DD hates me

[AuntieMeemz]

Someone help me please. DD is almost 18. Since about 10, she has often really me off. It's hard to describe but rather like a really nasty person would tell off a dog they hated. She tells me she talks to all her friends like that, but we've had her friends round all her life, and she doesn't talk to them like that. She never talks to family, our freinds or people outside the house like that. She says all her friends say it's me, yet they have never heard her tells me off.
It took DH a few years to get on board but now he backs me up more because he feels she is rude to him too. Every time I talk to her about it, ( iam generally fairly calm about it) she just rages at me with an endless list of everything that is wrong with me. She tells me there is nothing wrong with how she speaks to me, that she is not disrespectful and the problem totally lis with me. She used to gaslight me a lot, but now i get her to confirm things with a msg, and it's stopped. Nowadays I don't listen to it all but just repeat.. 'the way you spoke to me at dinner/ whatever, is unacceptable'.
She is generally a good teenager, doing well at school, follows our other rules has a lovely boyfriend and has a part time job.
Home life is comfortable and settled and has been all her life
It is absolutely breaking my heart thinking what if i am this godawful person, oblivious to all my faults, who haa ruined our relationship and prevented her from ever having a good relationship with me.i am probably a person with an average level of faults in average amounts, which I do work on.

I wouldn’t waste time and money on a therapist. I would tell her to get an evening job and pay for her own phone etc. You just want to make your point and that’s how you are doing it. If she dislikes you she can leave. I would warn her first and if by 21 she is still like this then kick her out - sorry but having a child does not mean you have to put up with this disrespect, she does it because you let her. Some people only understand toughness. You can try up to a certain point and call it quits, if she goes nc there will be downsides for her too. My guess is it will drastically improve by 21 or fail miserably. Hopefully the former. We have all had our teenager challenges or been one ourselves but there is a tipping point, only you know if you’ve reached it.
I have a high achieving dd too and it is easy to tiptoe around messiness and rudeness as you are so grateful she didn’t give you the low achieving headache you see elsewhere. She has scored points on that, I get it!

WhatDidIComeInThisRoomFor
We did stop cooking for her, since I haven't in 15 years, managed to serve up anything agreeable (and I have to say, I'm all about good mostly healthy food, homecooked, variety etc). DH is also a good cook, but she never picks fault with his cooking.
I told her I'm not doing her washing. She looked at me with tears in her eyes and said ' I hate it when you behave like this', and said how childish it was, how I make it all about me, make a big deal of nothing and that is why she always has to cry on the phone to her friends every night. She says she is sooo stressed right now and my pettiness is just too much for her to bear.
We haven't even got to the withdrawal of lifts to and from her part time job yet! I'll save that for next week.

coldcallerbaiter
that will def be the plan. Up to 18 I will try and sort it. She is off to Uni soon and if she is still the same at 21, I'm not having her home. Like you, I don't believe we have to put up with it. It's hard to admit that we can't change things, but that doesn't mean we will just put up with it forever.
She has an adorable boyfriend, but things are easy for them at present, when everything is provided. He will have his work cut out when she has to put herself out.

WhatDidIComeInThisRoomFor
Funnily enough, I've just started working on my image, work in progress... I've upped my steps to 7000 a day and will get some new clothes. I'd forgotten how nice that is. Going to get a new hair do too. I usually only have one or 2 a year.
We also just got an allotment, funny how you forget all life's worries when you are on an allotment.

It doesn't matter how she talks to anyone else- it's not acceptable to you. I'm not sure what can be done after letting it go for 8 years though.

SD started with a disrespectful tone around the same age, and I just used to say, "That's not a polite way to speak to someone, try again."

I would just laugh at the tears in the eyes routine. I would take the piss and show it doesn't get to me. If life is so bad, the front door is there. Uni is not compulsory, and it's not a right. She can show just how to do it and crack on with being a grown-up. No money to rent or buy? What a shame,Where does she propose to live instead if mummy's house is such a hard time. She would get very short shrift from me. Show some respect or use her feet. Bollocks to 'she is still young ' view, young enough to wind her neck in or old enough to be independent.

MrsSunshine2b
Def did not let it go for 8 years! Tried abosolutely everything. We were consistent and persistent for years, but nothing worked. It comes and goes. Like others have said though, it's time to say 'ah well, if life is so awful, better leave then..wouldn't want you to suffer, bye'

100% seconding the recording suggestion. Dealing with the same issues with my young adult son.

Sometimes I want to say this to my 16 Yr old 🤣 But I do have a question... do you have teens yourself? If you have a young child then you're going to be in for a surprise.

Some people are just not very nice, as someone said up thread. I have an adult stepdaughter who is the same, everything is everyone else’s fault, she argues with someone at least every single day, and she’s abusive. She’s got her own way her whole life by throwing a tantrum, and at 19, I just think it’s too late to change her. I’m pretty sure I’m the only person who ever says no to her, everyone else is scared of her reaction, but her usual reaction to me saying no is to go on social media and make rude videos about me. 🙄 I can’t see her ever changing, and at my age, I just don’t have the energy to deal with the bullshit any more, so I just ignore her most of the time.

I wonder if a different approach might help. Back off entirely in a non-confrontational way.

Say nothing unless she speaks first, and then respond minimally. If she says 'Good Morning' you respond cheerfully in kind. If she tells you something about her day, respond with a couple of words ...' oh, that's interesting'; ' sounds fun'; 'that sounds tricky' etc. No more than that. No questions at all. No advice or feedback of any sort unless asked. If she is silent, then also stay silent.

Offer no help unless asked, but don't sanction either - (I'm not doing your washing anymore type ultimatums). Just very gradually cut down on the frequency of the tasks without any confrontation or blame. If she's rude to you just respond with a neutral 'Ok then' as a standard response to everything, and leave it be. If she remonstrates about meals or washing or criticism about something you haven't done, reply with 'Sorry about that' as the standard response. Be less available for negative interactions, and refuse to be drawn into a disagreement.

At the moment you're trying to force her to behave politely with sanctions, a therapist, modelling good behaviour, talking to her. But you can't force her.

What you can do is back off, limit interactions unless it's reciprocated, offer no pearls of wisdom and behave in a neutral way to protect your own equilibrium. But it will also allow the emotional space for her to reconnect if she wants to.

She sounds incredibly spoilt and entitled! But, it's not uncommon for teenagers to be very self involved.
Explain you're helping her learn more life skills so she's ready for University.
Keep modelling respectful behaviour and disengage when she offers to critique you 😄
Have a little more love and respect for yourself. I think this will come good in a few years.

To me this does sound kind of normal. My DD is 14 and since she was about ten has been rather rude and moody to me. Not all the time, sometimes she's lovely, but generally I just get the impression I'm boring and irritating to her, which is what I was expecting from a teenager.
If we go out or go on holiday she really engages, telling us about school and friends. In the house I think she'd prefer it if we just kept out of her way! Conversation is minimal and monosyllabic.
I was probably the same as a teenager. I remember thinking my parents were a massive pain in the arse who just seemed to restrict my life all the time.
I became a more loving daughter in my early 20s so I'm expecting my draughting to "come back" to us around that age.
Obviously we need to pull them up on rude and disrespectful behaviour every time and I do. However, I don't think it helps to be thinking of it in dramatic terms like "Oh she hates me!". She's just a teenager.

She should be doing her washing at 18 anyway . It does sound like you and your husband have tried to have a nice relationship with her.
Teenagers and people in early 20s do seem to freely tell people how they see them . Especially faults they find. And don't think about how they make people feel.
Hopefully she grows out of it.
As a family did you all used to laugh and chat a lot together? Would she have played board games with you or things like that?
Or has she avoided joining in for years ?

OP, you sound absolutely lovely and kind, and I’m so sorry that you are being treated this way by your daughter 💔 I would do anything to have my Mum back as she was my world… so it annoys me when I hear people treating their mums this way without good reason.

I may have missed it (apologies if so!) but do you just have the one DD? Although either way, she shouldn’t be treating you this way as you don’t deserve it.

If you were such a rotten person, you would be alone in life and not have anyone, but you aren’t so you do! Hopefully as she matures, she will learn to appreciate you and all you do for her more.

Agree with previous posters about stopping everything. With her going off to uni, hopefully it will make her see and appreciate everything you have done for her and be a shock to her system!!

My 19 year old and I have an amazing relationship, and he talks to me about everything, but I have been a lone parent and thankfully he’s just like me, kind and caring too.

I don’t have any advice, but just wanted to say that you sound like a gorgeous person, and please don’t think the issue is you… the issue is your daughter and her behaviour xx

I have 4 dds op and at times have received some shitty behaviour from them as they went through their teens and consider it fairly normal. However the level of disrespect that your dd is showing you over such a long time would be too much for me. No way would I be doing anything, washing, paying for stuff whatever for someone who was so disrespectful to me. I know that you are trying to keep a connection and keep communication lines open but personally I would be downing tools and pretty much ignoring her until she moderates her behaviour. She is almost an adult, if she can manage to behave decently and respectfully to other people, she can damn well do it for you.

I so feel your pain. I'm having the exact same thing with my DD (18) right now. She regularly has a go and me and starts shouting at me and telling me how awful I am. She has just been through a break up with her boyfriend, so she is taking a lot out on me. She wants to talk to me, but then doesn't like it when I have an opinion.

I am just trying to deal with the aftermath of cancer treatment and a chemical menopause as a result of the meds I am now on. So my resilience is shot to pieces right now. I will be taking on board all the advice you have already got on here.

I just find it so hard - I want to fix everything. I want everything to be OK. But I also need to build up my own strength to stand firm. This is destroying me right now.

Sending a massive hug from someone in the very same position!

My tuppence worth is for you all to attend family therapy together and try to work through this together and for everyone to be able to hear everybody’s point of view. You have many years ahead of you and you want to have the best relationship you can. I don’t see punishments improving the relationship but only adding to the stress in the home and to your relationships. I would make sure to get a Therapist who comes highly recommended. The reason I feel family therapy is best rather than your dd just getting it is so that you All hear each other’s points of view in a safe and calm space that is managed effectively by the therapist

Twodogsisbetterthanone-
I really feel for you, and I'm so glad it's not just me. Unless someone has experienced this all day, every day for years, it's hard to understand what it's really like. Like you, I'm worn out with it! I did see a therapist, who said 'do nothing for her', so I did that. It's taken a week, and feels awful, because as a mum, you don't want to be harsh, but it's slowly having an effect. Thank goodness.

17Butterfly71 ·
I'm grateful that I don't have to deal with cancer and DD. Like you, I like things to be nice, and OK but DD isn't bothered at all. Therapy has helped me, and DD is going too, later on. I think you can't really help people like DD much, because they wholeheartedly feel that they are absolutely right!

It seems like she has a lot of anger and resentment towards you, what kind of things is she criticising you about? Was there anything that triggered this?

I was very critical of my mum when I was a teenager, no where near as bad as your daughter is, but looking back I think it’s because I always felt like she favoured my brother and I was lashing out at her in response.

Take back your power OP.
Be a little bit more unavailable to her.
Go out and have your own fun with your own friends and hobbies. Let her see that.
Seeing that you have a life full of friends will not only make you feel better but will show her you don't have character flaws, that plenty of people love you and that you are fine just as you are.

No. They don't!

Ime teenagers don't all hate their parents.