AIBU dd(17f) keeps trying to sabotage my relationships

[Doucebelle]

sorry. First time posting but I could really use some outside opinion here.

My daughter seems to hold the opinion that because I had children I am not permitted to have relationships. She was so confrontational and rude to my previous partner (7 year relationship) that it ended up with him moving out because I couldn’t cope being in the middle of the war zone all of the time. That wasn’t a great relationship for different reasons and it did finish about a year after that but I don’t think that is the point.

I now have a new relationship, over 18m, and while I used to only see him once a week when she went to her father’s, he will now come round once in the week too. We also just went away together for four days. She is now being openly rude to him whenever he is here and pointedly leaving the room when he comes in and I have challenged her on this. Her retort is always that I deserve this behaviour for dating when I have children. I have tried telling her she is being unfair to me but maybe I am being unfair to her? I really think I am trying to put her needs as a priority (otherwise my current partner would be living here too) and I am at my wits end.

Note she is normally a very good teenager. Very sensible, diligent at school, sporty, doesn’t go out wearing zero clothes so I can’t complain too much but I just don’t know what to do.

thanks

I think she's wrong to expect you not to date (after all she will be your 'child' for the rest of your life) but I have some sympathy for her having to live with your previous partner from a young age into her teens. Teenagers can be unreasonable towards their biological parents and she may have sensed your dissatisfaction with the relationship. How would you feel if she had a boyfriend and wanted him to stay over a couple of nights each week?

Well, yanbu to have a relationship.
She is clearly struggling with it and needs some support to work through it or nothing will change.

Both DH and I have seen friends and family where kids have been subject to new partners and new homes and new rules, new siblings etc. it's made us both say that if we ever were to split (touch wood, not looking likely) we would never move a new person into DDs home(s). She will always be the priority.

I look at it like this. Someone has to be incredibly special to me to even consider allowing them access to my space. So why would I put someone into her space?

Have a relationship. Just don't force your partners into your DDs life. She's making it clear she's not comfortable with it.

@Doucebelle I do not know what planet some of these posters are on. At a guess mostly have yet to experience older teenagers, or infantilise their own late teens.

I have two adult children both emotionally and financially good.

17 is an age where they are just emerging from pubescent behaviour, and learning how to be an adult.

So sulky rude behaviour is about hanging/clinging on to childhood rights.

She is off to university and would like her “home” to stay the same, no man in it.

So she is trying to guard territory, for the odd occasion that she may deign you with her presence in the holidays.

This is a period of developing a concept of separating from each other you will go your way and she will go hers.

So if i were you i would be saying, your home, my house. If any guest visits you WILL be polite to them, oh and it will not be long before he sleeps over.

Get a grip. Three years is not "quite quick". The OPs daughter sounds like a bratty little madam, and needs to wind her neck in. I suspect that she is projecting resentment towards her dad onto you and your OH, but that doesn't give her a free pass to be rude.

I pay for my own home and no snotty child would be dictating to me how I live in it.

just wait a couple of years until she's out of the house. Not unreasonable of her to not want her mum to be in a bad relationship and also not unreasonable of her to not want new men staying in her home. If you do really want a relationship, just go on dates with them. They don't need to stay over in the house you share with your daughter.

Do you have snotty children of your own?

Around 4 years old, her dad leaves.

7 years old, unrelated bloke moves in

Moves out when she's 14 due to it being a bad relationship.

Please remember how vulnerable an aged 14 year old girl is at this point in her life.

Seen her mum being treated badly by her 2 supposedly main male role models.

Then she gets her mum back for a bit, mum gets a fella and daughter is extremely worried history is going to repeat itself.

I mean, I can definitely see where she is coming from and I can see why she is very wary of the men you choose. Up to now, they seem to have let you both down.

She's probably wondering why you're doing this to her (and yourself) again.

Yes, of course everyone is entitled to a love life, but you must understand why she is wary.

I'm surprised at some pp's responses. As others have said, she was a little girl when her parents split up and a new man moved in, which by op's own admission wasn't great, followed by another. Op absolutely has a right to date and have a life, but a child also has a right to a safe home with a parent who prioritises them. Maybe she now feels she can state her case. I don't think she's being a brat, I think she's possibly feeling pushed out or overlooked or maybe the men were genuinely twats. It's her home too, she has a right to an opinion.

I think it’s tough for her.

From her point of view her family has been broken up and she has had no say in that and no control over the circumstances of her life.

Then she has to accept an unknown man to live in her home. Do you allow your boyfriends to have any kind of parental role or influence? Does she feel uncomfortable as a young woman in close contact with an unknown - to her - man? Has she had to change familiar because of the presence of an adult man who is not her father or brother in her home?

Yes you have the right to a life, and I’m sure your boyfriend is respectful (although it might be worth checking with her about that) but if you look at it from your DD’s point of view the situation might look very different.

it was just not great in lots of ways that she would have known little if anything about.

But children do pick up things. She may not have known exactly what was wrong but she may have sensed something was off.

And that can be uncomfortable in your own home and having little power or agency to change things or feel secure.

Like it or not, neither of these men are her family, but they’re in her family home. You’re in the relationship but she isn’t IYSWIM.

I agree with @YourPithyLilacSheep . In her quite short life she has seen you in three different relationships where two haven't worked out. She has already had to share her home with one man who she didn't like. She hasn't had a say in any of this and she is trying her hardest to retain some control over her life. I don't think it's right, like some posters have said, to say, I pay the bills so move out if you don't like it. You chose to have a child, it's your responsibility to make sure she feels like she has a stable home with her mum, don't tell her that she is replacable by some random man. She is 17, will leave home in 15 months, just see your boyfriend when she isn't at home or at his place. She is telling you that she is uncomfortable and she isn't able to decipher why but that doesn't mean it's meaningless.

I'd agree with these comments if the BF was moving in, I'd be on her side probably.

But seriously, your child has no right to decide who comes over as a day visitor, that is ridiculous.

Maybe an open conversation and reassurance is what she needs.

But I wouldn't, as an adult, be keeping my boyfriend as a little secret because of my nearly-adult DD.

@ThreeAmingos I guess she is scared that if she is nice to him he will move in. This is her way of making sure he won't want to.

She sounds quite immature and self centred. I would understand the behaviour at 13 but not when she’s almost an adult. I wouldn’t move new partner until she’s moved out to uni but I would remind her that you will go ahead with relationships with or without her approval and she doesn’t get to dictate to you who you are in a relationship with

If your Dd is so adamant that you can’t date because you have a child I’d start treating her like one…lifts everywhere, curfew, sensible bedtimes, limitations on use of tech…she is a child after all…

She sounds like a bit of a brat tbh

Some of the judgement on her is a fucking joke.

This has been going on since she was 7. I'm with DD I'm afraid. Wait until she moves into adulthood to move this one in.

She's 17, almost an adult. I would say she doesn't have to like your boyfriend but I would expect her to be polite to him as I would expect her to be polite to any guest in my home.

I don't believe the 18 month one is moving in. Just coming over one night a week

You have a right to a relationship but perhaps it would be best to see him out of the house, or at his place, during the week.

Yes, I think some posters have explained it quite well. Perhaps your DD saw and heard a lot more than you thought in the first two relationships when she was young. Those memories don’t just disappear just because she is “nearly an adult”.

You have said she is otherwise a very good kid and isn’t a brat as such. I would be patient with the fact history does affect her internal risk assessment process. Wait until she has left home (which is in the foreseeable future) before taking it further with the current bloke in terms of living arrangements. It will be a happier occasion for your relationship with him too, as you won’t have to worry quite so much about your DD’s feelings.

I wouldn't tolerate her bratty rudeness.
She doesn't get to decide.
Suggest to her she visit her father more often or move there for a spell if basic manners are such a challenge.

She’s 17 not 7. In a year (at the very most) she’ll be considered an adult.

She needs to grow up!!! You’ve been respectful and it’s not like he’s moved in full time.

You will get some replies saying mollycoddling is the best but at 17 it really isn’t!