After 5 years and my 9yr old still struggling with divorce

[Suki12345]

Hi everyone

It?s my first post on mumsnet, and I?m hoping some of you out there might be able to offer some words of wisdom, as I don?t seem to be able to solve this problem myself.
I have a 9yr old girl and a 12 yr boy. My and their father were divorced 5 years ago, and we both handled the separation well ? always putting the children first. We never argued in front of them, never dissed each other, and always supportive of each other. My friends tell me it was a textbook separation, if there is such a thing. Me and my ex live close by, and we share all parenting decisions, and the children spend half their time with me and half with their dad.
My 12 year old is fine with this and is blossoming into a lovely young man.
But my 9 year old girl is still struggling. When she is with me she is constantly rude, belligerent, talks to me like dirt, and cries a lot saying she misses her dad. This has gone on for years. Last night she came home having spent the weekend with hew dad, worked herself up unto a frenzy, and once more sobbed herself to sleep saying she misses him. My son says she is a differnt person when she's with her dad - all giggly and fun. I?ve tried talking to her, constantly re-assuring her by telling her how much we both love her, but she won?t move on. Outside this the children are loved, do nice things, and are given 100% attention by whichever parent they are with ? in lots of ways they are very lucky children. She is very strong willed, and sometimes is feels like she is just pushing me on purpose and that she?s only happy when she?s made me cry. I don?t know what to do. She says dreadful things like ?I hate my life? and ?I?m going to kill myself?. She adores her father, and he is a lovely man and a great parent, but it?s getting me down constantly feeling like the parent she doesn?t want to be with. Could it be that she actually doesn?t like me? Should I let her be with her dad all the time? She?s only little so I don?t think I should let her make these decisions herself, but am I being selfish?
What is making it worse is that after all this time I have recently met a new man, who I have introduced to the children, but only as a friend. She hates him even though he is a lovely man and it's really getting me down. Should I give him up for her?

Hi, my small son went through a phase of obviously preferring his father (we are still together!) even to the point of being physically violent towards me. we found out eventually that he had a medical problem which was causing him to have mood swings. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with your daughter, just that her problems might be completely unrelated to the divorce.

My parents divorced when I was 6 / 7 and I had a lot of difficult issues with this for many years and a lot of anger and resentment towards my mother. They handled the divorce very well (in the same way that you describe) and shared parenting (one night a week and every other w/e spent with my father). In retrospect I think your daughter sounds very much like me and the way I behaved towards my mother. When I was about 11 my mother finally bit the bullet and sat down and said that if I wanted to go and live with my father I could. It was an incredibly hard thing for her to do. In the event I chose not to go (I'd have missed my older brother for one thing - a major factor), but somehow being given that choice in a real and entirely possible way where everyone was prepared to follow it through changed a lot for both my mother and I. We now knew that I was living with her because I had chosen to do so and as such I had to start behaving a little better and show a little respect. I too felt respected and listened to for being given the choice. I'm not sure what any of us would have done if I had decided to go (least of all my Dad!), but everyone had to be prepared for that. Probably I would have come back to my mother's house after a couple of months even if I had made the decision to go. I'm not necessarily saying you should give your 9 yr old the choice, just that in my own personal experience it was a sort of watershed when I was given that choice.

Have you talked to her together about the divorce and why it happened (I mean not any gruesome details if there were any but a sanitised version), perhaps if you and your ex could sit down with her together and explain that you grew apart, but still like and respect each other and it was nobody's fault etc it might help.

I blamed my mother hugely for the divorce (totally unfair - my father had had an affair with my mother's best friend, but it was clear to me early on although they never said it out loud, that he would have liked to have got back together). I didn't know any of the details until I was much older, but I always had the sense that my mother had chucked him out (which she had!) and blamed her for it.

On the subject of other men - I absolutely totally and utterly loathed my mother's boyfriends on principle (she had 2 long term boyfriends before marrying my stepfather 10 yrs after the divorce), to extreme and embarrassing levels of rudeness and surliness. You can be pretty sure that she has guessed that your 'friend' is actually your boyfriend or at least that there is a chance that he will become that. I'm not sure what to advise in that regard, you probably need to stick with it and do not permit her to be actually rude to him. Draw a line in the sand and say that even if she does not like him she must behave politely, then try not to force the relationship with jolly days out or fun - she won't want it It may be worth talking to your ex about your new boyfriend (if your relationship is good enough to discuss this sort of thing) and see if it is possible for your ex to bring it up in conversation with her and make it clear that he knows about your boyfriend, mentions him with respect and has has accepted it calmly and happily - this might help her to come to terms with it. If your boyfriend is part of your life then she will eventually accept it if you present it as a given and he becomes part of the weft of your life, but don't force him into her life too quickly or try and make her like him, he can just be there as a fixture on the sidelines to start with. Ground rules about appropriate behaviour are important for both his sake and hers.

On the other hand I tortured my mother constantly with stories of my father's perfect girlfriends even though in retrospect I can see that my step mother was (and is still) a crazy loon and my step father is a wonderful man!

Thanks very much Nelly.
It's interesting what you say about giving her the choice who she lives with. I have thought about that, but if I'm honest, I'm terrified to do that in case she does choose to live with her dad. I have a friend who gave her son the same ultimatum, and he did what you did, so maybe there is something in what you say.
I have talked about the divorce with her, and my ex says that perhaps we have been too kind about the marriage and each other, and so she can't understand why we split up if things weren't that bad!
She is very manipulative too - demanding that daddy be told when she is crying and asking what everyone is going to do about it. It feels like manipulation but then I wonder whether she's just an unhappy 9 year old crying out for help.
I have been seeing my current fella for a year now and he is still very much on the sidelines. My ex is great about it and supports the relationship with the children. Before that I'd been on my own since the divorce, and now the children are getting a bit older I feel like I deserve a bit of my own life back. And then when I see her crying it makes me feel selfish.
I do wonder how she will react when her hero-daddy finds himself a girlfriend.
Anyway, thanks for your help. People tell me I'm a good mum but I honestly don't feel qualified for this one!