Feel like DD has tried to sabotage me again and feel furious.

[MouthoftheSouth]

Help me process this a bit: I'm emotionally all over the place about this and don't trust my own reactions. Want to walk a line between being compassionate and understanding and not being a walkover. and don't know where I am on that line.

DD (12) had a rough year 7 last year and had to have counselling to deal with some difficult feelings. One of the manifestations of this was that she went through a period of asking teachers to call me during the working day and ask me to come and pick her up from school. (This happened maybe 3-4 times).

Obviously this wasn't workable (apart from anything else I work FT) and it caused a bit of a flashpoint with school, resulting in them asking me to get her some help because it was disruptive etc. She was processing some difficult things, such as the death of my father during COVID etc, so they were compassionate about it but she also had to learn that this isn't acceptable behaviour and work on her resilience etc.

She had counselling and things improved a lot, so by the third term of Year 7 it had stopped. She generally is in a much better place and her confidence and resilience has improved.

Yesterday she had the first of three days of a summer club which was a real hassle to get to. I started work later to drop her off and within an hour of leaving her there got a call from one of the supervisors to say she was feeling ill, so I had to schlepp back up there to pick her up again.

I suspected that she wasn't really ill but didn't want to be there and when I questioned her about this in detail this turned out to be true: she just didn't really enjoy it and wanted to come home (basically didn't like the feel of it). I was beyond furious and it took me a few hours to climb down. It made me so angry that she just presumed I could drop everything to pick her up just because she wasn't enjoying it.

She's very dependent on me in many ways for her age (I'm a lone parent and we are very close). I love her to distraction and I am and always will be there for her but am really trying to push her to be more independent and resilient, partly for her sake but also because I need freedom to work in order to support her (I usually work from home) so I can't constantly be asked to disrupt my working day.

I increasingly also feel quite stifled by her neediness. It's very hard for me to do anything on my own without her wanting to be involved or feeling she has a right to be involved in everything I do and I often feel I'm not allowed any space to be on my own or with my partner (who doesn't live with us) without her having to be involved. I feel at some level that she is sometimes quite manipulative and will invent problems if they give her an excuse to disrupt my working day. Obviously it's shit that I have to work this much to support her, but that's the reality of my life.

I felt after the counselling that we were making some progress but she seems to have backtracked.

Having to pick her up half way through the working day for no reason is a massive, massive hassle for me and got me into loads of trouble. She knows this full well and she knows how upset I am that she's ignored this because she was feeling a bit of mild discomfort. I'm trying not to make her feel awful and I made sure we didn't go to bed on an argument last night and had a nice evening with lots of hugs etc but I'm still absolutely seething inside and can't let it go.

Am I over-reacting? Should I be more hardline about this or am I being unkind? I'm at my wits' end with it and starting to honestly feel quite resentful.

You say sabotage like it's something she is deliberately doing against you.

This is all about her, probably about how she is handling grief and wanting to be with the parent who is still there, but maybe she just hates the prospect of holiday clubs. (I did)

It really isn't about you

This sounds really hard. Do you think she’s trying to prove something, like that you love her more than work/your partner? Or do you think it’s a control thing?

Re the holiday club I guess there’s nothing you can do about it now, but in terms of school I’m surprised they didn’t just tell her to sit down because school is compulsory. Maybe they need to be tougher with her too.

you don’t sound harsh at all, I think one solution might be to tell her that you’re not going to have access to your mobile phone when she’s next at an activity, that you’ll pick her up at the end as agreed. If she thinks there’s no opportunity to get hold of you perhaps it would mean she isn’t tempted to test you.

She's 12 and seems to be going through a rough time.

Your anger and resentment come across strongly in your post. I'm sure she feels them.

She's an only child in a single parent family going through a big school transition. Of course she will cling to you. And if you don't show you're there for her with kindness and support then she's going to continue to struggle to feel safe, valued and heard.

Why is she supposed to accommodate you wanting to do things with your partner...who us caring for her and giving her love and fun then?

I think you need a new approach.

Don t have much advice really but I went through the same with my daughter for a few years.
The teenage brain rewires itself and they can be astonishingly selfish and fail to see any one else’s point of view.
It is positive she engaged with counselling so could you re visit that ?
Unfortunately for me it lasted a few years until my daughter grew out of the teenage horror years . She is a delight now.

She’s old enough to be reminded that you need to work to pay the bills

I can completely relate to your post. Most of all the fear/frustration that comes with being a single parent and being totally responsible for providing a roof over your child's head as well as needing to provide for their emotional needs. Don't beat yourself up over how you feel - I doubt anyone understands unless they're in that particular rock and a hard place.

I would look into child specific CBT. The causes don't really matter because there will always be stressful and anxiety promoting situations but it's how she learns to deal with them.

Agree with PP, she is only 12 and unable to handle some feelings. I understand you being tired of the disruption. But to finish the disruptions she need to be able to handle herself better.

Did she told you that she didn't want to go?

Be patient and help her in all ways you can you are the adult in the relationship.

@AquamarineGlass

That’s completely fair and I will take that. I was really angry and I know I need to chill out.

This isn’t really about my partner though: he wasn’t there. Not sure why you are particularly focused on this?

@Epidote

No she really wanted to go.

What would the club have said if you couldn't collect? I'd be a bit more unavailable straight away eg 'I'm in a meeting for 3 hours, then I'll collect'. Especially in situations where she's not actually ill.

It sounds difficult for you OP.

Re school I'd also give them the heads up that there's nothing wrong and they should be telling her to go back to lessons.

Can you do a bit of natural consequences too with dd? Like "sorry I didn't get paid cus I had to collect you, so no new clothes".

Just echoing above posters, 12 is a really really tricky age - it's not necessarily her "getting her way" at your expense, it very likely to be a whole heap of anxieties and not knowing how to healthily handle uncomfortable situations.

There are lots of things you can try to help her not rely on you and build her own confidence and expression. Things which helped my dd at 12.

Developing her own taste and styles, encouraging her to introduce me to new things she see and hears about from school/tiktok. Does she have any interests that can be expanded on even if they seem a bit trivial to you? Honestly, latch on to anything! I spent a month sampling mug cake recipes because she was trying to perfect a recipe!

Asking her to pick where we can eat out, being enthusiastic, laughing about it if it's a dud (it's a lesson learned if she doesn't like raw tuna).

New hair styles, body washes, stuff from lush, clothes, stationary - building her confidence to pick products for herself.

Being responsible for things at home, so she needs to do washing up or cooking, especially if she's outgrown holiday club, if she wants to be treated more as an adult she needs to take on adult responsibilities.

Stuff outside of school, park run, drama classes, learning an instrument. They can pick up and drop stuff frustratingly quickly, key thing is not to invest much I them and show its not a big deal to try stuff and not like it (far easier said than done!)

Clubs in school, especially if there is a class production, encourage expanding her friendship group.

Pets can also wonderfull confidants if this a possibility.

All of this of course most time and money - she can't have these opportunities unless you work - teenagers can be really expensive for this reason, but if you keep your end game of rasing a self confident able young woman, you won't go far wrong.

I feel for you OP. Can she go back to counselling if you feel she is going backwards? Are school still offering support? She is at such a tricky age and I don’t doubt that she knows exactly what to say to get out of doing something she doesn't want to do BUT try not to take it so personally. Easy for me to say I know. Don't be upset that you reacted though. You are never too young to see how your actions can affect people. You are not a robot, you are a human being. It will do her no harm to see that.

@Hercisback

What would the club have said if you couldn't collect

Not sure: it’s a new club. I didn’t want to try that out on the fly as I didn’t want to be “that parent”.

In terms of natural consequence she saw that unfold last night because I had to work two hours in the evening to catch up the work I missed going over to pick her up and couldn’t hang out and watch tv with her. I think she understands in theory but can’t stop herself sometimes.

She's 12. She's struggling and she's asking for help in the only way she knows how. I get it's frustrating but she's still very young. She's allowed not to want to be at holiday club. If you can work from home could you give her the option to work from home but you can only be interrupted for emergencies. Then take your lunch break giving her lots of attention.

What happens when she calls you 'ill'?

I'd just let her hang about at home for the summer. She is probably exhausted.

Realising how out of step my experiences are with many on here. My mum was self-employed and usually not reachable at work so even when genuinely ill (throwing up) she often couldn’t pick me up for quite a long time and I’d then often as not have to go to a neighbour’s or sit in the car.

Agree with other posters - this isn’t about you. My DD was the same at that age - would ask to go to summer club or another activity and then start to say that she didn’t like it after a day or so and she didn’t want to go. I thought it was because she had built up her expectation vs reality where she didn’t feel confident compared to the other girls or didn’t feel included enough etc. At that age they can really be put off by what other girls say.

I was also a single parent at the time and couldn’t afford to pay for something and then her just drop out and choose something else. I talked to her a lot about how it takes time to feel comfortable about doing something new and built up her resilience by talking to her and praising her a lot, also rewarded her for every day that she went - some small surprise or treat at the end of the day.

We also had a rule in the house - if you start something e.g. summer camp or gym class for a season then you finish it because you never know how things would go otherwise. Maybe it would turn out to be a great time (once you settled in).

Hope this helps, its a difficult age but it will pass!

Maybe. It’s really hard to know where to draw the line here though because while I feel sympathy the reality is that I have to work and she has to make peace with the idea that me not working because I’m hanging out with her would ultimately lead to me not having money to support her.

She does have to learn that lesson.

Thanks everyone I appreciate the kind and thoughtful feedback so much.

I wouldn’t be booking anymore clubs if she’s not even willing to give it half a day. At 12 she can stay at home if you need to go into work.

My dd went through a phase of feeling ill and not wanting to go to school. I was a single parent so it was difficult plus I was self employed and lost a days wage/messed clients around if they were ill.

After a few times I had a conversation about the difference between feeling ill and being ill and told them they couldn't stay home for feeling ill. Luckily school were pretty strict too.

I'd speak to school club and explain you think she's fine and to encourage her to stay. I'd explain to her you have to work and you can't pick her up until X time.

I knew you’d get grief as soon as you mentioned a partner OP, didn’t you know you’re not allowed one as a single parent according to MN?

Really feel for you having been in a similar position a few years ago although DD was slightly older. I remember one day when I was up to my eyes at work and had to walk out to get her because she was struggling at school. It was a really hard time and I remember feeling a mixture of pride that it was me she wanted to help her and frustration that it all fell on my shoulders. I take it your DD’s dad isn’t around to share a bit?

Many years ago I worked as a TA in a school and one of the girls who was friends with the child I looked after had something like 60% attendance, she was always ill. Her parents were trying all sorts of specialists and no one could get to the bottom of this. Her symptoms varied and changed and she was under 4 different specialists at one point.
I am not sure how it came about, but it turned out she was simulating all of the symptoms, because at the time her parents were going through rough time and mentioned divorce, and she desperately wanted them to stay together and look after her. She needed that extra bit of time with them and was not able to communicate it differently rather than seeking their attention, so they would not go to work but stay and look after her- because she knew if she said she was very unwell they would stay at home, but if she just asked them to go out with her or whatever, they would most likely dimiss her, say they were busy or sent her off with friends. She was btw in y10 or 11, so older than your daughter.
Kids need us more than we think they do, although I think sometimes it's easier to imagine them as little adults who are mostly independent.

At 12 can't she stay at home when you are work? My son has just finished year 7 and stays at home when I'm at work or goes out to meet his friends.