Dd has accused me of being a stately homes parent

[bendmeoverbackwards]

Youngest dd is 16. She's had some problems, diagnosed with autism aged 11 but refused to accept it. However she had a very good start at secondary school until the wheels came off in Year 10. Since then she struggled with attendance. I tried to support her as much as I could but she refused therapy or help of any kind. In spite of that, she sat her GCSEs this summer and did reasonably well considering her absence. Unfortunately it was not quite enough for her school sixth form and they denied her a place (we have an appeal pending).

Since then we discussed other options and she was enrolled at a local private school in September. After one day, she said she hated it and refused to return. Since then I have run myself ragged, doing research into other options, phoning/emailing schools, going to open days, talking to professionals for advice.

Lately she's been telling me she is in pain and this is my fault. This week she sent me a Tik-Tok video about a 'growing up in a toxic yet loving household'. I don't completely understand this but from reading some of the stately homes threads on here, I think she means I expect her to be grateful for all the thing I do for her yet refuse to accept the bad stuff. But I'm struggling to understand what bad stuff she means. I think I'm a good, caring parent but I do not think I do no wrong and accept my mistakes like any other parent. I try and listen to her (as I do with my two older dds) and always apologise if I get something wrong.

Sometimes I feel a bit abused by her. It is apparently ok for her to shout at me, call me names etc but if I sound even a bit snappy or walk away when she's yelling or cross- questioning me, I never hear the end of it.

What the hell do I do?

Keep in your mind she has a social and communication disability. Try not to take it personally, maybe step back and let her try and make her own way without as much support. Really her behaviour is her form of communication and she is probably feeling out of control and wants you to fix it but you can't and she can't fix it either

TikTok is the root of an awful lot of issues with vulnerable teens desperate to find their own community and apply the narrative they see on there to their own lives even if they haven't actually experienced it

Thank you @Singleandproud wise words. It’s not that I take it personally as such, I just don’t want to be the sort of parent who brushes their child’s feelings aside. My own mum was a bit of a stately homes parent herself and really wanted to do things differently. Dh says I’m too hard on myself. You are right about fixing stuff, she often looks to me to fix stuff, I’ve probably been a bit too involved and need to step back a bit, for her sake and mine.

Parenting is so so hard. Dammed if you do and dammed if you don't. The fact you care to post this says a lot about you. What prev poster said about remembering she has a disability is so true. Children expect you to be perfect, infallible and sick up their bad behaviour without being human.

I'd step back and let her do it, however if she doesn't find a college course soon I would expect her to get a job abiet part time.
Other than that step back.

I'm willing to bet she has you walking on egg shells around her at this point?
I would have simply replied to the tik tok video and said 'why have you sent this to me?' Let her explain what she thinks she means. Teenagers love a tik tok diagnosis no matter how far off the mark it might be but it doesn't mean you have to roll over and accept it!

Dd is a few years older and can be like this. My close friends who have seen and heard first hand a lot of her behaviour, listened to me pouring my heart out to them about what I try and do, have seen me dropping things to help her t8me after time say she bullies me. The comment about walking on egg shells definitely resonates.

I didn’t have a great childhood, I don’t talk about my feelings a lot (though always tell Dd I love her). I bend over backwards to try to help b7t seemingly I always get it wrong. For example recently she didn’t get a job she applied for and was upset, I gave her a hug and then tried to be positive, so stuff like rejection is normal, it doesn’t mean you won’t ever get a job, maybe something better is round the corner, promised to help her make a list of companies to send her CV to.

she said the next day I hadn’t been sympathetic enough. 🤷‍♀️. I pointed out I was gutted for her but was trying to cheer her up. She says she knows I can’t help being emotional deficient and she tries not to hold it against me.

so now, at moments of drama, etc I try and ask her what she wants from me. Does she want practical suggestions, does she just want to vent and have sympathy. I think sometimes I’ve assumed she wants me to fix something when actually she doesn’t. My automatic reaction is to go into “fix” mode and actually that can piss her off. But I’m just trying to help.

Drop the rope. You have done your best to meet her needs by providing her with the best education you can She is blaming you for her failure to thrive and playing the victim role because she does not want to do the work.

Ok, so let's look at this step by step.

She is autistic.

School attendance dropped off in year 11 but she has some GCSEs.

You have put an appeal in so that she can go to the sixth form attached to the school.

Her behaviour is clearly telling you she couldn't cope with that school.

She then started at a private school.
She also didn't cope there.

You are running yourself ragged trying to find out options for her.

Clearly, she is not in a position to cope with school of any description right now and her behaviour is telling you that.

I suspect what she means by stately homes is that you want her on the conveyor belt of education and she knows she can't cope with it right now.

She may need some time out of education to focus on her mental health.

(My DD has ADHD rather than autism but a very similar scenario played out and she went back to education when she was mentally healthier and ready to do so).

@Octavia64 I do actually think the best option for her is to re-apply for next year and have a proper think what course she wants to do. With her grades in hand she will meet the entry requirements for most local schools and some offer alternatives to A levels such as BTECs or CTECs which can be mixed and matched. Plenty of choices and some interesting courses available. Then she can have a breather this year, do a short course or a part time job or some volunteering.

The problem with this? She doesn’t want to. I got a hard no to the suggestion that she reapplies next year. And another no to anything other than 3 A levels.

I don’t want her on the conveyor belt of education at all, I want her to do something she enjoys and be happy. She is driving this insistence that is HAS to be A levels and is HAS to be this year 🤷‍♀️

And yet she has refused the options for this year. At the beginning of October I contacted a local school, they would have taken her (it was only a few weeks into term at this point) and they offered a wide range of subjects. She point blank refused saying it’s a ‘shit school’.

And yes I am definitely walking on egg shells. She likes to communicate with me by WhatsApp and expects a response to Every. Single. Message. Woe betide I miss one, she’ll then resend and hassle me until I answer to her satisfaction.

Ah, ok fair play.

Firstly, though, it's a really tricky situation to be in. Make sure you get some time for you and that you don't spend all you time worrying about her. Easier said than done, I know.

I don't know your DD but I will tell you my experience.

My DD dropped out of first year of a-levels. She was too anxious to go to one subject first, and then eventually all of them.

However, her dad and I both have degrees and her brother was on track for uni, so she was absolutely resolute that she wanted to restart year 12.

So she restarted with an online provider - maths, physics and computer science. She went to about the first two weeks of lessons. Then she got too anxious to speak in the lessons. Eventually she didn't go at all.

She was very difficult during this time. She wasn't coping but she didn't want to admit that she wasn't coping.

So we backed off and left her to it.
No comment at all if she didn't go to lessons, wouldn't be drawn into conversation about future educational plans etc.

Eventually she admitted to herself that she couldn't cope, and that was when we started to have productive conversations.

She still had some difficult times - did a part time course at college to get her back into it before doing an access course and is now doing a degree.

She needs to see for herself what she can do and what she can't, and the not wanting to fail is going to be making the anxiety much worse.

Does anything in this article about Demand Avoidance sound familiar OP?

It’s something I can see in my Dnephew, and for him it takes the form of twisting everything so it becomes the fault of my Dsister, perhaps because he can’t face his own limitations, it’s too overwhelming.

https://www.autism.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/topics/behaviour/demand-avoidance

@Octavia64 thank you for sharing. Does she feel more secure now? Obviously as adults we know there are many different educational paths but it’s hard to make a 16 year old see that. She just thinks her life is ruined and she has no future ☹️

Oh it’s a nightmare for you OP.

Whatever she has it hasn’t got, don’t forget your own parents loved you too and no one deserves the life u have in store here as a slummy mummy putting things right only to get shouted at. That’s not going to help her in life either. Stop being a punch bag for her emotional inadequacy. She may have issues but you both have to live a life and don’t spend it in misery. If that’s her fate, sure, but it sounds like she’s deluded with this obsession of it having to work out just the way she wants it to. Life does not work out like that.

Talk to her about how she deserves a good life and what are the steps towards that for her. Try and break the rigidity into a couple of pathways. But don’t fall for the guilt trip that she’s dumping onto you.

You can not keep apologising for the way the world works and it will not do her any favours to be able to belittle and attack you.

Yes, she feels more secure now. She's in so much a better place.

Independent, living at uni, in her third year, has a girlfriend.

Doing so well.

This. You’ve done your best as a parent and nobody is perfect. You don’t need to be a whipping boy just because she’s a miserable teenager.

That’s fantastic @Octavia64 I’m glad things worked out well for her, you must be very proud of her. I’m hoping time and maturity will help 🤞

Your post resonates with me though my dd does not have autism, rather anxiety and depression. She's 18 now and more mature but around 16 she tended to blame me for her issues. I think she knew it wasn't down to me (not that I'm perfect, of course) but she needed a scapegoat for feeling crap. So she talked about me being abusive, even to her therapist (luckily they realised it wasn't true). I see it as frustration for her situation.

I was given some simple advice that was effective - rather than try to reason with her, or explain it wasn't true or counter her arguments, just to ask if she needed any help from me. Maybe it's obvious but in the thick of it, I needed something simple and clear to hold on to. I guess it's just about being open to accepting her feelings - most times she said no there wasn't anything but it did lead to us having a much better relationship.

I also think it's about them guilt tripping you and trying to get you to solve their problems when really the only person that can do that is them. I see now my dd realises that what happens to her is more her responsibility. Advice is fine, when they want it but it's their life to live, not yours. She used to threaten to do something she knew I would not like, eg not attend college on a given day, until I just accepted that if she didn't want to go, then she needed to make that decision for herself, not to punish me.

I don’t know if this will be helpful but do you tell her how you feel? I don’t mean gushing with emotion or looking for sympathy. When I tell my kids how I feel eg. I’m feeling stressed, or I feel disappointed too. , it makes the whole interaction more human, more relational.

it can take out the ‘fix it’ dynamic. You’re still the parent, but you are also human.

You sound like a fantastic mum. She just sounds ungrateful and pretty unpleasant. So sorry OP. Hope you get plenty of love and support from your other children

WTF is a stately homes parent?!

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/relationships/april-2023-well-we-took-you-to-stately-homes

Don't think that thread exists. Off to google I go, every day's a school day!