AIBU to feel hurt by my daughter’s slow replies to messages

[GoldenGran]

My Daughter and her fella have two kids. Nearly 3 and 6 months.

I will text her or she’ll text me sometimes it’ll take nearly a day for her to get back to me.

I know she’s busy with the children but a reply literally takes seconds. She can be dismissive towards me. She knows my bedtime is 9 and she often replies around that time. I think it’s because she knows I’m going to bed.

She is quick enough to phone when she wants something!

My husband doesn’t get why I’m annoyed by this! It’s rude isn’t it?

When you had your two children, you didn’t have your mother texting you every 5 mins expecting immediate replies.

Messages that no doubt are unimportant daily waddle. Otherwise you would phone her or arrange to visit.

she’s replies at 9 pm because that’s the first chance she gets when the kids are in bed. Your bed time needn’t be her concern.

you are clearly unfulfilled, and jealous that you are not your daughters priority. She is a grown up - leave her be if you want to maintain a good relationship.

But you didn't have barrage of text messages when you were bringing up your kids. We didn't even have a home phone till I was about 5 and all phone calls were directed to my great aunt and mum would pick any messages up couple of times a week. Unless it was urgent, in which case aunty would walk to our house to pass information on.
School notes were written in a diary or passed to parents on a sheet of paper torn out of an exercise book.
Now everyone wants you every five seconds.

Your comment about managing your time also sounds incredibly judgmental. If that's what the rest of your communication with your daughter is like, perhaps, she does not want to respond for that reason alone.

This has got to be a wind up surely? Did you have a phone buzzing with texts all day and a mother who wanted an immediate reply while you’re arm deep in poo nappies, whingey children, driving, cooking etc?

if it’s urgent, call. If it’s not, let her reply when she can.

you aren’t the only person messaging her. You are one of many people demanding her attention when she is in one of the most intense periods of her life.

why not pop round and help out and have a chit chat? Otherwise have a think about the demand you’re putting on your relationship over something that she just can’t achieve right now. She isn’t sat there glued to her phone doing nothing - she’s busy.

Haven't had time to read paste first page, but I think pps are giving @GoldenGran a pretty rough ride. I also have two DDs with their own young families and who work outside of the home, leading very busy lives. I can't use the phone any longer due to deafness (unlike when I was a young mother myself and rang my own mother daily, as I was expected to do, but that's a whole other story) so I use text and email to communicate usually on a weekly basis.

I understand that younger people (my DDs are in their 40s) lead very busy lives but those lives are no busier than when I was a working mother in the 1980s/90s. It is almost always me who messages DDs on our family Wattsapp asking how they and their families are. They reply as and when they want to/have time. But if it takes me merely minutes to message them, then why can't they do me the same courtesy.

I don't feel 'hurt' but I do feel angry sometimes at being the one who makes the effort to keep in touch.

I sometimes don’t reply straight away. Sometimes I need a bit of time to think of what to say. Plus my texts don’t always go through straight away. So I think it’s delivered but I check to see if the person has replied but it’s not even been sent. Or it’s slow sending it. We live in south Cumbria near to the Lake District so visit the lakes a lot and often can’t get a signal.

Two hours and the OP has not replied to the thread. How rude.

No, we dont all scroll on our phone. Some of us even use a PC for mumsnet, you know.

Also, messages will often get prioritise by actuall need or non/urgency. Not by family relations.

Tbh OP I see your point, it does annoy me when people take an age to respond.

We all know pretty much everyone has their phone with them all the time now, I have a young child but I still manage to reply to people, not always straight away but usually always within a couple of hours. Only exception would be if I'm in work meetings/without my phone for some reason.

However, that being said, my mum's texts do sometimes annoy me so I'm wondering if this could be the case for your daughter too🙈She never texts me about a topic or with anything to actually say, but will just randomly text saying "Is everything ok?" or "How's things?" and I do find it a bit draining, especially as Iikely have seen her within the last couple of days. I do reply but nothing extensive unless she actually asks about something specific because otherwise it's just the same questions over and over again. There's only so many times I can reply that we're fine when she knows that already because she saw us yesterday.

What kind of messages are you sending her?

😂

the problem with some people is that if you reply quickly then they send another reply and it just keeps going.
whereas in my head I’ve ticked that off on my to do list

Well we're all different obviously but I'd certainly reply to my dm, df or dh and then leave other stuff til later if I'm so busy baking or doing crafts with my dc and have not been on my phone at any point all day.

My own mum sometimes takes days to answer my texts, it doesn’t both me as she always does in the end, and it helps that she isn’t ’high maintenance’. As a parent to young children you constantly find yourself with txts, emails , class charts etc to deal with. She may set aside some time at the end of the day when the kids are in bed to reply. The fact that she replies the same day is better than I could manage.

She is managing her time. She’s presumably prioritising her children whilst they’re awake - (it’s not great for parents to be on their phones), and she’s replying to you once they’re in bed.

if you said she waited a week to reply I’d agree with you, but getting back to you later the same day is absolutely a non-issue.

I avoid being on my phone around my children. I want to set a good example RE screens. I usually reply to messages while they're sleeping or in the evening when they've gone to bed. It worries me that you're reacting like this and haven't shown any empathy. I think you need to have a hard look at your attitude towards your daughter.

You are completely unreasonable. It’s so demanding and selfish of you to expect replies like that.

😂😂😂

👏

I agree.

I make a conscious effort to not be on my phone around my DC.

No one needs to be texting back and forward all day.

OP needs some hobbies or friends.

Respectfully @GoldenGran I think you need to find more things to occupy your time, maybe some new hobbies, making new friends. I am assuming you don't go out to work? (You never said but it sounds like you're home a lot.) Maybe some volunteer work? I don't know your circumstances as you've not said a lot about yourself, just complained a lot about your busy 'mum of 2' daughter!

I don't mean to sound rude, and I am sorry if it comes across that way, but sometimes when peoples lives slow down, and they're not so busy, it can feel like a lifetime waiting for something, and especially waiting for a text or message back from someone.

My mother used to be on my case if I didn't ring her 4-5 times a week and go and see her 3 times a week. (When I was working 3-4 days a week and had 2 small children! And she never worked!! Ever. She was a SAHM/homemaker all her life) She would make sarcastic remarks like 'I thought you were dead!' and 'been abroad have you?' (after 48 hours of no contact!!!) and occasionally 'you'll wish you'd been in touch more when I'm dead! You will feel so guilty!' (That has never happened, because I KNOW I gave her a lot of my time - and patience!!!)

But yeah, back off and stop demanding so much attention from her. She has left home and has her own family. What about your other child? You say you have 2 girls... Are bothering the other one as much? Are you as annoyed with her? Or does she act a good girl and message you immediately?!

Seriously, my 2 (also girls aged 30-ish) had a phase where they would take a day to message me back, and even now it can take half a day! I am used to it as I know they're busy and I don't mind... Sometimes they message first, sometimes I message them first, and I see them 3-4 times a month (sometimes I and DH go to them - sometimes they come to us.) I work part time (18 hours a week, and have a very small social life,) and they have very busy professional careers (that involve some travelling,) and a busy social life. I don't expect anything from them. They are independent adults, who flew the nest over a decade ago, and I don't expect them to always always text me back within 3 seconds.

YABVVVU, and you need to chill a bit, and back off. The poor woman has enough on her plate with 2 little ones!

You are definitely being unreasonable.
She has 2 small children and a home to run ( work too ? )

My mum expects a fast reply, and despite being full on in life with a 2 year old I try to reply fast, but then it has created a situation where if she doesn't hear from from for 6 or 7 hrs she panics that somethings wrong and sends messages asking if everything is OK. She's retired and has all day to be on her phone and gets alot if pleasure from pics of my son etc but it's become an expectation and for me tbh, a chore as it doesn't fit naturally with my day to be constantly in touch.

The dreaded blue ticks don't help. I'll have time to glance at some messages but can't always stop and reply properly so when she sees he ticks are blue I get "hello??" "Everything OK?" "Well??" Etc.

I think we're actually too accessible and in touch these days, and insecond ehat another poster said, her texting at 9pm is when everyone is down for bed, dinners done and chores are done, she has the mental space to sit and reply to daily messages. It's not necessarily all about you and your bedtime.

Was texting even a thing back then?

Did you have a phone then though with people with 24/7 access to you though?

I don’t have children but even I can appreciate she has her hands full!

I'm not very busy at all, and I still don't usually reply to texts straight away. I reply when I want to.

Obviously I'll reply quickly if it's urgent, but most texts don't fall into that category. Otherwise I'll usually reply by the end of the day, or else the following day. Nobody's ever complained (well, one fairly unpleasant distant cousin did complain once, but I just told her that I don't normally reply to things straight away.)

I'm polite to people. I just don't see why they would expect me to jump to reply to them instantly. I wouldn't expect that of them; they have lives to live and I'm sure my messages aren't their top priority. Why would you think that your daughter needs to reply to you quickly? There's no rush.

I rest my case!!! The OP has too much time on her hands - like your mum, and my mum!!! Do they forget how busy life was when they were younger with young children?! I haven't forgotten!

You may have 'managed your time' when you had young children but I don't expect you were dealing with text messages? Your DD is managing her time and possibly not using her phone much when she's looking after your grandchildren. I think it's good manners not to read and answer texts when I'm with another adult, so I would extend that courtesy to children. If your message is urgent - when are you coming over - then call her. If it's not urgent - what would you like for birthday next month - then her replying later in the day doesn't matter.