His daughter's behaviour....

[Forthelovagod]

Partner has one daughter 19, lives with him but now at uni so home some of the time. Just been home for summer.
Was her birthday 10 days ago. Saw lots of lovely gifts lying around one of which was a beautiful m&s bouquet.

Partner works away. Left a week ago. She left for uni yesterday. Called in to house today to do some jobs and when putting rubbush out noticed the bouquet still in cellophane unopened in the bin.

I didnt buy them but im pretty sure whoever did would be pretty devastated to see them chucked in the bin.. I just can't fathom this behaviour and find it hard to be around. Im actually sad i bought her a gift because she clearly doesnt value other people's money and i certainly don't have money to waste.

I wish i could park it but i find it hard to not let it affect how i feel about my partner. How has he raised a human that thinks this is ok.

Aibu or would you feel remotely similar?

Fwiw id absolutely go through my dc if it was them. I'd be gutted.

Perfectly ok, if it's yours to bin.

It sounds like what it's touching on is whether you and your partners beliefs are aligned. You say you feel they are the same based on what he says.. what do his current actions say rather than what he speaks of? I would also consider how much control do I believe one parent has on a child's behaviour? Not that there's a right answer but do I personally believe he is overwhelmingly responsible?

Is this lower mind fear based chatter or my intuition trying to show me something I might not like to look at?

Why do you need to separate his parenting from your perception of him? I would consider that that's part of your value system and is informing your opinion. At the same time, the experience of parenting over many years can change a person.

I'm sure you will come to some clarity.

I don’t like flowers. Watching them die etc. maybe she’s the same

Maybe they weren’t lovely to her. It’s definitely not that deep.

She is 19, of course she has a history of selfish behaviour.

So flowers a fortnight old she was supposed to have done what?

also. You don’t know who they came from. They might have come from a stalker ex.

I came home one day to 2 dozen red roses from interflora on my step. I didn’t fucking want them. No name but I know who they were from and they went straight in the bin.

I wonder whether a bunch of flowers was a good present for someone who was just about to go off to Uni? She couldn’t really enjoy them for long as she was about to go and probably didn’t want to leave them out to die after she left.

Or, they could be from a stalker ex as pps have said.

Or she might just have not wanted the hassle of putting them in water but even though that seems ungrateful, it’s probably not worth wasting your time worrying about.

If I had received a bouquet of flowers 10 days ago, and then I was leaving and there was nobody else in the house who would enjoy them, I’d bin them too. What else would she be expected to do with them - just leave them to rot?

Am I missing something here?

Do you have children OP? As parents, we get the children we are given and while parenting does obviously play a huge part in who a child grows up to be, it doesn’t shape their every action or feeling.

You accurately can’t judge a persons parenting skills on how teenagers behave in their own home.

She was going off to university, what was she supposed to do with a bunch of cellophane wrapped flowers? They were always either going to go in the bin early, or be left to rot and stink as while left in an empty house. If she’s done that you’d probably be on here complaining that she left her flowers to be cleaned up by someone else. YABVU.

I always chuck flowers straight in the bin. I have a horrendous reaction to the pollen and can't breathe so actually, the people that know this and still send them are the assholes in my situation.
Can't really imagine many 19 year olds wanting 10 day old flowers though so surely binning them rather than leaving them for someone else to clear up was the right thing for her to be doing here??

10 days old and back to uni, they probably needed binning by then.

It does seem a bit churlish that she didn't even take the plastic wrap off them and stick them in a pint glass. But young folk do have brains that don't work the same as ours. Mine moan when I ask them to bring down their rubbish bins from their bedrooms. It's too much, they're too tired, they don't have time. It's like I've asked them to perform the labours of Hercules!

Last time my son's girlfriend was here he went to get her from the airport and took a bouquet of roses. The roses went back up to his room with them. She seemed happy about them. However it occurred to neither of them to stick them in a vase of water. A few days later the roses came back down in the waste paper basket, dried out and still in their plastic. So I hate to say it but it's pretty normal behaviour at that age.

I adore getting flowers but not sure a 19 year old would feel the same. To me they are a real treat that I wouldn’t buy myself. I am rubbish at spending money on myself,

No pollen allergy, not from stalker ex etc... I've known her since nursery school.... Probably from her aunt at a guess.

I can see why as an isolated incident i appear to be the problem here. There's lots of back stories but i wont drip feed.
It is what it is. And i recognise im probably over thinking this because of my own stresses related and unrelated to her.

I'll get over it. Thanks for the perspective 🙂

Separate your feelings for him as a partner and as a parent? You mean you like him but think his parenting must be shit because she’s spoilt enough to chuck 10 day old flowers in the bin. I mean I’d say thanks love for not leaving dead flowers to someone else to clear up.
I get it, I think, you like him, but don’t align yourself with his parenting. That’s life and happens even with married couples who share dc together. No biggie, it means though you keep your opinions to yourself.

I mean she could've blended her 10 day old flowers into a soup, but most of us just bin them 🤷‍♂️

From her aunt ‘at a guess’? So in fact you have no idea who they’re from and they could well have been from someone creepy.

What did you think she should have done with them given she was going back to uni?

Clearly it is the back story that is the real issue here.
Throwing out flowers when going back to uni isn't unreasonable. Yes they might still be in the cellophane, but that doesn't mean she didn't keep them in a vase or something until she left.
You don't like her and are therefore over analysing trivial things. Even if she did throw them out immediately, it's not really your problem.

Yabu tbh, leave well alone

I don't see that this is really a drama. Unless she could have given them away what else could she have done with them.
i cannot stand cut flowers - I don’t understand why anyone would want to give me something that is essentially dying. The last bunch I got stood in a bucket in the utility room until I talked to my neighbour over the wall and offered them to her.

Taking flowers out of the wrap, cutting the stems and putting them in a vase with water and food is quite a faff. Did she even have a vase for them? After 10 days though even if she had done all the right things they would be likely to be looking the worse for wear.

Teens are selfish, give her till 25 at least to grow out of that.

You can’t separate your boyfriend from his daughter in your head, they are a package. You don’t like her, so stay out of her space and away from that home. You have such a superior attitude m, no teen girl needs that in her life.

Give other examples though because the flowers sounds trivial

What I would give for this to be the worst example of behaviour from my DP’s DD! 😭

The thing with flowers is that they end up in the bin anyway. You have no idea if she threw them on the day she got them (no one changed the bin in 10 days?!?) , or was just lazy /forgetful and put them in water in a vase and then chucked them out before going to uni.

This is not a flowers issue. The bigger picture is, she has a nice life with your BF (her Dad) and you don’t have money to waste, I assume your BF is a decent earner, so you now feel resentment toward her for not being grateful and her having a nice life. Sure you wouldn’t have liked them for yourself? She’s 19, too busy thinking about getting back to uni life. I think you need to look at yourself and the relationship with her Dad rather than pick holes with her, OP.