Why won't dd1 admit to dh that she enjoys dancing?

[SheSellsSeashellsByTheSeashore]

She eats, sleeps and breathes dance classes. It's what she lives for.

Every year after her play we discuss whether she enjoyed it and ask if she wants to continue. She has just told me and dh that she doesn't want to go anymore. Which is fair enough. She can stop. But while she was saying this she was whispering to me "Please don't stop me dancing"

On the way home from her play last night she was bubbling over with excitement about when she does the play as a big girl she will get flowers on the stage. When she is really big she will do what Miss X does and teach the babies and help them in the play.

Yet every time dh mentions dancing to her she tells him she doesn't like it. She is tired of dancing.

Which causes arguments between me and dh because he thinks I am making her do things she doesn't enjoy, which cost a fortune.

Why does she do this?

Any ideas?

FWIW dd1 is v headstrong. If actually didn't want to dance I wouldn't have a chance in hell of getting her into the class. Or even her shoes.

Weird.

Does your DH not like dancing, so your DD is trying to play up to him? Does he maybe disapprove of the cost, so she's trying to be polite to be 'good'?

How old is she?

Is it possible she's just being bubbly and grateful about it because she knows you like it?

I guess you have two real problems here - First, your DH doesn't believe your account of what your DD says. Can you (secretly) do a voice recording of her talking about it with you on her own (I know my phone does voice recordings really easily), and play it for your DH, so you can hear what she says when he's not around.

Second, your DD is being a bit funny about this, and it would be good to understand why. Have you asked her why she tells her father she's tired of dancing?

I think it's unlikely she's telling you a lie and your DH the truth, I assume she's closer to you than to him, and you're a SAHM or at least more of a caregiver?

Yes I have asked her why she says it and she says she just doesn't want him to know that she likes it.

He dissaproves of the cost but he has also said that id she genuinely enjoys it then he doesn't mind spending the money on it.

Yes I am the main caregiver, and I am also the one who spends the most time with her at dancing. He will collect her if I have to go to work but that is as far as his involvement in her dancing goes, he does not like going there as its noisy, hot and chaotic.

She is 5 btw. She has been dancing nearly two years now. And has done this ever since she started. She tells DH that she doesn't like going.

Weird.

Why doesn't she want him to know she likes it? Does she hide her other likes from him? Has he gone to her performances?

Yes he has been to watch her both plays she has been in even though he doesn't like sitting through performances of any kind

.

It sounds like she's trying to please him.

Any chance you can explain to her, that this is confusing you and him, and you need her to tell him the truth? He will still love her if he knows she likes dancing more than gymnastics - she maybe doesn't know this, though?

Call her bluff? DON'T take her to dancing for a couple of weeks and see what happens. If she asks to go and or whinges about NOT going you have a chid who wants to go to dance class. if she doesn;t notice.....

I have already done that UniS. Last summer my mum took a few weeks holiday from work and dd1 was more interested in going to her Nana's and going camping than dancing. Fair enough. I stopped taking her, as every day I asked if she was going to go today her answer was "tomorrow I'll go"

When my mum went back to work she seemed to have forgotten about dancing, untill she spotted her costumes from last years play she started talking about what she thought this years would be. I explained that she would not be in this years play as she had left dancing and she was inconsolable. She made phone the dance school that day to tell them she was going back and hadn't infact left at all.

She was not happy at all when she realised that she had lost her place in her comps classes and the under 8's troupes had all been picked.

She has vowed that this summer she will only go camping on days that she is not at dancing, or to places that are close enough to come back and attend her dance class.

I will tell her that DH will still love her just as much if he knows that she likes dancing, but I am sure she knows this as he tells her when we are talking about it that he won't be cross if she says she likes dancing. He just doesn't want to feel like she has to dance.

She is trying to please both of you by the sound of it.
Somehow your DH's disapproval must be silently broadcasting all over the place, as I think she is saying this to his face to please him. Somehow she really thinks her dancing is getting his disapproval (how overt is his criticism?).

My DD used to pick books that she knew I had read, for me to read to her, it soon became plain she was not enjoying them but was picking them because she knew I approved of them and liked them.

As my DD is five as well and a little girl very eager to please and fit in with mummy and daddy I have noticed she can say things because she knows we will approve, not because she genuinely feels it herself.

I think your DH is going to have to join in with the dancing vibe a bit more. My DD loves horses, which DH hates but he trailed to the stables last weekend and watched her and said she was doing well and explained he can't get on with horses "but it's really great you do, not everyone can like the same things". My DD also says she "loves daddy best" which I get depressed about, but she is being honest, his approval is VERY important to her, so DH works very hard on enthusiasm for her interests, even if he is not too into it himself. He always turns out to her ballet demonstrations, or watches the film I've taken.

I'm not being horrid about your DH but I think if DD is headstrong, it comes from her dad so you have 2 strong characters here, and she is feeling his (un)spoken disapproval and trying to assuage it, all the time knowing she wants to do her dancing.

Your DH is going to have to accept his daughter for what she is, not what he fancied whe she was in utero. Otherwise she will become miserable as her biggest love (dance) is not what her Daddy wants, and a little girl wants to please her daddy! It's true, my DD is a daddy's girl too.