To think daughter is ungrateful/expects too much

[Pompom42]

Have a teenage daughter she's 13.
She currently shares a bedroom with her younger sister. The younger sister is 3 but isn't really sleeping in there atm she still sleeps in my room with me.
We have a 2 bed bungalow which is not tiny but not large either. But we are all on the one floor so I appreciate we do get in each other's way at times.
Just recently she keeps saying to me "wish I didn't have to share a room with my sister".
Whilst it isn't ideal as I said youngest isn't sleeping in there. It's a nice room and was all decorated and new beds etc 2 years ago.
Now she's started saying "this house is tiny, when can we move?"
"All my friends houses are bigger, this house is really really tiny compared to theres"
I've said to her tonight I can't afford anything else. We live in a naice area and at the time it was this house or nothing. We have a drive and a garden and it's in a pretty village.
For some reason it's made me feel really upset. AIBU in thinking she's spoilt? Or is this normal teenage behaviour?
What about years ago when you had families of 6 children all living in a 3 bed house.
What can I say to her?

If the 3 year old is in with you and will stay there when she's 4,5,6,7 etc then there's no issue. Her sister just has clothes in her room and that's it. To all intents and purposes it's your older DD's room. It's if they ever have to ACTUALLY share that there'll be a problem.

You did actively choose a house that you knew would mean your DC sharing. And you do seem to splash cash around unnecessarily. Show your DD what things cost and the choices that have to be made and see if you have similar priorities. Might be interesting!

augustboymummy17
Yes it's an affluent area too. Lot of families have very well paid jobs.
Not everyone's house is bigger just differently set out.

whiteroseredrose

Splashing cash around unnecessarily?
I don't drink or smoke.
Don't you ever go on holiday then?

She doesn't need a room to study just separate area.
I work till 7.30 couple nights week, she can use that time to study from when she gets home at 4

Sorry OP but you are seriously underestimating the amount of studying that she is going to be doing if you have any ambitions for her to get decent GCSE's. Believe me, several of my children have done theirs and 3 hours every other day wont cut it. Would you not consider a heated shed as a den for her? If she is home at 4pm and you aren't home until 7.30pm then am I right to assume she will be looking after the younger one then? in which case how does that work with studying.

mummymeister

Why assume that?
3 year old is with childminder
I'm working all day not just from 4-7.30
Please don't assume it's not helpful

mummymeister

I did do GCSEs myself

Pompom42 - at least 13 years ago and things have changed since then. look, I have read your posts.

You aren't willing to compromise. you think that she should just suck it up and get on with it. I get that. you are the parent, that's your choice. I, and others, have made some helpful suggestions that you could consider or try but you choose to respond to one bit of my post and not the other about getting a shed den for her.

so carry on as you are then.

I and lots of other posters have had 15,16, 17 and 18 year olds in the house with all the issues that this brings. you haven't. I was just trying to give you the benefit of my experience. its an internet forum you can take it or leave it.

People are being hard on the Op. it's hard to be a single parent. IMHO if you want to study, you'll find a place. I had a lovely bedroom but would study in the dining room.

OP, with all respect:

You seem to be looking for affirmation rather than opinions. This is fine, and understandable.

But as frustrated as you are, it might be worth listening to (some) of the posters who have expressed a sympathy for your daughter. I would personally ignore those who tell you to move into the living room or castigate you for having children--those aren't reasonable solutions/helpful comments. But it costs nothing, in terms of money or logistics, to listen to your daughter and to empathize with her situation.

It sounds to me that she doesn't have a real sense of how money works (average wage, house costs, bills); that you live in an affluent area meaning that many of her friends have very different circumstances; that she's dealing with both adolescence and the adjustment of no longer being an only child (as well as whatever life event caused you to move from the 3 bedroom); and that she's also 13, an age of solipsism and a desire for privacy.

People who point all/any of this out don't need to be shouted downthey have a perspective that might be useful for you. Probably the answer to it is that you just cope, but that you try to empathize rather than getting frustrated with her. Again, she's not being spoiler or unusualshe's being entirely normal for her age, her culture, her location, and her peers.

Walkingdeadfangirl

You only use your bedroom to sleep because you use your living room to relax, a teenager only has one refuge.

Why do you keep going on about the living room being OP’s personal space? In every house I’ve ever known the living room has been the communal space that everyone shares. OP deserves privacy as much as her thirteen year old does.

MissEliza - but the OP doesn't have a dining room. she has one room downstairs and a kitchen and 2 bedrooms one of which the eldest is supposed to share. so where will she study? in the kitchen? in the bathroom? I agree, kids will find a place to study if there is one and that's why I suggested the shed den and others have suggested curtains and all sorts of other stuff.

Sorry op I hate to pile on but your priorities do sound a bit back to front. You are living in a house that was too small from the day you moved into it. I lived in a one bedroom with a baby for more than a year so I completely understand the restriction of finances but you've pretty much said you don't think massively in advance. You don't have any plan other than your older daughter sharing with a much younger sibling until she leaves home yet you've splashed out £1000 on bespoke bunkbeds (not even being used by both kids) and you go on multiple holidays per year and you've just paid £120 for a 13 year old who is still growing. You really need to consider what the long term needs of your family are and plan for them

I still don't understand why it isn't possible to do a loft extension. It can't be the cost because the OP has lots of extras. I've not seen a bungalow near where I live - and there are plenty - that cannot be extended. Yes it's a pain while it's being done but if you have decent builders and a fixed time limit, it's worth it.

If that really is impossible you just have to get on with things as they are. Not nice for the teenager though.

Agree Nancy. the Op just wants us to agree which is fine. but I hope she remembers this thread in 3 years time.

Is your lounge bigger than the large bedroom? Could you possibly split lounge to make 2 smaller rooms and then use the bedroom as the lounge? X

mummymeister I have a shed but not for her use.
Sorry I didn't find your comments helpful but thanks

mummymeister there's no downstairs it's a bungalow as mentioned

augustboymummy17
The lounge is small but good idea

Pompom42, sorry I didn't agree with you. Perhaps your AIBU should have been

To think daughter is ungrateful/expects too much and only people who agree with me should reply.

would have made it much easier.

You could explain to her what your house costs, get a copy of the local paper with property listings, and show her how the whole house size/area nice-ness trade-off works.

Like, look, sure, we could move to a bigger house. Except we would have to live in a not-very-nice area, probably no garden, you would have to change schools, I would have a longer commute so you would have to take on more household chores to make up for the things that I would no longer have time to take care of....

Your daughter is not being malicious, but she probably has little knowledge of how this kind of thing works and does not understand that you can't just magic a bigger house from somewhere.

As for the suggestion that the parent should sleep on a sofa bed in the living room, I don't know whether to laugh or cry. How ridiculous! Sharing a room might not be ideal but needs must and it's hardly uncommon.

I am aware that the following story will make me sound like the Yorkshireman in the Monty Python sketch, but when I was a child we had a 3-bedroom council house. All good, as just two children so my brother and I had a bedroom each.

Opposite us, however, lived a family with 12 children in exactly the same size house as us (in the days before the local authority was expected to provide a suitable house for the size of the family). Lovely family, little money to spare but everyone was fed and clothed. No idea what the sleeping arrangements were (although the houses did have a dining room so perhaps that was the answer to all their problems) but they had to manage, which they seemed to do with good grace. I know they are a close family still so obviously don't fit the pattern of those on here who have harboured a lifetime of resentment because they had to share a room as a child.

You don't have to be overly perceptive to realise that OP has hinted at a traumatic life event which has caused her present circumstances, so all those buffoons saying "why have children if you can't provide them with a bedroom each", "why not just build an extension" and the like, need to try to have a bit more empathy.

Equally it wouldn't hurt for OP to have a discussion with her DD about the (financial) facts of life so DD knows that she is not unsympathetic to her feelings. A 13 year old is not too young to understand that for most families £5000 per month on rent is a lot of money!

twatty

This house is too small but I didn't have any other choice.
Don't want to say too much. I'm not poor but can't move.

hmmm doing it again pompom. picking on something you can have a go about and focussing on that not on the helpful or attempt at helpful advice. I know its a bungalow. where did I say the word upstairs?

but just ignore me and my opinions. come back in 3 years time and let us know how its all going along then perhaps.

PomPom (replying to your not understanding me)......

you said that your dd was looking on Rightmove at a property that would be £5K to rent, I just meant that you could explain the single maths to her. So, to replace your 2 bed with a 3 bed would cost you an extra £100000 to buy or an extra £300 pm in rent (obviously I've just plucked those figures out of thin air - you could do a quick shufty on line to get some actual figures), then show her what that would mean you'd lose (in terms of holidays, clothes you buy her, other things you do that she likes), for how many years, to be able to pay for the extra bedroom.

My dc occasionally used to stick their bottom lip out when I couldn't get to their assemblies or sports days etc due to being out at work. I said that I potentially could not WOTH, but they wouldn't be able to have a house with as many rooms as we did, nor to go on holiday, nor to go to music lesson, nor swimming lessons, nor go on cub camp, etc.,etc.,etc. Even much younger than your dc, they were able to see that me missing an assembly wasn't that bad after all. It's the same sort of thing "If I took on an extra mortgage / paid extra rent, then we would have to use all the money that pays for {insert the things she likes} to then put towards the new housing costs.

It's like giving them their own pocket money, they have to make choices, and then decide that whatever it is they wanted you to spend £££ on, wasn't so necessary when they are spending their own cash.

Mummymeister
You said "she has one room downstairs"