To think paying my daughters debts enables her

[Rowinandgowin]

recently my daughter had two friends come to me and tell me she had borrowed a substantial amount of money off them each, she started ignoring them and reached out to me to talk to her. This was a few months apart and I’m really disappointed. Another friend had mentioned they had lent her money and never got it back.

i feel really upset, my daughter is quite vulnerable, she doesn’t work, she had two kids very closely together, two under two. Her childrens father left her with a huge rent to pay and I have spent a lot of money on sorting her out each month as she can’t make ends meet. I would love to have her back home but I have no space. Now she is borrowing money off friends that I have had to pay back, I’ve spoken to her in tears as I fear she will end up even lonelier. I suppose I paid up to try to mend things but these friends want nothing to do with her. I feel so sad as she wouldn’t apologise to them and it’s like she is self sabotaging

This is where you put your foot down, all you are doing is enabling her, as other have said and it is obviously affecting you emotionally. First of all, go through her finances with her. If the rent is too much then she needs to move to a smaller place. If her car is too expensive then she needs to get a smaller cheaper one. DD also needs to get a job to help with her finances, I assume that she's receiving maintenance from her hubby. And, she's broke and goes on holiday? What an insult, holidays are not a right, they are a luxury. When my kids were little and we struggled, I never once asked family for help. We bought some clothes from a cheap place and others from a charity shop, we got toys there too. And, no, we didn't go on holiday. I cooked cheaper food. As for the uni loan, that is a form of theft. She will have to pay it back, it doesn't vanish. If she does go to uni then what is she going to do with her kids and, no, they are NOT your responsibility. As for being vulnerable, yes, depression is awful but she should be on medication and referred for counselling. A lot of people suffer from depression as well as anxiety and manage a normal life. We have been through this with my younger son so I know how you feel. But you are not helping DD by bailing her out and you are not helping yourself either. Good luck and stay firm.

I think the phrase you are looking for here is 'tough shit' love...

Can't afford nails? Tough shit
Can't afford holidays? Tough shit

She isn't 'used to a certain lifestyle'... She is an adult acting like an entitled spoiled brat

Single parent here in full time university

Haven't had my hair cut in three years. Haven't had a holiday in 10. Paint my nails with £6 nail varnish

Not saying that you should be happy just scraping by, but there is a world of difference between living within your means and being on the verge of poverty

She is neither.
A student loan is enough to get by reasonable on. I do it ok and manage and still put my son in clubs etc and pay for classes and days out

She's letting you feel guilted into proboding a lifestyle she's not willing to fund herself

If she that badly needs hair and nail then she needs to be working more or cutting back somewhere else

No sympathy I'm afraid from someone who sees real people *actually struggling

If youre daughter doesn't want to be embarrassed in public then don't do anything that would be embarrassing if it was publicly known/seen. Simple.
Also, stop enabling her.
Support her in regards to getting financial counselling, professional budgeting advice etc. But do NOT pay her bills, debts or puck up the financial slack.
Imo the only thing financial I would be doing is maybe school excursions etc for the children so they aren't penalised socially because of their mother.

It's not up to you to fix her problems - it's up to her. You are enabling her by digging her out of holes of her own making every time. She has come to expect that you will always do this. You should insist that she apologises to her former friends. At least others have been warned (even though you might not like the way it was done) as this will end up saving you more bailing out situations.

If she's had a holiday and has an expensive car, she's not struggling. She might be struggling to manage her finances, but she's not struggling. The friends who 'loaned' her money may have left themselves short to help her, and she doesn't seem to be at all bothered about that. Tough love is the answer. If you always bail her out, what happens if the time comes when you can no longer do so?

That's terrible @ justcallmebebes.
You must stop paying for her and tell her everything everybody has said. That's the only way I'm afraid.

Don’t bail her out again we did that with our son and we are in debt Loan sharks target these people Use social services but they are stretched Our social worker discharged our son (just attempted suicide )being targeted by people who steal all his food drink tobacco and he’s frightened to call the police as they will beat him up She’s got to take responsibility you won’t be around for ever and whose looking after her children

The only thing she’s struggling with is how to cut out luxuries she can’t afford and manage that money on what she does need to pay for, like food and shelter for her children. She needs to stop being bailed out so she learns where her priorities should lie.
food for children is essential. Holidays, fancy cars, hair and nails is not.

And her friend had every right to expose her on social media after 5 months of asking for her money back and being completely ignored by your daughter. Hopefully that has stopped her being able to scan any of her other friends.

She needs to learn to cut the cloth. Sell the car and buy a cheap runaround.

Paying for her isn't helping her....teaching her to be responsible and supporting her wish to earn money is helping her.
Tell her you love her and that is why you have got to help her get out of this cycle.
It will only get worsesoending someone else's money on frivolous things is far easier... it's proven.
So support her (emotionally and psychologically) with her uni wish. Be interested. Be there to say she can do it when it gets tough. Show her you believe in her.
That will help her...paying for her will tell her she needs you to live her life. Not what she needs to hear at this age

Some people are being pretty harsh here. I’m sure it’s so hard to watch your daughter behave like this.

I also agree a serious conversation is needed, and the bank of mum should shut.

Ill add we’re also in a bad financial predicament at the moment. Trying to sell our house to cover our bills. I am sure people judge some of the things we haven’t dropped, but I have a mental health condition myself, and a really difficult job (which pays terribly) so am taking it step by step. And sometimes things take time. Like getting a new job or selling the house. I have a spreadsheet out every day trying to resolve things. So maybe people could be a bit kinder.

Id be mad too if I loaned a friend money and she went on holiday. But sometimes people need a holiday. But once she is on her own two feet - sounds like she’ll figure out how to get there.

x

She’s massively using you and her friends, I wouldn’t be bailing her out no way Jose, how is she going to learn everyone needs to stop giving into her.

I consider that you are being cruel to her by treating her like a baby crying to mummy because all her friends are nasty to her. Tell her to grow up. Transactional analysis is adult to adult not at her age child to parent ffs.

Now she is borrowing money off friends that I have had to pay back
No you don't.

I suppose I paid up to try to mend things but these friends want nothing to do with her.
Of course they don't. She took their money, didn;t repay, then avoided them.
Getting that money back from you instead doesn't make DD's behaviour to them any different, does it?

Well she just has got back off holiday! She has decided to go to uni so she’s spent her loan on that. She will splash out for silly stuff then come to me to pay her debts, or help pay for her expensive car. It’s so hard to see her struggle though
You are mistaking "struggling" for "taking the piss".
You've taught her that she can do exactly as she pleases & mummy will pick up the tab.
Can she even return her expensive car, or has she tied herself into a finance agreement, knowing that you'll pay when she can't?
Next time she asks you for money, tell her no, & explain that if she can afford holidays she doesn't need help. And ask her why she can't get a job?

Think you might ace used the word vulnerable when you meant manipulative!

Old enough to breed, old enough to sort her own problems out. Stop being a martyr and let her grow up and learn.

You are enabling her!! Sit her down and tell her that you will not be paying any more debts etc. You MIGHT want to get her to a point of zero debt first (depending on amount) then tell her she is now going to have work out how to manage on her money and if she can't afford something she can't have it. Tell her that if any more friends speak to you, you will NOT be paying her debts and she could end up in big trouble if someone takes her to the small claims court. The only way to help her is to be cruel to be kind in my view, but I do understand how hard that will be.

But you do know that you ARE enabling, or you wouldn't have asked the question

You, her mother, are enabling her to live that lifestyle so don't expect much sympathy on here.
If she was working and still couldn't make ends meet and didn't have a pricey car and holidays, I'd understand you helping out. As it is, you're just endorsing her actions.
She's old enough to have two children so let her manage her own money and debts. Tell friend that you're not her bank or guarantor and they'll have to talk to her about the debts. Remind them to never lend her anything ever again.

Who is going to look after the children whose she goes to uni for the next 3 years and will it realistically enable her to get a job...or will it end up being a 3 year jolly?

• when she goes, not whose.

My parents once bailed me out of $40k debt. And guess what? I did it again straight away and racked up another $40k+!! No way was I going cap in hand to my parents again - it's only since I've grown up that I've realised how much they sacrificed to come up with the original $40k and it makes me disgusted with myself every time I think of it. Anyway, back in debt again, I chose to go bankrupt. Because it was unsecured debt and I didn't own anything in my name that was worth enough for the Trustee to take, it didn't really affect that side of my life. But it affected travel (your passport gets taken) and a whole bunch of other stuff that certainly curtailed my lifestyle for the three years I was under the Trustee. I won't say it was humiliating, but it was pretty sobering. But the experience has taught me a lot and I've gone on to have a really good life. I've completely changed the way I deal with money and I've made good financial decisions post-bankrupcy.

Going bankrupt really did save me in a lot of ways. It gave me structure and taught me how to handle money - I wouldn't dream of not paying a bill or being late to pay, now. It stopped me from financially abusing my parents and also gave me self esteem to be able to survive on my own and take pride in the things that I saved for (house etc.).

Your daughter needs an equally hard lesson, OP.

sadly, you continually bailing her out has taught her that you will keep doing it so she has never learned any accountability. I know she's your daughter and all but it sounds like it's about time you teach her some hard lessons that she shouldve learned when she was young. Her expensive car needs to go. She needs to stop "going on holidays" if she has to borrow money from now, ex-friends to make ends meet. and teh fact that is making no effort to pay them back, "money she stole from them", although harsh, is more accurate. She needs to adjust her expectations and lifestyle to what she can afford and you DEFINITELY need to stop paying for her mistakes.

Yes, stop paying her debts! Similar situation with my dd- spending her wages/UC all in one day, then not able to cover her phone bill. Her Nan paid her credit card off twice. Asking for money for fuel, couldn't pay her car insurance so her Nan did.....
Never paid any of it back. This month she spent over £500 in a day, then had to ask her boyfriend for money to help pay her phone bill. She has no money until next week and keeps asking me.
I've now put my foot down with her Nan, and told her to stop bailing her out ( she never gives me any money or my son!), and with her boyfriend. And I've told her no more. I'm self employed, have lost a small amount of work recently and with everything else going up, I'm not prepared to go without stuff for myself to enable her. She asked me for money yesterday and I said no, and not to ask again. It's tough, but if we keep bailing them out, then they're never going to learn.

You're not helping her by paying her debts. She's a mother, so needs to buckle down and behave like one!

If I were you, I'd back off and let her get on with her life. She's by the sound of things, living way beyond her means. Just chill down and keep an eye on things.

You keep saying she's struggling, then you say she has an expensive car and squanders her own money and everyone else's. She's not struggling. She's just not taking responsibility, and why would she when she can use her friends and get her mother to sort her mess out? Yes, you are enabling her by bailing her out. She isn't learning to stop treating her friends like crap or to be more responsible with money if you keep bailing her out. This isn't genuine struggle. It's self inflicted. Let her sell her car or return it and use the payments she'll save on finance to pay back the money she owes everyone and then she might behave a bit more responsibly when she has to make sacrifices to sort her own mess out. She can't spend the rest of her life treating everyone else around her as if they are responsible for sorting her mess out.

My mom used to pay off all my sisters debts (ie if she went on holiday she would put everything - meals, drinks, clothes, shoes, jewellery etc on my cousins credit card which my mom would then pay off). She never learned to budget and managed to wrack up £20k of debt whilst working and living rent free in London. She will be 50 next year and lives at home with my mom with no savings but wardrobes full of clothes and shoes. She’s completely incapable of taking care of herself and my mom is so worried about what will happen when she dies.

Does your mum acknowledge her role is raising a grown woman who is incapable of looking after herself @BoobooMogooboo?
It really is very sad, for all involved.
@Rowinandgowin - I hope this thread has given you some food for thought. At least you now seem to be willing to address the issue, rather than waiting until your DD is in her 50s & living in your spare room, with no ability to manage her own finances.