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.

Honestly, if this is how you interact when people don't agree with you or your perspective, this is probably putting a lot of pressure on your daughter. Most of the posters (not all but most) who are not agreeing with you are doing so in a polite, considerate manner.
This I will be really damaging to your relationship with your daughter.
Please listen to the (balanced) posts offering another perspective.

I hear your pain, OP, but you can't force DD to do anything really, only set your own boundaries.
You can refuse to give her lifts unless she asks politely. Quite reasonable.
You can refuse to give her money.
You can say 'Please don't talk to me like that' or 'Why are you so angry? Tell me what's going on, I'm worried!' when she swears at you, or shouts.
You can't force her to spend a certain number of nights a week at home. She's 18 and officially an adult. You can move her stuff into a smaller bedroom while she's out of the house if you want to, and set up the room for something else. But is that a good idea? Her relationship is very new and she may be back home tomorrow in floods of tears because he's dumped her. In which case it would be good for her to have a familiar bedroom to come back to.
You can't force her to do chores. You can ask her to clean up after herself when she uses the bathroom if that's the most annoying thing, but you can't make her.
You can't force her to pay anything towards her keep. You could chuck her out for not paying, but again, is that really what you want?
My gut feeling is that hanging on in there is the best option for the moment, and self-soothing as much as possible. Your very strong response to her behaviour does sound trauma-driven, and hyper arousal is not a good place to make decisions from.

I would have laughed in my mum's face if she told me I had to be at home at 18. You can't ground an adult.

That said, I did have my own car. I probably wouldn't give her any more lifts, but maybe try being friendly when she is at home, rather than nagging her to do housework (especially as she's barely there to have made mess?). Leave her be, she'll be back.

This thread is absolute batshit. How can a seemingly normal problem, that so many people have and will go through, turn in to such a horrendous bun fight!

OP, your daughter is pushing you away because she is 18 and is trying to assert her independence. You are getting the brunt of it because you’ve probably got the most secure relationship with her out of everyone (counter intuitively) it’s the same as when a toddler pushes away mom in favour of dad. She is pushing you away in favour of independence and she knows she can do it because you will always be there. Teenagers are tricky creatures and this is totally normal and will pass.

Having said that, you do not need to put up with the disrespectful ness, nor can you be too controlling about the situation. I’d move her in to a smaller room, tell her she has to start contributing proportionally to the house work etc but do not dictate how much time she has to spend at home. Let her start standing on her own two feet as much as practical and as much as you are comfortable with but do not dictate to her how she should spend her free time. Let her see her boyfriend as much as she likes, she is an adult after all, take a step back and it’ll fizzle out soon enough. It’s probably her first love and is very intense because of it.

Also, kindly, you are over reacting with how much this is affecting you. I do not believe that’s usual nor normal. Please, for your own sake, try to reframe this and not see it as being the end of your relationship with your daughter. It’s not the end, it’s just changing that’s all. This situation has not been going on for very long, it will get better

Honestly, if this is how you interact when people don't agree with you or your perspective, this is probably putting a lot of pressure on your daughter. Most of the posters (not all but most) who are not agreeing with you are doing so in a polite, considerate manner.

TBF when I joined MN about 18 years ago I used to feel mortified if someone even vaguely criticised anything I posted but now I've realised (particularly on AIBU) that you have to give as good as you get because a significant minority of posters here don't give a shit how their post makes anyone feel. It's made me a harder person in real life as well for better or worse.

OP, I know you’ve stepped away from this thread but I just wanted to flag that the boyfriend’s behaviour sounds very concerning. He could be seeking to isolate your DD - her behaviour changes and him telling her to hang up on you are red flags. It sounds incredibly tough but for that reason alone, I’d try to keep the door open as much as possible.

Thank you

Well if were true that it was "constant scolding and negativity" then of course she wouldn't want to be here. But as I've now repeatedly said, it's NOT. Nothing about me has changed from the previous 17 years of her life. I am the same person she has always had a close bond with. What's changed as I've said again and again is the new boyfriend.

There are always some who pile in for a bun fight.
However on this thread there a lot of posters giving sensible advice based on their own experience of navigating this situation with older teens. Listening to them may help the OP with achieving what she says she wants to, maintaining a close relationship with her daughter.

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

But if people aren't holding back to the point of actual rudeness, I'd say that is not robust debate. It's far beyond that.

It could be argued that rudeness and insults actually are detrimental to robust debate, as it makes the person with whom you're disagreeing justifiably angry and upset. They're then less likely to consider any sensible points that you did make. (I'm using 'you' to mean generally/collectively here, not 'you' to mean you personally.)

@HelloWorldItsNiceToMeetYou

Honestly, if this is how you interact when people don't agree with you or your perspective,

The post of mine you quoted was my response to a ridiculous poster saying "cinder-fucking-Ella" and that she felt sorry for daughter.

So, how I respond to that is in fitting with the tone it's delivered in. Ain't gonna get the best out of me, is it. Nor would it get the best out of anyone. Surely that's obvious.

There are always some who pile in for a bun fight.
However on this thread there a lot of posters giving sensible advice based on their own experience of navigating this situation with older teens. Listening to them may help the OP with achieving what she says she wants to, maintaining a close relationship with her daughter.

And the OP has acknowledged and is thanking those who have offered sensible advice.

@HelloWorldItsNiceToMeetYou
And I absolutely HAVE listened to and thanked many of them.

Cross posted!

Your tone comes across as really arsey, even to people who are trying to be helpful.
I genuinely suspect this is coming across to your daughter and may be part of the issue.
I know you say nothing has changed, but she is changing, she is growing up and may pick up on subtle difference of tone etc in a way she would not have preciously. She will be seeing a wider range of interactions in other families and comparing them.

I honestly think you feel more people are getting at you when they are just asking you to look at this from another perspective. If you are struggling with you mental health I am sure you may this is part of it. But your daughter will definitely be picking up on it.

When a bit of time has passed why don't you revisit this thread. Ignore the posters who are being blatantly rude, but have a look again at some of those who have been through this stage and consider what they have to say. It doesn't mean you're in the wrong, just bumbling along like all of us to figure it out.

Ignore the typos, I didn't proof read!

It never ceases to amaze me on this board how posters are so quick to point out the "aggressive" or "defensive" tone of an OP, whilst not for one second ever stopping to consider the tone of other posters' comments; which elicit those responses.

All those pointing out how I've responded to posters, and smugly saying "well if this is how you interact in real life, no wonder...." No, of COURSE it's not how I interact in real life! Because for a start, I don't have strangers making comments like "cinder-fucking-rella" and "poor kid" in reference to my children, or "good luck with new second family, hope you do a better job this time around", or "no wonder your daughter doesn't want to be at home".

Have any of you holier than thou posters pulling me up on my responses to this stopped for one minute to consider how you would feel in resposne to the above? Defensiveness emerges when one feels attacked - so maybe that should be considered.

My responses don't exist in a vacuum - they are elicited in a reciprocal way by what I am on the receiving end of on here. Any "psychologist" worth their salt knows this, and also knows that you can't determine the entirety of a person's functioning or know that they are "dysregulated" and "need psychological help" based on one mumsnet post and their responses to a number of unpleasant remarks about themselves as a parent.

Who I am as a person and a parent is not defined by who I am here, anonymously, when defending myself from perceived attacks.

Anyway, I don't owe anyone an explanation. I came here for advice and I thankfully found some very good advice - I've thanked those posters individually. To everyone else - I urge you to think about what you post, even if I am an anonymous stranger online. Words can really fucking hurt, and when someone has revealed that they are already in a low place, it says a lot of very unpleasant things about your character if you enjoy being part of a good kicking of that person.

Thank you! I absolutely have.

Actually i disagree. Sometimes teenagers need to know where the boundary is and i know a few it worked very well for! People seem terrified to remind teenagers who the parents are!

I was this teenager (sort of, no swearing) except I was at home Monday to Thursday nights. I would then leave at about 5pm on a Friday night, stay at my friend's, go to work Saturday, and spend Saturday night at my boyfriend's. Home Sunday afternoon.

I think the mistake that many mums make (mine included) is trying to disguise the personal offence taken at their child being out all the time under a layer of what seems like reasonable objections. As in, thinking surely nobody can argue that I'm being unreasonable saying she has homework/chores/is wasting the biggest room. When actually both the mum and teenager know the mum wants them at home for selfish reasons. Honestly the more hurt my mum expressed the more I wanted to be out so I didn't have to see how she felt. It was a vicious cycle.

I think you need to choose a route. You can either put your foot down, move her room and do the aforementioned washing/cooking/paying for Ubers strike or, as someone said, drop the rope and reverse psychology it with a last conversation saying fine, you'll be the one suffering the consequences if your grades drop and a gap year becomes no uni. think I'd choose the latter.

I think the absolute worst thing you could do right now is move her out of her bedroom. That gives her a clear message that she’s not welcome or as important as her half-sibling.

The boyfriend won’t last. She’ll be back home with you soon and needing your support. Teenagers can be arseholes, especially girls. So many of my friends with teen girls have a hard time around this age. There is a lot of grinning and bearing it.

This 100%.

Hopefully it's just a teenage relationship with an unhealthy intensity and nothing more sinister but it's important to notice the red flags.

The responses on this thread are honestly eye opening as to how abusive teenage relationships are able to happen under parents' noses.

If the OP's daughter was 30 and the OP had referenced these red flags (sudden behaviour change, isolating from family members, spending 100% of their time immediately with their partner) posters would have been saying unanimously that he was bad news, this was signs of abuse etc.

But because they're teenagers the OP's concerns about the BF are dismissed, she's told its normal for their age and she's crazy and unreasonable to think otherwise.

One rule I would impose is that if she says something about going /doing with little sister that she in turns up

Your tone comes across as really arsey, even to people who are trying to be helpful.

Really? Did you miss the number of times I thanked people who genuinely were trying to be helpful? 🤔

@teenmumstress24 no one is saying you can’t have feelings.

Being sad, frustrated, angry - all perfectly normal in a big life change.

Needing medication to offset panic attacks, anxiety and sleepless nights and wonder if you should threaten your child with downsizing or moving out because she’s had a boyfriend for 8 weeks and isn’t home enough to sit with you and a 3 year old is not feelings.

It’s a complete and utter overreaction and emotional manipulation even if you haven’t said this to her, that is going to alienate your daughter and drive a tank through your relationship.

Some posts are harsh but sometimes that’s what it takes to break through from only wanting validation to acknowledging that you can fix it as well as break it but only through changing what you are currently doing.