To stipulate minimum number of nights at home for DD?

[teenmumstress24]

DD turned 18 a few months ago. Her 18th birthday coincided with her meeting a new boyfriend who she is inseparable from. She spends around 1-3 nights per fortnight at home, and that's only to sleep / occasionally grab food or a shower. She doesn't converse with anyone (unless to ask for lifts or to borrow cash), and she certainly doesn't do any housework. Since this time there have been numerous issues and arguments; mostly around the following themes:

• constant requests for lifts from me or partner (although this has declined since her boyfriend passed his driving test a few weeks ago as he's seemingly the taxi now)
• never doing any housework
• never being at home long enough to converse with anyone and all her interactions being requests for something
• letting me and her little sister down after agreeing to do something with us and then dropping us in favour of the boyfriend (little sister is only 3 so doesn't understand and gets very upset about her big sister not being there)
• more recently me and my partner (her step dad) we're both told to "fuck off" when we were unable to facilitate a lift whilst juggling bedtime and household tasks between us after work one evening (she later apologised for this; but it's left a very sour taste)
• boyfriend got involved in disagreement following the above incident, and whilst I was the on the phone to her during a heated discussion about that, I was apparently on loudspeaker as I could hear the boyfriend chirping up "just hang up on her" (to my daughter about me)

I'm at my wits end and I can't take anymore. I've contact the GP for some medication to take the edge off because I feel so low and as though I've basically lost my daughter. I've tried telling her miss her, I'm sad about it all, I want her to spend more time at home, etc. She still doesn't. All I get from her is, "it's normal for me to want to be at his house more often he's a new boyfriend". However, she makes time for her dad, her dad's side of the family, my sister (her aunt who's she close to), her friends, and her boyfriend. The only person she lets down and seems to not want to be around is me.

She pays no board (she's at college and works part time earning only about £70-100 a week so I've never taken any money off her). I pay for her phone contract. She doesn't contribute to the food shop here but does buy her own takeaways etc . Her only regular bill is a gym membership.

I've suggested to her since she appears to not live here anymore that she moves out and pays her boyfriends mum board? The response was "I don't want to move out". But 1-3 nights here a fortnight on average would suggest she pretty much has moved out. She has the largest room in the house and it's just wasted space, it's never occupied.

My AIBU is, would I be unreasonable to stipulate that if she wants to continue to live here that I put in place the following rules:

1- she actually occupies her room more regularly than 1-3 times a fortnight? So set a minimum number.
2- she pulls her weight with household tasks and until I see her doing so on a regular basis without any prompting or nagging, I will charge her board. I will stop charging board once she pulls her weight regularly.

Does this sound reasonable? My head is a total mess with it all, I'm struggling to disentangle the emotion from the practical side, so it may come across as garbled. I'm not a good place with it all tbh as I feel so lost and as though she just dislikes me for some reason 😔

Any help appreciated.

@Plastictrees you're a psychologist??! I have no words

But you’ve not lost her! You need to let the elastic stretch! You’ve not lost her!

No, my advice is accurate and necessary.

The OP has been utterly unpleasant and positioning herself as the victim for this entire thread. The lack of responsibility in incredible.

Anyway, on you go with your misplaced vitriol continuing to wind up the OP and further drive a wedge between her and her daughter. Bravo.

You’ve posted in AIBU, which is a trial by fire as very robust debate is allowed. You might want to repost in ‘Being a Parent’, like ‘Teenagers’, ‘Parents of Adult Children’, etc

But surely there's a difference between robust debate and bad manners?

@Plastictrees
@Goldenbear is acriallyt helping me! Bloody hell don't start on her as well.

It’s the word “chores” that makes me cringe.

Mine never did any, other than keeping their rooms and en-suite bathrooms clean. I never did any at home either. My mum’s thinking was that as grown ups we have a lifetime of the bloody things, so let kids be kids. And young adults be young adults.

My house now is clean and tidy, so is my kids place, and they have sure as heck never told me to fuck off.

@SorcererGaheris
Yes there is a difference between robust debate and bad manners and it's disingenuous for posters who have been deliberately unpleasant towards me to say otherwise. "Good luck next time around with your second family, I hope you don't better job". That is fucking awful. By anyone's standards.

How can you possibly know this from reading one thread from the OP.

Do you have late teenagers, no you don't as your advice seemingly is not informed by an real experience.

Hardly a tangent, it is completely relevant and you must be on the wind up to dismiss the OP's concerns as being unjustified and making it that she has a problem if she can't be joyous about her 18 year old chucking away her education and playing married life at this ridiculously young age.

People don’t hold back in AIBU. I’ve had my arse handed to me a few times here.

Not saying OP should have the same, if you read my posts, they’re all supportive of OP.

Not really, life online is what you want it to be, you don't need to be unkind just because you can't be seen.

@Goldenbear Because the OP’s interpersonal issues and emotional dysregulation are so glaringly obvious that you’d have to be wilfully blind not to see it.

Or just ignorant of mental health issues and trauma, and instead focusing on hating an 18 year old boy who has the audacity to be in a consensual relationship with the OP’s daughter. Posters like yourself are enabling the OP in a really dysfunctional way.

Best of luck to the OP, and especially her daughter.

shes 18, she is no longer a child , her behaviour is not on. If she doesn’t want to move out then she needs to contribute in some way to the household. A lodger would pay rent , as she can’t ask her what she thinks is reasonable- send her link to spare room .com and write out a budget for rent, bills, etc. treat her like an adult and see what she comes up with.

In the last 8 weeks this has all happened apparently and now she's getting kicked out!

So they never did any housework except that they did? Eh? What's the difference between what the OP is expecting and what you expected?

OP you haven't lost her. Your relationship is changing, evolving and it will take a while for you both to adjust. And yes it has changed because of her boyfriend but it would have changed anyway, maybe not as fast but it would have changed. And it's not the boyfriend himself by which I mean it would be likely whoever she had chosen to date.
Can you really not see how much more appealing it is for her to hang out with her bf in a house with 1 other adult who might not even be there half the time than it is in a busy household with 2 parents and a little sister ?
Give her breathing space don't alienate her. Tell her you hope she keeps up her studies to achieve good grades because then this keeps her future options open but absolutely support her taking a gap year if that what she wants to do. If she can see you meeting her half way in a sensible non judgemental fashion then she is far more likely to still come to you for advice

I totally understand how hard this must be emotionally. Some posters are not being very empathetic.

You haven’t lost her! It’s only been a few weeks/months. Of course she wants to spend every moment around him now. It’s not a reflection on how she feels about you but if you make it into a source of conflict it will become one.

Second the advice of other posters to pick your battles. I wouldn’t give her chores but if she’s making mess when home she should clean it up - don’t leave dishes in the sink, for example. You need to check in with her regularly on her college work and revision. And provide natural consequences for rudeness. “Fuck off” means no more lifts for X amount of time.

Other than that, I would let most things slide and just make sure you are being positive when she is home and not creating any stress for her.

She will come back to you in the end. But if you try and force her to spend time with you, she will develop negative associations and you will push her further away.

You're a psychologist...?!

You're lucky you haven't pushed OP over the edge with some of your posts.

Whether she needs psychological support or not you certainly won't have encouraged her to seek it out with this approach.

You're not much of a psychologist if you've formed an opinion of how I conduct myself as a person and parent based on how I interact with anonymous strangers on an internet forum, many of whom are being rude an unpleasant. If you were worth your salt as a psychologist you'd understand that you can't extrapolate someone's entire "interpersonal functioning" from that alone.

So frankly, alongside what appears to be blatant unpleasantness for the sake of it towards an online stranger who is at a very low ebb, I don't rate you as a professional. Or as a person for that matter.

@Fluffyiguana thank you!!

How is being concerned for your 18 year old DD and her future 'emotional dysregulation'? Mothers are allowed to have feelings they are people in their own right and they are allowed to express them and sometimes they are emotional and it is not always rational and that is fine, there's nothing wrong with not being a robot and there's certainly nothing wrong with missing your child! The OP invited the boy around, he didn't turn up, what is she supposed to do.

Fuck me, crying through the tears and now mentions of suicide. Being desperately upset and then ranting swearing because things aren’t going your way. If this is how you behave at home perhaps your daughter chooses not to be around your turbulent mood swings.

you keep saying you’ve replied to advice but literally only advice that you agree with, you’ve shown yourself to be difficult and incapable of seeing other view points. Your way or no way. Again, perhaps your daughter is struggling with that.

That being said, I hope you get sorted by the GP soon as your reactions here seem very extreme for what is essentially part and parcel of raising teenagers.

Sigh. I have been supportive of OP throughout the thread.

So please don't tell me 'you don't need to be unkind.'

It was a comment that AIBU attracts fierce debate, so it's not always the best board to post in, especially if you are at a low point.

Fuck me, crying through the tears and now mentions of suicide

I actually said it's a good job I'm not suicidal as some of these responses would have tipped me over,

And yes, I shed tears over my relationship with my daughter who means a lot to me because, shock horror, I am a human and not a robot. How wildly unreasonable and "dysregulated" of me. Next time I'll engage robotic mother mode and feel nothing. 👍🏻

I'm not telling you, 'you' don't need to be unkind and meant generic 'you', basically very unkind people on this thread.