Is my daughter being unreasonable? What to do...

[EmmaWizard909]

34 year old daughter called us in tears last Saturday night, asking us to come over on Sunday as her relationship has broken down and her other half has left to stay with his mum so he can think. We live around 35 miles apart from her, and through countryside so it takes about an hour to get there.

We declined (my DH is 60 and gets tired after working all week) and we’d planned to use Sunday look at some fabric at a store 45 mins in the opposite direction. We were happy to speak to her on the phone and have a chat (didnt last long as she was in a state and didn’t want to speak for long) but on Sunday morning we received a load of abuse from her.

I’ve been told I’m a shit mother, im never there for her, I have my priorities elsewhere and would prefer to shop that support her when she needs me, she’d ‘never felt so low’ and we still couldn’t come over. She said she never asks anything of us of this nature and that she was clearly desperate and alone, and we failed her. We apparently only give her money, not emotional support. The list of accusations went on and on: mostly that we were selfish for going shopping when she needed us and we had all week to shop when she was at work (not strictly true as we both work two days in the week so don’t have as much free time as she likes to suggest).

My DH argued back, he was furious with her. I sided with DH but I’ve been unable to forget the conversation. DH isn’t having any of it and thinks we are right to defend ourselves but my daughter hasn’t spoken to me or him now for nearly a week. I’ve no idea what’s going on with her relationship but i can only presume it is over.

Is she in the wrong, are we? At 34 I would never have called my parents asking them for this kind of support. In fact I was married with children by then! Part of me feels she is over the top and demanding, the other part of me wonders if we dealt with this wrongly. Can’t talk to DH and feel trapped really because if I contact my daughter that will undermine him.

Any advice as to how to deal with this?

You keep saying she's fiery like that's a bad thing...

You chose fabric over your daughter. How is that right? She needed you.

You sound like my mum - although I have never flown off the handle at her (as she turns it around to be all about her, and sends me loads of abuse) - I am how no contact with her as she was never there for me, and whenever I went though anything and needed her support it was all on her terms and all about her.

Well I know exactly where my mum would be in that situation, and it's not shopping. How heartless

Wow. Fabric sale is the new stately home.

Course she did.

If you have shown similar levels of emotional support throughout her life, I'm surprised she still talks to you tbh. I'm hoping this is a reverse. Otherwise it's the worst example of parenting I've read on this site and I've been here for years because it's the most deliberately wrong-headed and lacking in compassion.

YABU imo you are shit parents. Selfish and unkind. Your DH is a bully by the sounds of it. Myself and my DH are similar age and work 6 days a week but would fly round the world on our one day off for our grown up kids

She's giving you another chance. Please wake up. Your daughter deserves better from her mother.

Oh my fucking god. Young enough, sure, but she was incredibly upset, you dense fool! How could that have been safe?! You’re vile. I feel so sorry for your daughter.

My dd is 45 and if she needed me I would be there no matter how far, what time or what reason. If she asked that would be enough and dh would support me.

OP the more you write the more detached you sound. I dont think you're taking on board anything, you're just reiterating how difficult she is.

You sound emotionless and are making excuses for letting down your daughter when she has said she needs you.

I am 37 weeks pregnant and these posts just highlight the type of mother I dont want to be

My sister’s husband left her when she was 28 and our dad was 61. My mum slept in her bed with her for a week, stroking her hair and speaking to her when she woke up at all hours. My dad drove the 1 hour round trip to transport all her stuff from her old home for her, doing several runs. He’s a full time farmer. My sister is also a fiery character.

You didn’t say in your op that she does this all the time and you’re tired of supporting her through multiple breakups. You said you had a fabric sale to go to.

My fiery sister is currently nursing my father who is post op. She’s taken time off her work to help mum care for him. Some food for thought for you.

You're manipulative and emotionally unavailable. She's going to go from bad relationship to bad relationship until she releases that she deserves better from her parents and from all her other relationships.

My friend is a similar age to you. We have known each other for years. We've always been there for each other.

She works full time, 8-6 5 days a week. Every time I go into hospital, despite it taking her just over an hour, she insists on coming to see me.

It's what nice caring people do.

My own mother, however, it didn't fit in with her schedule, or so I'm told when she spoke to her gc's years ago. They have since gone lc, as they keep her around to understand a bit better why I am the way I am.

I'm 100% in the YANBU camp, OP.
Sounds like you are making up with your DD.

I admire how much dignity you've handled this thread with.

If your DH wasn't able to drive and you really wanted to be there, you'd have found another way. The driving thing is a poor excuse.

I agree entirely with your daughter. You are being unreasonable. It would have been a different matter if you or your DH were in hospital, seriously unwell, etc and so couldn't go and visit her but to prioritize a fabric shop over seeing her? That's really odd. Some break-ups can really trigger people into the worst mental states, depending on the relationship and the reason for the break-up with some people even becoming suicidal so it's understandable you downplaying it would have upset her.

Your situation of you at 30 is not comparable. Like you say, you got lucky - you were married and with kids by then so you wouldn't ever have been in her situation at her age so it's no achievement you didn't ask this of your parents.

Also 35 miles is nothing.

You are an awful parent.

Awful, selfish and pathetic.

I don't think it was at all reasonable for a 30 year old woman to expect her parents to drive an hour to see her because she's split up with her boyfriend - I think it's bonkers that so many people on here think that's a perfectly reasonable request and I wonder how many of them would really drive an hour like this??? We really are infantilising young people these days - this is a woman of 30, not a kid, and she should have friends who are more local that she can turn to for the heartbreak stuff. I've never turned to my parents in this sort of situation and I genuinely have a great relationship with them and I actually thinks it is such a great relationship because we aren't co-dependent.
I do think the op should have gone around instead of going shopping but I also think that the daughter should have travelled to them as asked if she really did need them so much - that seems a much more normal way to behave in the situation to me anyway. The fact that she's sent rude messages also doesn't endear her to me.
I think it must be horrible to be trapped between your dd and dh OP. If I were you I'd say stuff it to your dh and go to see her but only stay if she's polite to you. Parents of 30 year olds are entitled to have lives unless it's a genuine emergency- this was not that.

I’m actually fuming. Received a similar call tonight from my DD. She’s in Australia- I’d kill for her to be an hour drive away. I want to be there. Not just for her but for me- I’m her Mum, she hurts, I hurt.

I'm 62. My daughter is 37. She phoned to ask me to pick up some craft stuff from her house. I asked if she wanted me to come tomorrow, or next week when we had planned a visit. Next week is fine, but if she'd needed me to collect it I would have made the 3 to 4 hour return journey to do that. To collect craft items. If she'd phoned to tell me she needed me, I'd have been there tonight.

I thought the opening post was made up. No-one could be so uncaring. Then I remembered my eighty-seven year old father has just disowned me, and that he didn't send a birthday card to my granddaughter, his great-granddaughter, because of it. Some parents are just not nice.

Your a horrid mother and your husband is even worse. You deserve the abuse your daughter gave you she was crying for help and you basically slapped her in the face! Vile, let's hope you feel enough guilt to go over there ASAP

So how did the conversation go?

Because if I'd had that phone call from my daughter I would have been telling my husband "no shopping tomorrow we are off to see daughter"

Or if she had wanted to drive over straight away or asap the day day-that would have been that.

No pissing about trying to fit her in around the shopping.

So who decided that he shopping must come first?

Who gives you emotional support, OP?