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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To think my friend's daughter is an adult who should be able to cope with this?

49 replies

user1485342611 · 21/04/2017 09:28

My friend's daughter is nearly 23. She was meant to go on holidays this Summer with a few friends, but one dropped out to go on holidays with her family, another decided to work abroad for the Summer and the whole thing got a bit messy and ended up being cancelled.

Disappointing obviously, but my friend is reacting as if her daughter has been through some major trauma. She and her DH have now altered their own holiday plans so they can do something that includes dd, and she's constantly talking about how this has had such a bad effect of DD's morale, she's learnt such a terrible lesson about people letting you down, she hopes she'll be able to move on etc etc.

AIBU to think this is way OTT. Her daughter is an outgoing, confident girl and should surely be able to cope with a minor setback like this. We've all had holiday plans fall through, or a friend let us down. It's just life, get over it, surely?

OP posts:

user1491572121 · 21/04/2017 09:30

Well perhaps she's got anxiety or depression that you're not aware of. Perhaps she was bullied in school and really feels rejection?

YABU to care enough to post on here about it really. You just seem a bit petty.

wobblywonderwoman · 21/04/2017 09:31

Is the daughters holiday a one or two week job.. Total overreaction and the mother is feeding into it

If it were a long term working holiday then I could understand the upset as it is the type to thing you only get the option a few times in your life

Original poster

user1485342611 · 21/04/2017 09:32

It was just for a few weeks. She's finishing up at College shortly and will be job seeking soon.

No, she hasn't go anxiety or depression. Her mum would have mentioned it.

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corythatwas · 21/04/2017 09:33

Probably. Though do you know from inside that the dd is such a confident outgoing person as she seems?

That is what my dd looks like from the outside. On the inside she has been battling depression and severe anxiety for years and though I wouldn't go nattering about it to friends this is exactly the kind of thing that could trigger an attack. She still has to go on with life.

BoneyBackJefferson · 21/04/2017 09:34

Are you sure that its not just her mother making a drama out of it?

StringyPotatoes · 21/04/2017 09:34

I think you're right about her being an adult who should be able to handle the disappointment. It was just a lovely idea that didn't quite work out and nothing more.

But I wouldn't let the parents reaction colour your perception of the daughter. At that age I could well see myself initially getting upset and lamenting my lost holiday before quickly moving on. My mum, however would probably move Heaven and earth to make sure I got some sort of holiday and say the type of things you mention to her friends (I hop she can move on, what a lesson to learn etc) whilst I'm sat at home shrugging my shoulders and making new summer plans!

Original poster

user1485342611 · 21/04/2017 09:35

Hi Cory

Yes, I'm pretty sure this girl isn't battling any unusual levels of worry or anything like that. I can totally understand her being a bit upset and pissed off. It's her mum's reaction I find a bit OTT. I would have thought a bit of sympathy and then leave it at that, but she seems to be almost as upset as her daughter (who has lots of friends, and a busy social life).

OP posts:

Osolea · 21/04/2017 09:35

The dd could be absolutely fine and it's just your friend over reacting about it.

corythatwas · 21/04/2017 09:38

In that case, may well be the mother who is creating the drama and daughter is totally oblivious. Or daughter has vented to mother- as you do- and mother can't distinguish between momentary rant and longterm issue.

Chavelita · 21/04/2017 09:41

What Osolea said. My mother, a shy, socially-anxious woman who has never understood why she has no friends after a lifetime of rushing around doing things for people, was never able to understand that her adult children weren't her, and that what she would have interpreted as some cataclysmic rejection was shrugged off as a minor inconvenience by her socially-confident daughters. In this situation, she would see the daughter as her own mirror, the put-upon eternal victim, and rush about over-reacting.

Chavelita · 21/04/2017 09:43

X-post with cory. Again, that's my mother. I learned very early in my teens that a momentary complaint about something or someone that I promptly forgot about wasvturned by her into a major issue that she brooded over and worried about for weeks.

Boulshired · 21/04/2017 09:48

This happened to me at 21 and I was extremely pissed off about it. Mine was for three weeks at a time I could of easily filled up with other events but by the time it fell through others had booked holidays / festivals that I would have joined if I had known I had been free. It taught me a lesson but left me with a crap summer.

Badbadbunny · 21/04/2017 09:49

Sounds like the mother is super-imposing her own feelings onto her daughter. My sister does exactly the same. Whenever something minor happens to her daughter, it's the mother who massively over-reacts, goes into major panic mode, way over the top with sympathy etc. All it does is make the daughter worse where she'd probably just shrug it off and get on with things otherwise. Whenever she's not with her mother, she's resilient and can cope when things go wrong, but whenever her mother is around, she's a gibberick wreck!

nothercupoftea · 21/04/2017 09:53

she's nearly 23? good grief, she is an adult, not an 8 year old! Her mother really need to get a hobby or something, and stop being over-involved in her child's life. Being that ridiculously dramatic will put everyone off.
Don't tell me that this girl hasn't been dumped at least once at her age...

Original poster

user1485342611 · 21/04/2017 10:12

The things is, my friend is normally very chilled about her children. They're both well adjusted adults with healthy social lives. My friend herself works as a teacher, is into keep fit and has a good social life.

She just seems really incensed over this, and is constantly bringing it into the conversation. She actually mentioned casually, in the middle of one such conversation, that her son had moved into a flat several months ago. It has slipped her mind to tell me, but I was given chapter and verse about the failed holiday plans.

I think she's just shocked that her daughter, for whom everything - academic success, sporting ability, friendships - has always come easy, has now had a setback to deal with. But I really have to bite my tongue at times to stop myself from saying 'For God's sake. It's not a big deal. Can we talk about something else".

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FeliciaJollygoodfellow · 21/04/2017 10:18

Oh FFS.

YANBU OP. This warrants nothing more than probably many rants and ravings from the daughter and maybe an invitation to go with her parents.
I don't doubt she's pissed off but seriously? Indulging this is no good for anyone.

She might be pissed off but it's hardly a setback of any kind to have a holiday cancelled!

GwenStaceyRocks · 21/04/2017 10:22

If your friend is usually a chilled mum, then I'd think there are some issues going on either at home (that are making them all more stressed than usual) or with her DD's friendship group.
FWIW I'd be annoyed if I'd booked a holiday with friends and they ended up cancelling.
I'd also feel annoyed (as a mum) if I felt I had to change my holiday plans to include DD because she had flaky friends.
Perhaps your friend was looking forward to a break with her DD and now feels both guilty and annoyed at the changes.

Original poster

user1485342611 · 21/04/2017 10:25

True Gwen. But I don't really understand why a mother would feel obliged to change her holiday plans to include an adult daughter whose plans have fallen through. Holiday plans fall through all of the time, and this girl has not been deprived of holidays over the years. It's one Summer where she might not get to go abroad with her friends. Hardly a major trauma or tragedy. Sometimes I think you need to let your adult children just suck stuff up, instead of trying to protect them from every disappointment.

OP posts:

GwenStaceyRocks · 21/04/2017 10:32

I agree, you can't protect them from every disappointment. Maybe your friend is struggling to cut the apron strings. If she mentions it again, just make sympathetic noises and change the subject

user1492767068 · 21/04/2017 10:35

May ne she is just over thinking. After all, she is the mother. She should get better with time.

Batgirlspants · 21/04/2017 10:36

No you can't protect them and she shouldn't be going on about it but changing her plans to include her dd is something we would do in a heartbeat.

However our 18 year old dd has PTSD a fact we don't always choose to share with even close friends. You never know op.

0live · 21/04/2017 10:40

You are supposed to be her friend, just let her rant at you a bit. That's what friends are for.

AlternativeTentacle · 21/04/2017 10:47

One dropped out. Surely they could have just absorbed the cost or invited someone else on the trip?

NancyWake · 21/04/2017 10:54

She sounds like my mum's bff who is constantly making dramas out of minor mishaps of her (adult) children.

Original poster

user1485342611 · 21/04/2017 10:55

I think it was two dropped out and, as they were the common links between the rest of the girls the whole thing fell through. I don't think there was any nastiness or anything like that. The girls who dropped out were a big thoughtless, but there doesn't seem to have been anything personal in it. And I think there was just a sort of common reluctance between the remaining three - who weren't that close - to go ahead with the holiday without the other two there.

Just one of those things really. I've seen it happen so many times, but I've never seen parents get involved or try to compensate by re-arranging their own holidays. As I said, we're talking about an adult in her twenties, not a child.

OP posts:

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