To be irked by this message from my 18 year old?

[feedmefudge]

We’re not getting on so well at the moment. Usually we’re pretty close and have a good relationship. She’s great! However she is incapable of reflecting on her own behaviour and admitting any wrongdoing (her behaviour is actually fine; it’s more that she has an entitled attitude). Anyway, here’s the annoying and rather patronising message, which was sent to me and her younger sister:

Her - ‘I bought lots with dad to eat for the next week. If something says Waitrose on it, do not eat it. I will know if either of you have.’

Me - ‘I’m not a child. I think you can trust me to hold myself back from your Waitrose food.’

It’s irritating because her father and I divorced years ago, and he has taken her for food for my house. I don’t shop in Waitrose but will generally bring home anything that she wants if she’s cooking for herself, plus I do a weekly Tesco shop. So it’s not like the poor love is starving!
Also, ex husband will be loving it that we’re not getting on as well as usual.

Daughter has told me that my reaction to her Waitrose text wasn’t normal. And I’m just so fucking tired of it all. Raising teenage daughters on my own is genuinely the hardest thing I have had to do (obviously the Waitrose text on its own isn’t a big deal, but small issues can sometimes tip you over as they’re often part of a bigger picture).
I’m also menopausal and really feeling it tonight. Some kindness would be appreciated, even if I am just a horrible mum! 😆

It would really piss me off the dad has bought food for only her and not also her sister?! What is that about? We don’t have food in our house that is only for certain people to eat and I wouldn’t be ok with this. She can keep her food at her dads house or he can get her a mini fridge but she is treating you like a flatmate whilst not contributing and whilst you pay for the shopping the rest of the time! When does little sister get food treats big sister can’t have? Your ex is a horrible twat clearly.

How exactly is the op taking her feelings about her ex, out on her teen in this scenario?

She isn’t. She is setting a boundary by not accepting rudeness.

If teens are rude and entitled, it’s our job as parents to educate them
to do better. It’s not our job to sit back and say, “there there you can’t help being a teen diddums”

Obviously we are sensitive to the fact that adolescence is hard and they aren’t fully baked yet, but it does the teen no favours at all if entitled behaviour goes unchecked as they will go on behaving that way at uni and work and reap the consequences.

Also, I think it is really important that a mother with an irritating ex and a teen going through a stroppy phase, is able to come on here and express those perfectly natural feelings, without being made to feel guilty about it.

My advice is to ignore her message and only buy and prepare food for yourself. When she inevitably asks WTF, say “Oh, I assumed you were independent now, and we were doing our own thing from now on.” I would then suggest that she toddle off to Waitrose and buy her own food again.

Buy some M&S food and tell her the same!

Don't get irked, go cool. Don't answer or just with a smiley.

She won't be a dickhead forever hopefully.

Exactly this, Thank heavens for sanity,

You are so not being unreasonable OP. The nice thing would be for her to want to share the food with you and her sister, I don't understand why she wouldn't want to do so.
I would have replied to tell her to go and live with her father, she's mean and at 18 needs a wake up call.

YANBU but I don't understand the logistics of this situation in terms of cooking. Does she make her own meals then?

my reply would be

are you taking the piss?!

sounds unnecessarily argumentative from you.

but admit she sounded combative.

i am sure you can both move on

Her message only needed a smiley face at the end and all rudeness would have been forgiven…
Thats why I hate messaging. Things can get blown out of proportion depending on the reader’s state of mind.
Just give her a personal shelf/box in the fridge and ignore the remote-control unpleasantness from ExH.

I doubt she knows Waitrose is more expensive.

Why do you doubt that? She was in Waitrose with her father buying the food and she's 18. Why would she not know it was more expensive?

My daughter is 18. Until she went to university and when she comes back, she has a shelf of her own in the fridge.

OP, I think you've taken the waitrose part as a bit of a snub tbh. My daughter's dad sometimes takes her shopping for food, I buy her specific food she wants or she buys it herself and, no, I don't eat it. She's asked for specific things or bought things for herself for her own meals. I do the same.

I can't see anything 'entitled' about her message. If my daughter's dad buys her something, of course it's hers and not available for everyone to use. That goes for anything he buys her.

Why have you assumed that by identifying the food as her own she's implying you starve her by providing food from Tesco?

You both have an adversarial approach to conversation with each other.
You need to model the tone you wish her to have with you.

She sends a snotty text, you don’t reply with one in kind. You reply “Ok ☺️”

When you’ve got a leg to stand on further down the road, if she’s still speaking to you like that, you can have a word with her.

And don’t do what other posters have suggested and start being petty about food. It will just escalate the bad feeling.

It's obviously as much about the rude tone as well as the content

The tone wasn't rude, just matter of fact. She was just explaining that some of the food was hers. She's just trying to set a boundary, which she is actually entitled to do.

There are threads on here all the time where women are questioning whether setting a boundary is rude. It's not. Or questioning whether simple straightforward wording is rude. It's not.

A better response from the OP would actually have been along the lines of, "That's fine. Just make sure that you clean up after any food to cook/prepare for yourself 😉," because, it's not a problem for the daughter to have her own food. It would be a problem if she cooked/prepared it and then left the mess for the OP to clean up.

Personally I would have just sent a laughing emoji to this message. I don't see the big deal. (I then would probably have a look what treats there are to steal 😂)

Thanks for being the expert on my life while knowing nothing about it 😄

Agreed. I don't think it's especially rude.

I'd take it as a heads up that she'd got this food and knew what she was doing/when she was having it. It's really annoying when you've planned something and you come and find someone has eaten a key ingredient.
We've certainly had posts on here from people annoyed that their partner's eaten something from the fridge that they were looking forward to, and MN generally, even though they hadn't told the dh, condemns him and says he shouldn't have.

And the last sentence "I will know if you have" I'd take in a jokey tone, as a light-hearted remark.

I've 3 young adults in the house, and they do sometimes buy food for themselves and it's much better all round if they say "Please don't take the food in the fridge-I've got plans for it", although I wouldn't take something I know they've bought without checking first, which makes me wonder what the DD might have as a back story, if it's not light-hearted.

Of course she does. She's 18 not 5. But she didn't say it was from waitrose and therefore better than the food her mum buys, she was just identifying it. The OP has taken the wiatrose part as a snub because she 'only' shops at Tesco.

My exh buys our daughter food from M&S because that's where he shops. I shop at Lidl but I don't take offence at him buying her food from where he shops. And I still wouldn't eat it because its hers.

I would have replied
“ no problem darling , now you’re providing for yourself can you be sure to not eat anything that doesn’t have Waitrose on it - I’ll know if you have 😉 “

Thanks again everyone. I really appreciate your replies. I do sometimes have these ‘is it just me?’ moments, and Mumsnet really helps with that.
To answer a couple of things just quickly before work, no, she wasn’t joking. In fact, she finds it hard to laugh at herself 😁
And her sister currently has a sickness bug, so can’t keep anything down.
Their father, for his faults, is generous with them. Sometimes too generous, I think, which can cause an unhealthy dynamic where he gets resentful if they’re not playing ball. And frankly, they become spoilt.
I try to balance things out but it’s hard. Oh and yes, she often does cook for herself but loves to do so, often politely turning down my offer of meals.

Did she just send it to you or was it to you and your other daughter? I wouldn't have been happy with that if it was just aimed at you. If she is going to have her own food I would give her a shelf in the fridge - and I probably would have responded something along the lines, no problem, I bought lots from Tesco for this coming week, please do not eat it if you have your own food. Petty, I know but......

I have grown up kids and I put some stuff that is 'mine' in the bottom drawer of the fridge or freezer - they know not to touch it, mainly treats or my packed lunch stuff, but that's because they will just hoover anything up without tasting it, and there is plenty of other food for them - and 2 of them earn more than me so can feed themselves!