Daughter very demanding of me

[Beebeedoo]

Hi
Changed username as feel a bit odd writing this. My daughter is almost 20 and so demanding of me, examples as want to see if this is unsual, background at uni but comes home every weekend and has long summer holidays from uni. Is this normal????

• Follows me around the house
• as soon as she wakes up messages me asking what am i doing
• when i go to a friend or my mother for a coffee she is constantly messaging me asking when i am home
• says 'entertain me' a lot
• seems to want to hang around me all the time, i want some time but not 24 7!
• has friends but rarely sees them
• wants me and her to go to all these places for lunch and shopping and its really nice but im struggling to afford it every week a nd my savings now v low

I just feel its all too much, when she is home i feel im on edge and snappy with her when she is at uni in the week i am relaxed.
My husband did tell her to stop constantly messaging me when im out with a friend as it makes me feel under pressure to rush home and she didnt do it last time, which was much better.

What can i do about this as im so miserable, want to enjoy mother daughter time but i feel i cant handle this, i sit in laybys and cry as i also feel a bad mum for my feelings.

This sounds to me like undiagnosed ASD. You would wait a long time on the NHS. Can you afford private assessment at all?

If not then you could ask GP if there is a pathway to assessment to try to get to the bottom of anxiety problem, but it's likely to be a 2 year wait.

Is this something the university might offer?

Jesus that sounds hideous. She seriously needs to get a life and a grip. My 11 year old wouldn’t go on like that.

Why does she come home every weekend? This suggests that she doesn't have any meaningful friendships at university.

I would absolutely make yourself unavailable at least one weekend per month (initially), and in time, increase that to 2 weekends a month.

Unless you help her to start to disengage, she's likely to return home full time after university and this will be your situation every day!

It's really not a usual way for a young adult to behave.

Thats exactly what I was thinking.

Agree with all the comments re autism

I think you need a careful plan to build independence. It's all very well people her saying just be tough with her. But this is her and her needs and it requires realism particularly given she may be autistic etc.

Break down some aims and then tell yer the plan
Tell her she needs to spend time at uni on a weekend and help her plan that

Tell.her that you need her to develop ways of occupying her time

Tell her you will sometimes ve away and help.her plan around that

She may find understanding that she is neurodiversr helpful

I'm feeling stressed reading about this. I don't think I could cope either.

Regardless of whether there is something underneath this behaviour - anxiety, autism, or something else - your DD needs to work on strategies to manage it while living the adult life she wants.

Pick 1 or 2 things to work on with her at a time. I'd suggest you start with independent travel to/from uni and having a weekend where she stays at uni, but see what you (and she) think.

To get ready for the independent travel, make the train/bus journey to and from uni with her the first time. Make her go through all the steps of preparing for it - looking up routes, times, organising tickets, anything else needed. Ask her to take the lead when you do the journey. Basically this is about building up her confidence - and yours - that she is capable of doing this. Talk to her about things that might go wrong (train cancelled, get on the wrong train, miss stop, lose ticket etc) and strategies to cope with them.

Lots of luck!

Also agree re diagnosis. If you can afford its about 2 grand to pay ...find a reputable organisation that do in person

I think op you will make her even more anxious if you suddenly F off and demand independence out of the blue. It will make her anxiety worse. Is there any reason that this codependent relationship developed? Illness or trauma in childhood? Something affected her attachment? Does she have ocd type behaviours? I’m not sure she’s ASD as we have too little info from the post, it’s definitely anxiety of some sort I’d say.

I agree with PP who suggested going in train with her first and troubleshooting any challenges that may arise. You’ll need to give her the chance to develop confidence and not protect her from every challenge BUT you also can’t throw her into the deep end. Think of something you’re really frightened of, say you’re scared of water and needed to learn to swim, would you learn by being thrown into the sea or would you do better if you had to gradually get used to shallow water first.

If she is bored, tell her to do her course work. Or see her friends. Or do some chores. Or get a hobby. Or read a book. Or watch a film.

Tell her you can't afford lunch out every week. Tell her you can do it once a month or once every 6 weeks or whatever you feel is reasonable within your budget.

When you go out, put your phone on silent and stop looking at it every 5 minutes.

Agree. Everyone agrees on the end goal .... its the how its done thats important and will determine its success and growth of a healthy independent relationship with you or not.

Of course I do and I love them dearly and I do all sorts of things for them, but they are so mind-numbingly boring, so here we are. I do go out with them though, when my dc are unavailable!

I think she sounds lonely has she not found friends at uni?

She reminds me a bit of the girl with the office crush on Karl in love actually and her brother always calling her r

When you are out with friends don't read the messages.

With regards to doing stuff if you can't afford it say no and suggest a cheaper alternative.

If you want time to yourself say I'm going to sit and read for an hour we could do xyz after?

If she says "entertain me" I'd be tempted to say "no because you are not 5" failing that say go read a book/magazine/jigsaw give her solo activities.

Have you sat her down and told her directly it's all to much. That she needs to respect your space and actually let you have some.

It actually doesn't matter whether she's autistic or not @Beebeedoo . Boundaries is key here. I've got an autistic 14 year old at home who will never go to university (so not high-functioning like your DD) and yet I teach him about boundaries for our sake and his sake. I am not always available (unless emergency) and if he's bored I tell him "good, children are supposed to be bored, that's how they get creative". I am thinking about his future: if I give into his every desire of always being available and at his service how will he learn to respect people's boundaries? I've told him calling somebody multiple times when someone is not answering is stalking and not polite so he doesn't do it to me neither to other family or his only friend. When he'll get a girl friend one day atleast he's got manners and know what's OK and what's not. You have to teach DD to respect you or she risk behaving like this in close relationships (friends, boyfriends). I felt suffocated just reading your OP. You have let this go on for too long. You are not doing her any favours letting her act like a needy toddler and getting away with it. Not healthy for you and not healthy for her.

You have to stand up for yourself and I would start by losing my shit at my husband for constantly throwing me under the bus. "Oh, go on" indeed. He just wants her out of the house.

Stop picking her up and ask her why she does this. She may think it's normal.

Would she still want to come home if neither you nor your husband were there? Go away for a weekend (it sounds like you could do with a break anyway) or if you don't want to do that, just tell her you're going away. How do you think she would react?

She needs to stay in her university digs at weekends. A weekend job near the university would be ideal for her - even a volunteer role at a food bank, shelter, etc would be preferable to coming home all the time.

Sit her down and establish a plan to find a job and stop coming home.

Find out if she really does have friends. Normally if you have university friends you do stuff with them at weekends.

I don’t think the OP will come back - this is probably very painful for her because she knows everything is out of whack.

Sounds like you have created this situation OP. You pander to her every whim. If my child came to disturb me while I was working just because they wanted to be entertained I’d be really cross.annd demanded ‘entertain me!’ I mean wtf. And mine are pre teens. If they messaged me constantly when I was out with friends I’d tell them to stop. I don’t understand why you are so scared to tell her no. You have now created someone who has ridiculous expectations of you because you do as she wants every single time.

I thought we’d left this silly mindset in the past where it belongs. Anxiety is awful, dismissing it as a ‘get out of everything card’ is ridiculous.

Don’t be too hard on yourself, it’s really hard especially when they have ASD. I know I do too much for my autistic daughter and am trying to change that. It’s very hard as especially it’s less stressful and easier to do it for them. My daughter won’t wash unless I tell her to. She would also much rather discuss books and music she likes with us than socialise. It’s annoying when they don’t care about “normal teen” stuff.

@Hwi

errr,ok!

why are you so bored by your friends?

You do realise that your kids are gonna grow up and move on from you as is life…and then what you gonna do??!

You are a person as well as a mother! Invest in yourself!

Your DD seems a lot like mine, OP. The amount of times I have cried just from sheer exhaustion due to the constant catering and pandering to her 1001 demands and pure clinginess. For years it never occurred to me I could just say no. I had to end up in counselling to see it.

I don’t agree that it automatically means she’s ND, she could just be anxious, going through a particularly difficult phase, etc. But catering to her every need won’t fix any of this. She’s more than old enough to take the train.

I’d be very willing to bet that the issue is she’s struggling with forming friendships. My DD became 100x more clingy after her friendship group disbanded, but the fact is a parent can’t replace friends their own age.