Teenage daughter has left home and refuses to speak to me

[Houndmother75]

Please help. My teenage daughter and I (she is 17) had a massive falling out three weeks ago. She was unbelievably rude and abusive to me, having been in a foul mood since before I’d even spoken to her first thing, and went out to spend time with family friends. I asked that she be back in time for an early supper and to spend the rest of the evening studying for her a levels. She has been so rebellious of late, and far ruder than usual, and her college attendance has been poor. She continued to be abusive over WhatsApp, so in informed her in no uncertain terms why I was less than pleased with her attitude, and said if she wasn’t back in time she would be grounded until she could improve it. The online argument continued, she refused to be told what to do, so I concluded by saying if she wasn’t back then I’d asked I would simply lock the door. She wasn’t back, I locked the door, she tried to return several hours later, but had to return to our friends house. She hasn’t come back and has only spoken to me once since. She has accused me of all sorts, neglect being one (because the house is messy, but she won’t lift a finger to help me, preferring to hurl abuse when asked instead). She has been doing all sorts of stuff while living here, e.g. requested money for lunch when in college and has clearly bought vapes, alcohol, energy drinks etc etc (I found them under her bed along with so much mess and rubbish when I cleaned it after she’d gone). She told our family friends that I’d mistreated her, and that she will not return home. They took her at her word, without consulting me at all. Earlier this week they arranged to meet me, and I was told by them that she will now be staying with them for the next two years while she completes her a levels, and they will support her to get her own place after that. I have not been consulted and this is apparently non-negotiable. They alerted children’s services, who said they could do nothing since she is nearly 18. My friends have said they want her benefits to be transferred to them (child benefit and child maintenance), and that they will no longer be paid to me. I’m told that it’s unlikely I’ll be able to speak to her for a couple of months or so. I’ve also been told by them that my house is disgusting and unpleasant (which is part of the alleged neglect), and that my relationship with her is abusive and complicated and it’s been implied I am not good enough as her parent. Nobody in authority has contacted me about this. What the hell do I do? It’s like these “friends” of mine have decided to facilitate my daughter’s leaving of me, and have not once tried to find out what’s happening, despite my attempts to explain and discuss since she has been staying with them. Please help me. It feels like my soul has been ripped away…

They will soon get tired of funding another adult especially an ungrateful one! I think theyre trying it on to get money out of you.
Unless she legally moves out then you keep all payments moving forwards.

I really couldn't lock my own child out of their own house, however angry I was at them, that's really harsh.

It sounds like you both need some relationship therapy if things are to get better.

They’ve even said they will teach her to drive (I have already told her I will do this), and that she can have double the amount of piano lessons each month!!! Ffs!! Yes, they have two kids of a similar age. They’ve said they’re just going to take her in as though she is theirs!

I've only skimmed the thread OP so not sure if anyone has mentioned that this might be a scam and sadly its not unheard of for people to "take in" unhappy teenagers, their own kids' friends for example, in the hope of accessing benefits. They could be coercing your DD, they could have an agenda. I wouldn't necessarily see this as a benign intervention. I've heard accounts identical to yours many times through work and parent support groups, I think you need to get advice ASAP.

You could also consider contacting a child to parent abuse charity, have a read through this website see if you recognise yourself and DD:

https://www.pegsupport.co.uk

All other things aside, I do find it odd that pretty much their first action was to say they want money 🤔

Well they've got a lot to say but it's only been three weeks. I'd say the chances of this "adult adoption" working out for very long are extremely low.

I wouldn't focus on these friends or let them get to you. While I understand their boastful, superior tone is extremely annoying, I think they're also the very least important part of this whole picture. Your daughter will be eighteen in a week and a half so I'd deal with her directly and just ignore them. I wouldn't doubt if they're soon out of both of your lives for good anyway.

Thank your friends for offering your child a temporary place to live. Thank them for giving her a space to reset and focus on her best attributes and on her study.

Inform them that you pay your child's money to her and that they need to ask her to pay a contribution to her living arrangements.

Inform them that you will Spring clean her room and send any important things to her that she is likely to need. Repeat that your DD is welcome to resume living at home once her very rude and abusive ways are a thing of the past.

Ask whether your DD wishes to have her pets sent over to her. Inform that you are happy to care for them for six months.

Then tidy her room. Tidy communal spaces and get on with your life.

Send DD congratulations for her birthday: tell her your gift is at your home for whenever she wants to drop by for afternoon tea. Suggest that you are always home on a Sunday afternoon and.look forward to seeing her.

The ball is in her court. DD is an adult.

@Houndmother75 have a look at @DecisionTime123 ’s comment above. They may be genuine, but even if they are, remember they only have what DD has said to go on.

No, I told the college I am very worried about her. That I would welcome their support for her. She has had terrible attendance rates for the past year, and in the six weeks she has been back there it has got to the stage where she has to see the principal about it (I’ve had the emails). They email me if there is a problem there (which they have done a lot recently), and I have tried sitting down and discussing this with her. I just get verbal.

I asked Safeguarding if they could try to arrange her some counselling, and to check in with her to make sure she is ok, since she sure as hell won’t speak to me about what’s been bothering her. I did tell them about how she behaves at home, because it’s all relevant.

This.

I’ve done all that (except the birthday bit). She has blocked all contact with me. It seems we have an impasse, and I’m told by my friends it will likely be a couple of months before we can communicate.

I don’t think it’s odd at all. They probably know these things can take a while to transfer over, so they’re getting the ball rolling so everything is in place asap I suspect. They are being organised IMO

I really doubt they’d accept a whole child living full time with them and the additional upheaval that can cause just to access what - a few hundred extra per month? For all we know Ops daughter might be pushing for it as well or asking them for money to do X and Y and they’re needing to buy extra food for her and all the rest.

OP, you need to understand how unusual it was to lock your teenage daughter out. I assume this was quite late in the evening as well. I am not surprised they’ve taken her in and I’m not convinced at all it’s for the money. I think they have legitimate concerns.

There’s plainly more to this…

1. ”foul mood before I’d even spoken to her” - your daughter is upset and possibly going through something and you sound dismissive/ out of tune with what it is..?
2. “went out to spend time with family friends” - do they also have a teenager? Or has she literally escaped to be with adults…? This is very telling
3. your response is to demand she gets back for “early supper and to spend the rest of the evening studying”, not to try to resolve whatever is wrong. How early was the early supper - what time did you demand she return?
4. ”college attendance has been poor” - where is she going?
5. you “informed her in no uncertain terms why I was less than pleased” - what exactly did you say..? Could it have been read as nasty or threatening?
6. probably yes as you then issue her a threat of being grounded - inappropriate for a 17 year old, let alone one who is clearly going through something and has currently escaped to your friend’s house
7. you then issue a further very serious threat of locking her out of her only home if she doesn’t comply
8. she returns - despite everything - to find the door to her home locked. You have said in later posts that she has let herself in to collect belongings in the weeks since, so presumably she has keys? So what measures did you take to lock her out exactly? And where did you expect her to stay if not with your friends? The streets? Were you at all concerned for her safety? Did you not think she might need clean clothes, toiletries, toothbrush?
9. you acknowledge your house is “messy”. Your friends, who have seen it and known you for years, say it is “disgusting and unpleasant”.
10. You acknowledge social services are already involved and you’ve got MH difficulties including three breakdowns during your daughter’s lifetime
11. you complain that she “requested money for lunch” (how else is she supposed to eat?) and that she has at some point bought vapes, alcohol, energy drinks ( normal teenage behaviour). Also one of these is not like the others - energy drinks? Why is this an issue for you? Why does the poor girl feel the need to hide them under her bed?!
12. your daughter says she feels “mistreated”. Yet you continue to sound dismissive of this and angry at her.
13. your friends who have known you for years find this a credible claim and are putting themselves out to house and protect her
14. the friends have alerted children’s services so are clearly happy for a neutral intervener to look at the situation and for authorities to be involved

OP I understand not be handing over benefits to the friends, as i see that might feel like a transfer of authority and perhaps you would rather offer practical help with food shopping etc. As you are still her mother you don’t want to transfer that authority and obviously want her back. But I would seriously consider taking an honest look at your parenting, behaviour and the situation and consider getting in some professional help to support you and your daughter repair your relationship. Sorry to hear you’re struggling so much but I honestly think you ought to blame your daughter less and consider that if you’ve been struggling, she certainly has been too.

I tried to put my side and they said it is irrelevant….

OP, look at it from DD perspective. You're going to start paying the CMS and CB into her bank account. If she comes back to live with you again then what, you going to want it back and stop paying it to her? Which would be fair enough when you're paying the bills and buying the food, but you need to be realistic - she's not going to come back if it means losing that money as an income for herself.

Unless your friends kick her out. It doesn't sound like they will, they've put a time limit on it already, saying she can stay there for 2yrs to do her A-Levels and then they'll support her to find her own place. I actually think they're pissed off, given how you said they were in your second post. I'd say they phoned SS not because they wanted her there but because they didn't want her there. But SS fobbed them off and wouldn't help house her because she's almost 18 and they CBA getting involved. So they perhaps feel stuck with her and are cross about that. They'll support her but not for free, is what they're saying. The stuff about you having no authority is basically true. She's almost 18, you should be letting go, you're way too controlling for the age she is. Once she turns 18 you have no parental rights or responsibilities legally. You need to accept that your opinion on what's right/wrong and how DD lives her life is soon to be of no relevance. It's the only way you're going to get anywhere with her. You need to accept her as the autonomous adult she will soon be.

Your perfect picture you paint of her childhood actually sounds very pressured. Money stress. Risk of losing your home. Warring parents, DA and court cases. Going to a prestigious school, where they probably piled on the academic pressure to achieve achieve achieve constantly without let-up. House so messy/dirty SS stepped in to provide support to get it cleaned up, not something they do lightly. Absent dad, which comes with it's own issues, but also means you're the only parent. And you've been suffering with your MH her whole life. You've had 3 breakdowns, all of which DD has lived through too, with no parental support - since you were too unwell to help yourself, you wouldn't have been able to support her emotionally at that time. Which is understandable, but it's also emotional neglect. It's not bad enough to have a child removed by SS, but that doesn't mean everything was fine. Just because you did your best, it doesn't mean your best was enough. That's not the wondrous happy picture of childhood you've painted. That's a difficult childhood, one that it seems DD has been struggling with for some time, judging by her behaviour.

You really need to lose the anger. The attitude of "after all I did for you...". DD never asked to be born, OP. She doesn't owe you. It's not an attitude that's going to help you move forward in a relationship as two equal adults.

Houndmother is such a horrible, disrespectful thing to call yourself. You think of your daughter as a hound?

Yuck.

You should not have locked your 17 year old daughter out of the house. That has obviously backfired massively.
Your friends are weird. I can't imagine their kids will be happy with the new addition, especially when she starts acting out at that house.
I would back off now. Transfer the maintainance directly to your daughter, that will hurry along the process of her coming home when the 'friends' start demanding it from her.
Then look at fixing your relationship with her. Try not to blame her. It isn't fun watching your Mother have a breakdown, nevermind several. I can imagine she doesn't feel very safe or secure. Try fix that.

We’ll have to agree to disagree as I really do think it’s strange. What on earth is the big rush to access additional funds? They’ve basically decided they have another child now. I can’t imagine that money would be my first thought in that situation.

By the way I didn’t suggest that they were doing it for the money; you’re setting up a straw man there. I simply said that I think it’s very odd.

She said she’s got dogs…

FFS

Oh, so she sees her dogs as more important than her daughter.

FFS.

Lockig the door at night and not allowing her to come back home when she tried is abusive behaviour. She's nearly 18. Is it really so bad if she stays out later and buys energy drinks and vapes? Could you not have let some of that go?

I don't see why she would want to come home to a horrible relationship with you.

Are you joking? Please tell me this is an attempt at humour 😂

Excellent post @m00ngirl the lack of empathy and EI displayed towards the daughter is staggering.

I am almost triggered as quite frankly OPs posts reads like the communications we received from a certain type of mother while working in social services.

These mothers all had personality disorders or other mental health issues and were incredibly self absorbed and abusive. They didn’t read or respond to their children’s needs at all and really struggled to see things from their perspectives. They’d go between the extremes of neglect and excessive control.

Relationships usually deteriorated in teen years when the kids became harder to control and were more troubled by the emotional instability their mothers displayed, and then the mums would spiral and the kids would kick off and so on.

I must say I always partly blamed the men too as they were usually absent or present but completely useless. Mostly these men were at the root of a lot of the mental health issues.

You locked the door ….. she couldn’t come back

Are you joking? Please tell me this is an attempt at humour 😂