
In spite of this she is refusing to consider applying, says it's a waste of an application.
I don't want to push her, but I do want her to apply because she clearly loved it and is more than capable. All of her teachers have been saying it since before I can remember, and she reads almost constantly.
Aibu to try and change her mind?
Sorry for the lack of coherence here, my mind a bit of a mess!

The oldest child in an abusive relationship can be almost like a third person in a marriage - insofar as they are one who feels most responsible for protecting the victim parent, and also the younger children.

She experienced her father's behaviour the longest just by virtue of being around him the longest. And I remember you saying that he did turn his abuse towards her. So she was perhaps more in the firing line than her siblings. And, having found him, she was more involved in his death.

Did she find music an expressive activity, or was it more of a technical skill thing? If it was about expressiveness, that could be a clue why she broke down in that exam- she felt closer to what was really going on inside then due to the nature of the subject/discipline than in other ore academic subjects.

It could just have been overload/coincidence, but if she breaks down every time she connects to her feelings, she does need help quite urgently.

This might be helpful for when the flashbacks happen

www.pete-walker.com/13StepsManageFlashbacks.htm

I'm not surprised that she doesn't want to do a gap year. If she works to keep her mind off things then the yawning chasm of a gap year, as yet unplanned, would be terrifyingly. You can see from the way that she has a career planned, in the familiar environment of a school, that having a break isn't something she's comfortable with.

I had the same plan to be a primary teacher as a teenager, probably because I didn't feel adult enough for an adult job, in an unknown environment, but I knew I was adult enough in a room of small children. Obviously some people do just want to be primary teachers because they'd be good at it and enjoy it, not because they are struggling teenagers.

I think that if you push her to apply for universities that strike her as too challenging then there is a chance that she will feel the only way to regain control will be to throw her A levels. There would then be the very real chance that she would miscalculate and miss her insurance university too.

Sorry, haven't read all the other posts, so you may have mentioned this.

Rather than any mentor or form tutor, you NEED to talk to the SENCO and give them medical info if you haven't already. That way, if she has any major problems next year, the appropriate support can be put in place. She may be able to get special exam conditions etc, so long as it's backed up by medical evidence.

I didn't see the panic attacks as totally relevant due to our attitude towards them. She has always told me the last thing she wants is for them to impact her future. When she does have them, she immediately tries to get back to whatever was going on before because she doesn't want to let them consume her life.

I do maintain that the panic attacks are not something she intends to "give in" to.

I would very gently suggest that you yourself are much more affected by the abuse from your first husband and his death than you realise. Otherwise I think you wouldn't be minimizing the panic disorder/PTSD/whatever it is as no big deal that doesn't affect her life. You're not helping her by allowing her to pretend it's no big deal. Panic attacks are unbelievably disturbing to experience - it is not normal to be having them this frequently and they undoubtedly will go on to consume her life if she doesn't address the root cause of them. How will she hold down a job when she's out of the protective cocoon of being a student? How on earth does she expect to be a teacher to young children if an attack can strike at any time?

If she is having attacks involving screaming and throwing stuff around at least once a week, it must be having a MASSIVE impact on everyone in your household. It must be really distressing for your younger children to be around. They must be constantly on edge not knowing if something will set her off. What prompted your husband to seek new forms of therapy for her?

You seem - frankly - shockingly complacent that she'll just grow out of it. There's every chance she won't if she doesn't get appropriate treatment, and I am astonished that you seem to be wasting time on therapies that clearly aren't working when she should probably be under the care of a psychiatrist. It might be that a course of anti-depressants, if nothing else, could stabilise the panic.

I'm a bit worried by your quest to find out why "SHE" appears to have been so much more badly affected by the trauma than her siblings. I think you're probably giving her the message, consciously or not, that there's a set norm for emotional reactions and anything outside this is to be devalued or ignored. So you think you're doing her a favour by ignoring any extreme reactions like panic attacks or screaming. This is also typical perfectionist thinking on both your parts: she shouldn't be having certain emotional reactions, behaving in certain ways, or experiencing mental illness.

Actually, her reactions are her reactions. She is entitled to be much more badly affected by things than others without there needing to be an external reason for it. She needs help and attention paid to her emotional reactions, not to be told that they're somehow outside the norm or shamed for them. I think your belief that she somehow shouldn't be as badly affected by trauma, or that it's best to ignore and minimise her symptoms of mental illness, are feeding her denial of her own state. Mental illness generally only gets better when people are able to accept it as part of their life and work with it, not minimise and deny it. And part of that is acknowledging and validating one's own emotional reactions as legitimate, even when others don't seem to see or experience things the same way.

The language of the original post is also revealing. (Should I 'push' my daughter?)

Young women are put under pressure both in terms of mind and body.

The thing about dysfunctional families is that a very great deal of damaging - and damaged - behaviour is normalised.

No matter how many As somebody has, or how many sporting achievements they have - if they've experienced significant harm and loss - they are very vulnerable, and have no chance of becoming happy healthy, fully functioning adults until the harm and the loss and the vulnerability are adequately addressed.

I don't think we have a dysfunctional family kinloss, and I don't think anyone who knows us would describe us in that way.

Look, I accept that I've dealt with her mental illness poorly, and I also accept that I don't know how to deal with it any better.

TheQuestingVole DH tried to get support as her panic attacks disturbed his DCs, but they have since adjusted.

I feel a bit battered and worn down. I've accepted I'm in the wrong and now just feel scared of the future and haven't a clue what to do.

I watched one of my daughters nearly self destruct at University, and I feel very sorry for the position both you and she are in.
I completely understand you wanting her to go somewhere that plays to her strengths ( and for all the flaming there IS a difference between the top universities and the ex Polys for the majority of traditional subjects.. it all depends on what you want to study!) but she sounds so far from ready to go anywhere whatsoever, if there is any way you can help her take a gap year... please please do.

If the lack of structure of a gap year panics her, can you not suggest some structured ones? (Pineapple picking in Oz, or helping at an orphanage in Vietnam.. whatever) They also look great on UCAS forms along with what are likely to be stellar grades.

My DD1 went off to Med school (not Oxbridge..she refused to apply) but a decent RG one, when in hindsight she was already becoming mentally unwell.. anxiety, and a soon to fully blossom eating disorder. By the end of her first year she was deeply unhappy and a 5 stone anorexic... yet before she left she only had mild signs of anxiety, a happy and full social life etc.
The stress of moving away from home, pressure on herself to be the bright pupil she had been at school... was too much.

She did get through it..just..and with a LOT of support from her University, Mental Health, and medication, but she is still a long way from the happy-but-exhausted doctor she should be.. the effects have been profound and she lost some of her sparkle along the way. She is now a still very thin F2 doctor and while she loves her job I wish we could have withdrawn her at the time and given her time to regroup a little.

My DD1 now carries quite a few 'labels'.. anxiety, depression, ex anorexic but barely... they haven't hindered her in her job at all, oddly enough, and they were very necessary to help her get the treatment she needed.

PS Exeter and Nottingham are both lovely .. two of mine went to those!

I can understand you feeling battered and worn down so I wanted to say that I think when you take into consideration everything it's clear that you have only ever wanted the best for your daughter. You are her mum and it's only natural.

However, parents are human and humans make mistakes. There is no manual given out when you have a child so we all just plod along doing our best.

You, however, have taken everything said onboard and you plan to take steps to help your daughter and that is incredibly admirable. This has been a very tough thread and there has been a lot of criticism and harsh truths.

Of course you are going to be scared of the future. Both you and your daughter face a very long and tough path. There will be tears and very dark days, you will both be tempted to give up. However the long term gains are worth the long term pain.

You can both do this, it will just take time. You can't rush recovery.

I meant "long term pain is worth the short term pain"

We are all flawed human beings and nobody has a perfect family life.

But I do not think a family life that has involved abuse and suicide can be described as well-functioning.

I think one of the most powerful maternal emotions I feel is to do everything I can to shield my children from harm, while acknowledging that is impossible.

If I had, through my own vulnerability, exposed my child to considerable harm - exposing them to an abusive parental relationship which culminated in their discovering that her father had taken his own life, I would be absolutely devastated.

I think I'd then be looking for help for myself - as well as trying to help my daughter.

My failure to remove her? QuestingVole and anyone else who wishes to kick me further, please stop now. Enough.

I will do whatever it takes to get my daughter help and make her happy and stable again. This thread has made me feel awful enough as it is, I can't take much more.

I love my DD and I may not be a great mum but she is a great kid so I will do my best to help her. I will get as much help as I can.

My niece went to a very high Russell Group University. Brightest student in the school, 14A* GCSEs etc. etc. Ended up blue lighted to hospital during her finals due to stress. Please don't pressurise your child - at some point they will fall apart.

Christ OP you're getting a terrible pasting here, having already had some awful life events. What comes over to me is how much you love your daughter, and the keyboard warriors who know NOTHING about your life should fucking well hang their heads in shame. What ghastly judgemental twats.

TheQuestioningVole I've reported your post, which you are clearly so proud of.

"Removed"?, she was in an abusive relationship. Do you normally blame victims? Kick them while they're down? Shameful post.

Kinloss you should put a sock in it and think how bloody lucky you are that you weren't in the OP's shoes. Your post is so bloody sanctimonious.

Haven't RTFT but have seen that there are wider issues that your daughter is experiencing.

Anyway in reply to your original post, I would not recommend Oxbridge for someone who is already anxious. I was at Oxford not Cambridge but found the academic pressure significant but also the social pressure was relentless. I also went to a grammar (state) and was looked down on for not going to somewhere like Westminster or similar. I loved the work and it's true that the quality of education provided compared to other universities is very different (most is delivered one to one for starters) but the environment was very stressful and I always say that I would never recommend Oxbridge unless you had a great deal of mental resilience. Bear in mind that although supportive to an extent, if she fails exams as she can't cope, they won't hesitate to kick her out as well.

I would also try to promote a gap year to give her some thinking time and she could always do a masters at a more rigorous uni after her first degree if she felt up to it by then.

If I was in your position I would absolutely tell DD that you want her to take a year out to get herself better. You cannot make her do it but you can do the broken record technique whenever she asks for advice about the future.

I have complete sympathy with your DD and I think she is very confused, upset and scared.

I am in therapy for my MH issues at the moment, it is tough! I have spent evenings saying its crap and the therapist is rubbish, it doesn't help and just makes me upset but actually I have made major improvements since I started therapy. It has taken a few goes to find the right therapy and therapist but it has been worth it.

I was like your DD and believed anyone with MH problems was weak, I would criticise them (privately) all because I believed if I ridiculed and ignored, it would go away and I wouldn't be as weak as those people, like burying my head in the sand really.

You need to help your DD to get help, you need to help her find herself and let go of her issues before even thinking about uni.

Op I agree that what comes across throughout this thread is how much you love your daughter and what extremely distressing life experiences you both have had. Im sorry you have been so heavily criticized for what looks to me like doing your best in very challenging circumstances.

I was similar on paper to your daughter at 18. Academically high flying and succesful in many extra curricular activities. I was motivated by success and didnt know who i was. I struggled to chose a university, oxbridge candidate but frightened of failure. I too had endured traumatic life events. My parents were trying to do their best but were heavily invested in my life. I ended up heading to medical school by their arranging.

What followed was a dramatic breakdown and a ten year career in psychiatric units. My recovery is ongoing and hard. I am changed as a person because of what I have been through. All hopes of a succesful career are long behind me.

Im not suggesting in any way that this is the trajectory for your daughter, not at all. I just want you to know that for me education and career options were almost irrelevant when my life started to fall apart. I needed love, compassion, validation of what I was feeling and therapy to help me heal. Please dont underestimate the gravity of mental distress. Your goals and aspirations for your daughter may have to be on hold if her priorities are different right now.

Wishing you both well.

Allie, the point isn't to give you a kicking and I'm sorry I've upset you. The point is to help you look at the situation in a way you obviously haven't before, in order to help your daughter, who is clearly not OK, your relationship with her, and the other children in your home.

If you know MN you know it is generally incredibly supportive of women in abusive relationships. I have posted under many different names on countless DV threads in an attempt to help women understand the cycle of abuse and persuade them to seek help from WA or similar. However - one thing MNers will invariably point out on DV threads involving children is that being exposed to emotional abuse as children has life long lasting effects on people and on the way they handle relationships. There are posters on here who state they do not have relationships with their mothers as adults because they blame them for not protecting them from the effects of DA as children. It is awful but true. Yes, the psychological effects of abuse on the victim are terrible and complex, and being in the grip of an abusive relationship is paralysing - but it doesn't lessen the effects on our children or remove our responsibility to protect them, or to help them heal afterwards.

I'm saying this because you have time to acknowledge this and do something about it while your dd is still living with you. Please help her find the right treatment, and please find something that helps you too.