She is SO much prettier

[BellsNava]

The above is a statement from my mother, about my eldest daughter in comparison to my 3 younger daughters.

For context my eldest daughter has a different dad to my younger daughters, he is Spanish and my eldest looks distinctly Spanish (tan skin, dark hair etc.) she is 23 now and undeniably gorgeous.
My younger girls are 11, 13 and 15 and I think they are also gorgeous, my 15 year old is being bullied and a lot is around looks.

My mum went on to list all the ways my eldest is prettier, tall, slim with abs, long legs, beautiful long dark hair, tanned, “gorgeous face”.
Then she listed all the ways my younger girls aren’t as “pretty”, short, “a little chubby” (I don’t even think this is true), acne, not very “pretty in the face”.

I was gobsmacked and told my mum that sentiment isn’t appreciated. She then said oh but you can’t argue with facts, and listed the ways they are “better” than my eldest (more friendly and sociable, “just” as smart etc.) before wrapping up with it’s a shame but it’s life.

AIBU to think this is good grounds for no contact? My mum is very vain and my eldest is her favourite grandchild (despite knowing her the least as my eldest hasn’t lived in the UK since she was 11). She has never said any of this to my children but I feel that’s beside the point.

It’s still not ok to put her other grandchildren down in order to be ‘protective’ of her eldest grandchild. She can talk about her positively, without being nasty about 3 other children, who are also her grandchildren. There’s no justifying it.

Ok well in context it kind of makes sense. You said your dd is getting bullied due to looks and compared it to your eldest.

she probably shouldn’t have gone on and on but the comparison was invited.

People need to stop making massive assumptions. The reason she wanted to move and the lies she were later told were nothing to do with my husband.

The lies related to abuse which never happened and to do with me apparently not supporting her passions.

If that is the case, it’s still not ok for OPs mum to be horrible about the other children. If she has a problem with her daughter, she should address it like an adult, not resort to putting down children. That’s horrible.

'ABUSE THAT NEVER HAPPENED' here it is. That's what we were all thinking. New stepdad and no contact. You are despicable OP

Your mother's words are far less damaging than the fact that you only speak to your daughter 2 or 3 times a year! Wtaf?

Why have you walked away from your daughter? If you were a man you'd be ripped apart for this

I agree.

The responses to this thread are a bit odd and unhelpful. They seem to say:

1. A mum should not let a child live with the dad
2. If there's a step dad involved it's all your fault
3. My advice to you is go back in time - hope you've got a good time machine

The OP started the discussion on comparing them. She is the one who brought up one being bullied for looks and one not being bullied for looks and asked why. As far as I can see the mother pointed out the differences physically between the 2. I can’t for the life of me understand why the OP asked the question. The kids lives don’t intersect. It is in no way a golden child situation.

Kids get bullied for all sorts of reasons. If this is obviously about looks then it is probably a self esteem issue that is making her a target.

Very attractive people get treated differently and it gives them confidence. An average child might be gorgeous in their parents eyes but the world won’t treat them that way. It does the opposite these days in an extreme way. The OP needs to be aware that her positive affirmations aren’t going to cut through any of that. Indeed they could be making things worse. Maybe that is what the mother was trying to say.

I don’t see how a Disney dad could convince a child to leave home and siblings to this extent. There had to be a reaction against as well as a pull to.

This. Its all a bit melodramatic. Surely your eldest is an adult now though and your younger girls are in their teens so they are going through lots of changes. They will look really different potentially by their early 20s.

Let’s for now go with the bullshit idea that the 11 year old moved away from her mum to live in Spain with her dad because his house was bigger and the weather was nicer. How OP did you fail to maintain a relationship with her after that? Her dad managed to keep a relationship with his daughter whilst they lived in different countries for 11 years.
Was it a case of out of sight therefore out of mind for you? Maybe she noticed the effort her dad went to when they lived in different countries and compared it to the lack of effort from you when she went to live in a different country. On top of that, as far as she’s concerned, you replaced her with new daughters.
OP, can you hand on heart say that you made enough effort with you eldest? Like I say, let’s pretend for a minute that she moved to Spain with her dad because he spoiled her - but surely that is reason to make even more effort with her, not seemingly less. She wouldn’t just not want to speak to you because of lies your ex told her if she’d had a good relationship with her for the first 11 years and you’d been a good mum and continued to make an effort to maintain a relationship with her.
i predict the OP will probably request MNHQ to remove this thread soon because she’s not liking the responses.

yes op but for the years she was a young child he flew over every other weekend. when she left, did you do this?

I'm more bothered about the abuse she says her daughter claimed happened in her care but according to her 'never happened.' It's clear that all this stuff about looks is massively the tip of a much bigger iceberg.

Did your daughter claim her stepfather abused her, OP? Or you?

You'd better have rock solid evidence for not believing a child who says she's being abused.

It's grounds for telling her to cop on to herself.

People are so quick to go no contact these days instead of actually dealing with problems.

OP updates that the daughter claimed she was abused. OP says it's lies. Daughter goes no contact

Did it never happen, or did you just not recognise the way you were acting as abusive?
No happy child has panic attacks when left with one parent and then permentantly moves away from their mother willingly.

After reading all your responses, I can see that there is far more than meets the eye.

Whilst I do not agree with the comparisons made with your eldest and younger children, I do get the sense that your Mum has played a motherly role and praises her beauty for the eldests own self esteem.

No matter how people look on the outside, it can be alot different in the inside, and I wonder whether the loss of contact with you has left a painful mark. It's a shame that you and her father lived so far apart that the physical distance led to real emotional distance too.

I expect sometime in this lifetime it would be good to try and heal those wounds and remind her how much you adored her and would have done anything to see her happy.

I've got kids, I understand stand how you can gel with some and it feel like a battle with others, but to show your love will always be worth the battle.

Don't shut your Mum out, just remind her how alot goes on in teenage years and it can be hard for everybody to get through, people don't need their looks criticised in the process.

Much love to you x

She is the one who brought up one being bullied for looks and one not being bullied for looks and asked why.

That’s not true. OP hasn’t said she asked her mother why, just that she’d didn’t know how to deal with it as she hadn’t had to deal with it either eldest.

I'm guessing it could have been stepdad

Your DM is wrong but OP why would you suggest no contact as the first port of call? Is it because she maintains such regular contact with your eldest.

I would say to my DM that I never wanted to hear that repeated but going NC with the one person who has regular contact with your eldest is quite extreme.

i can understand the desire to ‘start anew’ with your youngest daughters and sweep to the side anything associated with your eldest but you do realise how unhealthy this impulse is. You need to do some work on yourself to tease this out. Parental estrangement is awful, I imagine you are very hurt but try not to make it worse

Sounds to me like your mum doesn't think you love or at least care about, your eldest as much as the other 3, so she is trying to tell you how wonderful she is.

She might be right too (with thinking you don't love her/care about her as much as the other 3) ...

Oof, OP. I'm going to say this with all due respect and as gently as I can (although it's becoming a challenge for me to remain calm reading this thread!): no child prefers to be "spoiled rotten" over having a mother. Not one child.

Thats your own opinion based on your own life and your own perception of what your children would choose in a hypothetical situation. Imagine if a man said “no child would prefer to be spoiled rotten over having a father”? Lots of kids would choose material things over their mums. You might not like to think that it happens but it does all the time. Also she went to live with her other parent - her father, not some random cult or something.