Did we ruin daughter by spoiling

[Daringbear]

Hi,
First of all I'm going to be quite vulnerable and I know this is my own doing so please be nice, even if harsh.
My only daughter is 17, she is 18 at the start of August. She was an incredibly wanted child, my husband and I had been trying for 6 years, several miscarriages, failed IVF rounds, it was emotionally the hardest time of my life. When our daughter was born 5 weeks early, and so desperately wanted all we wanted to do was spoil her. We were 35 and 38 by the time she was born, we had 6 extra years of career advancement so were in a financially good place and could spoil her. We knew we wouldn't have more children so we really put it all into our girl. She was also 5 years younger than her closest in age cousin, of which she only has 3 and all boys, so being the only girl and youngest she was also massively spoilt by grandparents. My husband and I aren't massively social people, we had two close friends who were in similar positions and kids a little older. We live in a town where most people are comfortable financially, the house prices are much higher than the rest of the region, so all of daughters socialising have been with children similar to her.
She was also among the youngest in her year, I was terrified she would feel less than etc. so we pushed our financial limits for piano lessons, ballet, tennis, vocal coaching etc. The best schools in our area were state schools so there wasn't that but we did cripple ourselves financially to ensure she never had to struggle, tutors too from about year 5.
Now to the current point my daughter is due to start university in September and increasingly as I view her more and more as an adult I realise she isn't very likeable, she isn't lazy, she is always busy but never doing anything of worth, we told her to get a summer job, she looked for a day said they sounded boring and gave up, my husband still gives her, an allowance, refuses to stop and I find it impossible to be mad at her. So her summer has been spent shopping, enjoying the sun, playing sports, being with friends, going to the gym etc. nothing actually useful. She also has expensive taste and the only way I can describe it is she comes across snobby, she will talk down to me if she thinks my clothes are cheap etc.
She was very popular in school and sixth form, always had loads of friends and her reputation amongst them seems different than the girl I know. For the year book they got random people in the year to comment on the person and several of my daughters were about her being nice/friendly.
The other issue which is pretty new, she is a massive flirt!! She is very naturally pretty, tall, slim, blonde etc. and she is definitely not afraid to flaunt this. I hate it, she can come across very shallow. She will blatantly flirt with waiters etc. even Infront of me, it turns my stomach.
If I were to sum her up I'd use words like, smart, beautiful and eloquent but also shallow, snobby, stuck up and narcissistic. I hate that these are words I'd want to use.
My husband doesn't see it, still spoils her, has just bought her the most expensive tickets for Taylor Swift and a stupidly expensive laptop, whenever DD asks for money he hands it over, will never tell her off. Prides himself on being a cool dad etc.
I was talking to one of her friends mums when we were waiting to pick them up at the station and she asked if I could have a word with her as my daughter told her daughter she should work out more and she is going to get fat and that obviously upset her daughter. I spoke to my girl and she apologised but the fact she said it all horrifies me. My husband said he didn't see the issue.
I don't know what to do, I feel like I have failed and ruined her!! It was all done is pure love and wanting nothing but the best for her and now she isn't a nice person!!
AIBU to feel like I don't like her? If she wasn't my daughter I wouldn't want to be her friend. What do I do? Can I make this better?

Yes, I covered that. That behaviour works on high school kids.

It doesn’t wash with adults. They won’t entertain her.

What uni is she going to? Honestly I think quite a lot of privileged young people are quite shallow at that age. Once she’s been dumped a couple of times, had some jobs not work out etc I think real life will be enough to knock the edges off the youthful arrogance. Some kind of volunteering could be good.

I also reckon this young woman would give a very different perspective of events with her mother if this is true

It’s not ideal but it’s infinitely better than neglecting a child.

Oh she'll be fine OP. You've given her love and a strong sense of self worth. There are way worse things you could have done.

Just let her fly the nest and she'll grow up a lot. One day she'll realise how lucky she is and she will be grateful.

Maybe she will carefully pick friends and partners who suit her social standing so all will be fine

OP says she isn’t very likeable. If you don’t even like your own children you’ve gone very wrong somewhere. She also describes her as snobby and entitled, shallow, stuck up and narcissistic.

Parents not liking their teenage children (at least some of the time) is pretty normal, it's practically the default state of parenting a teenager.

I'm sure anyone who has parented a teenager knows what it's like to have a teenager who's a monster at home but delightful to everyone else. It's just part of the biological evolutionary process.

A lot of the OP's comments seem to be coming from a place best explored with a therapist (ie the perception of girls who gently explore their womanhood and changing relationship with the opposite sex as "shallow and narcissistic" when that's just normal teenage behaviour.)

All teenagers are obnoxious, lazy and self-interested and it means nothing about their character or what kind of person they'll be as an adult.

Flirting with waiters is no big deal. Pretty normal.

However, you and your husband are being ridiculous by continuing to indulge her and buy her expensive things when she refuses to get a summer job. Of course she's not going to get a summer job if she gets all the things she wants without working. If someone was buying me everything I wanted and giving me an 'allowance', I wouldn't work either. This is on you.

However, I knew plenty of girls with wealthy parents when I was a student/teen who had things bought for them but were not snobby about clothes, didn't look down at cheap things and weren't bitchy and shallow towards other girls by putting them down. So I think maybe it's more a matter of not passing down core values to your daughter rather than spoiling her materially. If I'd insisted on designer clothes and sneered at other people's things, that would have nipped in the bud pretty damn quickly and long before I was 17. I just wasn't brought up that way.

I wonder exactly why the OP says her daughter isn’t very likeable ? Despite the negative way she’s written about her DD, she seems to have a lot of positive traits.

I suspect the OP is feeling a little resentful, lost and rejected that her DD is becoming independent, creating her own life and heading off to Uni.

Would the OP prefer if her daughter had no friends and spent her summer sitting in her room by herself. A 17 yo spending one summer with friends, keeping fit, playing sport, some shopping, etc. isn’t heading down a path of self destruction.

I actually feel sorry for the girl, whose biggest issue is to deal with the unhealthy relationship with her own mother.

Distance and space will do her a world of good.

Some of these responses are odd! I was not spiteful or mean to my friends at 17, I would never have criticised their looks. And no way would I have out my mum down over her clothes. But I wasn’t a spoilt madam. Can we stop pretending all 17 year olds are like the OP’s daughter?!

OP, she will as others have said, learn the hard way. I have an acquaintance whose ds has had the corners rubbed of him at Uni, his first couple of terms in halls were very hard for him. He was spoilt and had a very high opinion of himself, and also a big gob! Let’s just say he’s learning to eat humble pie now.

She sounds normal to me, a pretty privileged 17 year old girl with older drippy parents.

I would be most worried that because daddy can’t say no she will go out into the world and exit her little cosseted bubble and not have the life experience to handle tricky situations.

Her dad is the issue as far as I can tell specifically because you don’t have a similar value system for how to parent her.

The only thing cited in the OP is one instance of the girl being a bit off with one other girl.

Apart from that, she likes designer stuff, she doesn’t want to have a summer job (I don’t blame her) and she flirts.

That’s IT. She’s narcissistic on that basis?

I bet no one calls Elton John's kids spoilt. Or David Beckham's.

She's lucky enough to be the only child of well off and indulgent parents. She's pretty, intelligent and likeable. She likely won't get her "comeuppance" at uni as much as some posters would like this to happen; she'll fall in with a crowd of similar girls from similar backgrounds and have the time of her life, meet a wealthy boyfriend and do well in life.

I think posters have been watching too many Lindsay Logan films.

And as others have pointed out, the person she is at 17, isn't the person she'll be in 10 years time.

She is very naturally pretty, tall, slim, blonde etc. and she is definitely not afraid to flaunt this. I hate it, she can come across very shallow.

FFS, you want her to live hidden away? If you can't make the most of being young and slim when you are .. young and slim, when can you!

Why do you resent your own daughter's looks? It's weird.

You need to reread the OP again. She literally calls her narcissistic and every other comment I mentioned in my post.

All teens say and do stupid things and can be very self-absorbed, but she sounds mean and unpleasant with it.

I'm sure everyone did want to be her friend at school, since kids are easily impressed by material possessions and looks. That doesn't mean she was necessarily much of a friend to anyone.

Still, half of our leadimg politicians seem to be self-important, entitled bullies, so maybe she has a bright career ahead after all!

I agree. She seems perfectly well equipped for adult life and will probably have the time of her life at university.

Yeah that's because she IS a high school kid.

She's not just suddenly going to get pitched into a world where she only interacts with adults who are weirdly expecting a 17yr old to act like a 30-something.

She'll have a good three years at least ahead of her of being a uni student and mainly interacting with other teenage/early 20-something peers (or professors and other uni staff who are used to dealing with teenagers). And she'll naturally mature and change over those years anyway, because everyone does.

If she works during uni or during uni holidays (which hopefully she will), that will give her experience of the working world but most employers understand that college students are young and inexperienced and don't expect the same from a teenage student worker as they would from an adult in full-time employment.

Who knows what kind of person she'll be by the time she finishes uni and is ready to enter the adult world.

Yes I know she does

Why?

wow, projecting much?

All that about from a 17 year old who is an average teen, but a bit on the spoilt side?

I may have misread but I think that's the point PP is making.

Quite

She sounds absolutely fine! Of course she’d rather spend her summer enjoying the sun and working out and seeing her friends. She’s 17! Hardly the crime of the century. She has her whole life to be ground down by work - let her enjoy her life if you’re able to support her!

yes at uni she’ll see more variety of the world and that’s no bad thing but honestly she sounds fine to me and her peers obviously see a kind friendly popular girl.

You didn’t misread. I have no idea what this girl is doing that’s so terrible. I’ll risk deletion and admit I think it’s a reverse or made up, but the responses aren’t and the number of people just dying to see a nice looking teenager have a terrible time is a bit worrying!