Worried about DD who is NC

[SMEHJmammy]

Afternoon all,
I have 5 DC, ages 18-26, my middle child is my 22 year old DD. DD and I have been no contact for almost 5 years (since she left for uni). The context of this is my other 4 children all have chronic health conditions/disabilities, DD was our only "healthy" child and as such she feels she was neglected. I feel awful about her feeling this way and miss her very much, she was never intentionally neglected but with 4 children with complicated needs she was the "easy" child. My ex husband and I definitely weren't the best parents to her, we missed parents evening, sports games etc. This was never because of a lack of love but rather being overstretched by the needs of our other children. Since the day DD left for uni, I haven't heard from her. She talks to her dad but also hasn't seen him in that time (he does insist on sending her money though) and she still talks to her siblings. She struggled with her mental health somewhat as a teen but we did go out of our way to provide her with as much support as we could, especially as some awful things external to family life happened. I was also told recently that she received a formal ADHD diagnosis, but this was never something anyone was concerned about when she was a child.
Anyway, DD has always been a very smart, responsible girl, she was head girl, straight As, she went to St Andrews and I know she graduated in the summer with a first class honours, and is now in London doing her masters.

Recently my eldest DS went to visit her, and he has come back feeling quite concerned, he said that she is drinking a lot, several week days after uni and on the weekends (out well into the early hours), she smokes weed (he said not like a "stoner" but socially), vapes, has used cocaine, seems to be just dating random men all the time. He also said she seems to be surviving on very little sleep, energy drinks and not enough food (she was anorexic as a teen).
I miss DD all the time, but I'm also feeling incredibly worried. I have tried to contact her to no avail, my ex husband says if he mentions anything about this to her she stops contacting him, and sends any money he has sent straight back. My DS doesn't know how to approach this and honestly neither do I.
So please mumsnet, what do I do?
AIBU to feel totally lost at dealing with this?

You are allowed to feel whatever emotions you want, they are all valid. The way you choose to deal with your ongoing relationship with your mother is your business, whether that's no contact, low contact or trying to repair and nobody else gets to weigh in. Nobody else gets to tell you how to feel about it.

Love this perspective

It is really sad to read so many posts from people who are NC with their mothers and who hold no hope of reconciliation.
I am reminded of a post a while ago that was about young trans people cutting contact with their families once they graduated from uni and no longer needed the financial support. It made for very sad reading.

At least OP’s daughter still has contact with her dad and siblings. In your position OP that would give me comfort.

Write to her and apologise as thoroughly and as earnestly as you can. Do not explain, qualify or justify anything you did or didn’t do. Just tell her she deserved much more and so much better. Tell her how much you love her and what she means to you. If you can do this without making any reference to any of the things which you feel ‘ she maybe ‘should understand’ - and which no doubt caused the NC in the first place then you’ll make at least a proper connection. She sacrificed far far more than anyone else. You had parental attention growing up I’m sure, as did your other children - but she didn’t. She missed out in ways you’ll probably never understand the gravity of.

Agree with this.

Hoe's the dad not to blame when OP was probably doing more than him in looking after the kids and home.

Women are an easy target and unfortunately other women are quick to beat each other down.

OP posted asking for help, but instead of guidance, so many are quick to condemn and call her names.

She’s LC with her father, NC with her mother. You’d have to ask the daughter why she’s willing to have a relationship with her father, given that she’s the one intimately familiar with her relationships with the both of them. Not that she actually needs to explain or justify herself.

You have no idea that she’s blaming OP more ‘because she’s a woman’, or that her mother gave more to and did more for her.

No one here knows what the daughter is thinking/feeling.

I don't have to justify my post to you either.

No one can tell you how you feel.

Everyone gets angry about when they have been mistreated / bullied and it should not be dependant on who that person is.

My own relationship with my mother has improved since her death.

I don't think people who have no experience of the kind of upbringing some of us had, can understand that going NC is the last straw not a reflex reaction.

*Hoe's the dad not to blame when OP was probably doing more than him in looking after the kids and home.
Women are an easy target *

this is such a pattern. People always find it easier to blame / be angry at the the woman/ their mother, because we expect more of them. When it comes to men, we make excuses “they didn’t know better”, “they did their best, but they are who they are” etc etc. we assume the harm men inflict is unintentional, whereas women should have known better.

When it comes to shitty mothers it runs deeper than simply an expectation they do more as a woman. There is a deep instinctive need to have a mother, and by that I mean one who actively acts like one. It's something I can't explain very well as I'm not particularly articulate but the string want and desire is still there for me years after going NC because she is my mother. I protect myself from her by not having anything to do with her, but let's not pretend that comes easily. It's heartbreaking every single day. The PTSD can be kept under relative control but the feelings of wanting my mother because quite simply, nature, will never leave me. It's not because she is a woman it's because she is the woman who grew and birthed me and my instinct makes me want her.

Bits not a feminist issue.

That's your experience which can be said for many, but there are mothers who happily give away/go NC with their children without a second thought.

Not everyone has the instinct to be close to their parent/child. In some cases, even without neglect or abuse being an issue.

We're brought up to expect mothers to be loving, nurturing and protective of their children, but unfortunately some mothers don't have it in them.
Unfortunately, many only realise this after having children.

Equally there are men who fulfil the "mother" role naturally.

Not everyone has a bond with their birth mother or blood family.

Then don’t. My disagreeing with you does
not mean that I expected, or required, a reply from you,

We do know that she wants NC, and that she has consistently rebuffed any and all attempts at reconciliation. We know that both OP and her ex husband acknowledge their neglect of her.

Deciding that ‘well, I think that I was a piece of shit as a teenager, so the same probably applies in this case too’ and/or that this is case of women being held to higher standards is quite the leap of logic.

@Treesandsheepeverywhere

That's your experience which can be said for many, but there are mothers who happily give away/go NC with their children without a second thought.

I know. I'm not saying otherwise

Not everyone has the instinct to be close to their parent/child. In some cases, even without neglect or abuse being an issue.

Specifically talking about the child's instinct to want their mother. It's a natural thing. You can see this throughout the world in the vast majority of species. When I talk about close I don't mean close relationship it's so much deeper than that.

We're brought up to expect mothers to be loving, nurturing and protective of their children, but unfortunately some mothers don't have it in them.
Unfortunately, many only realise this after having children.

I know this too. In fact that's kind of the whole point. A shit mother doesn't mean the child doesn't care. It's the hardest thing in the world to actively choose not to be in contact because the one person who should love you without hesitation, doubt or question turns out to be a cunt.

Equally there are men who fulfil the "mother" role naturally.

I know this too, I didn't say otherwise

Not everyone has a bond with their birth mother or blood family.

Right, which is why I was trying to discuss the fact that the instinct is still there. It’s fucking brutal coming to terms with the fact that the person who should love you above all doesn't. That's not to say dads don't or can't love their children and do a far better job than a shit mum. It's just to make it very clear that by far the hardest part of going NC with your own mother can be the overwhelming desire to have a mum.

That’s a perspective that I hadn’t thought of before, but it completely makes sense how you have put it.
I suppose in many ways we demand more of them because we simply need them more- they matter more.

I’m so sorry for your experience xx

I have reread the OP's posts and the only "neglect" she mentions is not attending sports events, parents evenings etc. Now that's not great, but it isn't up there with the kind of abuse my daughters got from their birth mother, which led to them nearly dying. And I know it's not a competition, but the OP is absolutely getting it in the neck when she is only wanting to fix things.

My dad never harmed me.

My dad never humiliated me.

My dad didn't hit me.

He didn't see a lot of what my mother did. She was a master at manipulation.

I’m really sorry to hear you went through that.

What did your dad do out of curiosity? Where was he? Why didn’t he protect you?

If I understood correctly, DD remains in contact with DH and siblings, but not with you? In this case the only thing you can do is to keep the door open if she wishes to seek contact - but nothing else.

' it often felt like she was just a mini adult, like she had it more together than we did it, we never asked her to do this at all, she was just always so together'

One, this explains her behaviour now where she does not have to hold it together, which seems quite understandable. Two, what do you mean by 'she had it more together than we did'? I suspect this may be the clue to no contact.

OK so parents evenings too.

Wow.

I know plenty of parents who didn't attend for whatever reason.

I said it's not great but it's not the end of the world.

And anorexia is often difficult to spot. OP says they got her help when they found out.

Going NC is really popular atm. The idea has taken hold across social media and is delivered hard as a solution by devotees. And quite honestly, it is going to pick up people with a few quarrels rather than properly abusive childhoods and I AM team OP (and why not?) because it all just sounds OTT to me.

This is so true. The neglect in this case is pretty minor in the grand scale of things, and occurred as a result of the OP's busyness rather than a lack of love for her DD.

I must inform my 78-year-old mother that she is a victim of neglect and abuse. Like most kids of her generation, she was turfed out of the house straight after breakfast with sandwiches and an apple and told not to come back until supper time. She, her siblings and the neighbours' kids roamed the streets, exploring bombed-out buildings, playing in streams and talking to strangers. The older children were expected to keep an eye on the younger ones. Of course, there were no mobile phones and, although there were payphones, they were of no use to my mum since her family didn't have a telephone in the house anyway. A couple of her childhood friends died or sustained serious injuries in accidents and several were "interfered with" by various men.

Would you consider these mothers of the 1940s or 1950s to be neglecting or abusing their kids? If so, I think virtually every mother of that time must have been guilty of it. Like OP, they were busy with things they simpy had to do to keep their families alive - like growing vegetables (there was still food rationing at the time), food shopping (daily, because no fridge or freezer), making/altering clothes for their DC, washing clothes (and nappies) manually, cleaning the house, cooking everything from scratch (no ready-made jams, cakes etc). Children were expected to get on with it and fit in with their parents.

Strangely, despite these traumas, my mum and her siblings and surviving friends thrived and went on to be happy and well-adjusted members of society. None of them went NC with their families and my mum would laugh like a drain if I suggested that she'd been neglected. She didn't bring her own children up like this, but she didn't hold it against her mum because she understood that her mum - and all the other mums she knew - were just doing their best under difficult circumstances. I think some people on this thread would do well to remember that.

I'm baffled.

You had 2 children with severe disabilities and then, despite presumably already being overstretched, decided to have another, who was not disabled to your knowledge at the time.

Then you decided that having 3 children, 2 with severe disabilities, was such a doddle that, even though by now you have noticed your genetic predisposition for disabled children, decided to have 2 more.

You must have known that you weren't going to be able to give all of the children what they needed and deserved but you prioritised your desire to keep having babies over the children's need to have a parent who could adequately care for all of them.

Of course DD is struggling in her adult life after a childhood of neglect. It's too little, too late, to worry about her now.

I wish people would read OP's updates! The oldest child wasn't diagnosed until after the youngest had already been born, and the three disabled kids are disabled as a result of a car accident. Not really something that could reasonably be predicted.

I'm baffled

that’s because you haven’t read the thread.

Also, how ridiculous to start analysing why OP had her children. What use is that? And there could be so many factors. Why are so many women on mumsnet fixated on criticising women for reproducing , regardless of what advice they are seeking in their OP ?

OK, so firstly, all the stuff she is doing is totally normal uni stuff these days.
Secondly, I'm sorry to say, but you lost the right to pass judgement on her choices with regards to coping mechanisms before she left the home.
Thirdly, this is called Glass Child Syndrome and I suggest you read up on it and research both the short and long term effects this has.
Lastly, I implore you to write her a letter, DO NOT mention anything your son has told you. In this letter you need to be honest, with how you felt when she was a child and how you feel now. Be honest with her about what you wish you could change if you could go back, while acknowledging that you know that can't happen. Say you're sorry, and mean it. That means not following the "I'm sorry" with ANYTHING like "but, it was because of..." etc. Any words that follow an apology need to amplify it, not deflect blame from it.
I'm sorry you're in this situation but you need to write this letter and then leave the ball in her court. Do not, under any circumstances, contact her uni or her friends etc about her current actions, she will NEVER forgive you. I understand you are concerned, but she is a grown up and has to make her own mistakes.