Why did she put me through that?

[elesbells]

I really don't know how to start this one. Sorry if its long.

My dd2 is 17 and the normal stroppy teenager type.. but no big trouble until now iykwim.

last Monday afternoon she went out to a friends house (it was a friend from where she used to live and she had to get the train). she text me to let me know she had arrived ok.

I called her at 10.30pm to see if she was on her way back and she said she was at the station waiting for the train home and asked if I could meet her at the other end.

I got to the station as her train was pulling in but she wasn't on it so I called her mobile which was switched off. I waited for the next train and the next (going home in between to see if she had called) but nothing. By this time it was gone midnight so I drove to the station she said she was at when I called her but again nothing. I ended up going to the friends house who said she had left for the station at 10pm. I then went to the police.

I was at the police station until 6am. The police had been searching for her all night They put a trace on her mobile and it was about 20 miles from where she said she was I was convinced something terrible had happened - she had never disappeared before.

All through the night as the police searched for her (this involved two police forces) they 'pinged' her phone, it kept comming up in the same place (it hadn't moved at all) and I had given up hope on seeing her again tbh.

I then got a call from my mum aroung 9am to say she had turned up there - she was okay but knew she was in trouble. she wasn't with the friend she had said she was with (she had got her to lie) but refused to say where she had been (and was quite bolshy to the police when they went to see her apparently)

So now 1 week on, she is still at my mothers. I know this is going to sound strange but I can't see her - I'm so angry and upset - not because she stayed out all night or the fact that she lied...its about what I went through that night and the fact that she asked me to meet her knowing full well she was never going to be there. She text me last night (first contact) to ask if she could come and talk - but I couldn't do it. Ive told her to give me a few days as there is no point when i'm angry.

I'm crying all the time and feel bloody empty and useless tbh. Its like I don't want her home now.

so tell me - What would you do? how would you handle it?

sorry its long but I needed to get it all out.
tia x

I think that part of the problem is that, if you react badly (and you have every right to do that) and she is anticipating that, she knows that she can just scuttle off to grandma's. And grandma isn't helping by appearing to be more concerned with her granddaughter than with her daughter.

I cannot imagine what I would do if any of my ds's did this however I think you have to concentrate on the fact that she is a teenager and teenagers do stupid things and make errors of judgement,she has made a massive mistake but it sounds as if she knows that ,it also sounds as if this was very out of charecter for her and I think I would try to concentrate on that aspect.Is it possible that she was pushed into doing something that she knew pretty quickly was wrong but didn't know how to retrieve the situation .

I can understand you being livid,I would be as well but everybody has to be allowed to make some mistakes in their teenage years;she hasn't killed anyone as far as you know or done anything illegal and it does sound as if there must be something fairly profoundly wrong ,could drugs be involved ?

Whilst it is frustrating that Grandma is effectively sheilding her at least she has somewhere safe to go ,it would surely be worse if she had stormed off and you had no idea if she was safe or not .

Sorry - should have said "I think she has to understand just how angry/emotional her behaviour has made you".

Is it possible that she asked you to meet her, knowing she wouldn't be there, because whatever she's done/ been doing, on some level she wanted you to know? She wanted you to catch her, so she'd have to tell you and it would all come out?

Maybe I'm being stupid, just trying to remember being 16!

Hope you're feeling calm enough to talk to her soon, it sounds like she needs you

God no - I'm not frightened of her at all. I'm frightened of how angry I am. I want to do things I never knew I was capable of but I know that isn't good for the long term. Every time I think about meeting her my blood starts to boil and I want to scream like a mad thing and smash her face in.

I do keep thinking she is a teenager and teenagers are strange things sometimes...oh I don't know - I need to calm down a bit before we can move forward iyswim?

I think the letter is the answer I can then spit, scream and shout in it without physically hurting her.

I think you are right about the letter and you have shown great restraint in not going round and tearing strips off her but I do think you need to find out what really happened otherwise you might find that you write or say things that you regret and that neither of you can forget.This happened to me ,my mother said something to me agred 16 which with the benefit of hindsight and maturity I can understand but at the time all I could see was that she couldn't or wouldn't see further than the original misdemeanor (minor compared to your dd I have to say) and I will never forget that ,even now 25 years later I can't really forget that she concentrated on her reaction and not on disciovering why her otherwise sensible daughter had done something so out of character .

WHat a nightmare - I can't begin to imagine what you must have gone through that night. You're doing absolutely the right thing keeping your distance for a while - the anger probably won't ever completely go away (when you're in a nursing home aged 80 you'll still start seething about it every now and then ) but it will lessen in intensity.

It's tough because on the one hand she's young, we all do stupid, thoughtless things at 17 and it's up to the parent to be the bigger person, forgive and move on, but on the other hand what she did was so thoughtless and stupid, and she's old enough to have foreseen the consequences that I can see that forgiving and moving on must seem impossible at the moment. Give it more time - but don't expect any quick return to normality.

I think you need to hear what she has to say before you unleash your fury on her! She could already be feeling very frightened (about something you don't know about) and a letter from you full of anger could be very damaging.

You do have every right to be angry with her, and to let her know it - but surely it's worth getting the whole picture first. If she's not told your mother what happened, then could you suggest that she write you a letter - that way you can absorb the facts before you then either respond with your letter, or meet her face to face?

I agree with most of the posts on here already and imagining what you went through that night scares the wotsit out of me! BUT I am posting to say the things that have jumped out to me, that no-one has mentioned yet...

You don't yet know what happened that night -maybe your DD went to hell and back that night herself?

Maybe she is involved in something deeper than she can handle and it all got out of control?

Maybe the only way she could flag that up to you was by doing what she did - maybe she needed your help/was scared and didn't know how on earth she was going to be able to get it?

She is a TEENAGER. Maybe she didn't have the maturity to think clearly and rationally that night in whatever situation she was in and just did what she could think of at the time (even if we think it was a bit odd).

Maybe she was shaken or scared & was putting herself or HER situation first without thinking of what that situation would do to a 'mother' in this day & age (she doesnt have children of her own and she is a teenager, so that would be the natural path of thought for her surely?).

Maybe she is scared shitless by whatever happened that night and is at Grans because she needs some time/space and TLC to digest stuff before she deals with you (because now in hindsight she KNOWS what she did was terrible and is embarrassed/scared/sorry?!)

Please speak to you daughter and find out everything, incase she desperatley needs you right now.

Then, if not....if it was purely a selfish teenage act.....let rip!!

What did the police say to her and did she given any information to them? Does she have any friends you could speak to? What about the one she was supposed to be visiting? Does she know what actually happened and be willing to talk to you?

I do think that you need to write your letter when feeling less angry. You need to get across to her just how terrified and sick you were at the thought that she was missing. You need to know why she deliberately put you through all that, as she knew she wouldn't be on the train you were meeting at her request. There has to be something behind that particular aspect.

Please update us and let us know she (and you) is alright.

At least she is at her grandmother's not kipping on the floor God knows where. I think you're doing the right thing by refusing to see her until you are certain that you can talk rationally about this.

I agree that this is vastly different to just turning off the phone - she made a calculated decision to send you to meet that train and must have known that she was blowing the situation up a thousand fold.

You need to get to the bottom of why she felt the need to breach your previous trust in a way that was designed to punish you so harshly - for no good reason as far as you can tell.

She is verging on adulthood. She needs freedom but also needs to respect the fact that you need to know that she is safe - even when she is somewhere that you're not entirely happy about. I'll take a guess that she was staying at a boy's house while his parents were away and assumed that there was no way you would allow her to do that.

So time to relax the reins but also to make dd understand that she has a responsibility to you whilst she is still your responsibility. When she's 18 you can tell her the same as my dad did to me - that she is legally an adult and can do what she likes, but that she may continue to live under your roof if she obeys your rules!

Write the letter but don't send it. Then contact her and talk/listen before you do anything else.

i came onto this thread ready to defend some teen staying out all night or not ringing home but holy fuck, what she did is a whole differant leval isn't it?

i can't imagine what you had to go through that night waiting to meet her for hours and then being told by the friend she'd gone to the station

i can't think what situation can have made her think it was ok to deliberately send you down that patyh of worry, especially as it turns out there was never any chance at all that she was getting on that train. staying out all night without ringing home would have been one thing, but to intentionally make you think she was on her way and ask you to meet her

i hope you get an explanation that justifies what she did or at least explains it (although i can't fathom what that could possibly be)

good luck with the letter..... and tbh, i'd go round and scream blue bloody murder at her while you're good and angry, she deserves it!

Me... 'she made a calculated decision to send you to meet that train and must have known that she was blowing the situation up a thousand fold.'

PinkTulips on Tue 02-Sep-08 11:56:54
i came onto this thread ready to defend some teen staying out all night or not ringing home but holy fuck, what she did is a whole differant leval isn't it?

I think PinkTulips has expressed it rather better than I did!

I feel for you, reading this has made me cry as I used to be like your DD at this age.

I am now 30 and boringly sensible (there is hope for her)

To be honest, (from how I remember feeling at that age), I don't think that she has done this to punish you.

I would imagine (and you DO need to ask her). She was probably planning on coming home, then "exciting" friends/boyfriend (that she knows you would disapprove of) tell her to stay out. At this age, in order to achive something I wanted to do, I would selfishly just ignore anyone trying to stop me, ie)I would have turned my phone off.

I also used to turn up at my grandmas as she is a soft option compared to my mum. I now have a DD and am so scared of the teenage years, she is only 8 months old. I spoke to my mum and asked whether she used to resent my grandma as I always used to go there, and she said that grandma was a god send as at least I was always safe. Grandma used to let my boyfriend stay over, mum never did.

I once ran away too (only for a few hours as the police found us). We were naive and not even meaning to scare anyone, it wasnt for attention from my parents but for attention from an older group of friends (lads).

We (my cousin and I) never got in to much trouble, we were just involved with older boys (6 years or so). I feel bad now that I used to hurt my mum so much, but it was never aimed to hurt her. I wanted her to not care and let me have fun, as selfish as that.

WHAT IF....she DID plan to be on that train but 'new' friends had other plans that she felt compelled to go along with?

WHAT IF....someone else switched her phone off and wouldn't give it back?

WHAT IF....she wanted you to 'rescue' her but couldn't say so out loud so actually WANTED you to realise she was 'missing' and call the police?

Surely, if she was planning to stay out with a boy that she knew you'd disapprove of she'd have just continued the lie with saying she was staying at her freinds for the night. Even if it was a last minute decision.

Maybe I am being niave but I really think there is more to this than a usually normal, no trouble teenager "punishing" her mother for no obvious reason.

Is there something going on in your life which would want to make her do something to become the centre of attention? To make her do something very extreme to obtain proof that you love her?

You haven't mentioned her dad. Is he around? Has he had any input? If you are divorced, do you have a new man, which may make her feel that she is not the most important person in your life at the moment? Any siblings?

PonderingThoughts - I think it's remotely unlikely - this all started with persuading her existing friend to lie for her and to continue to lie when her mother turned up worried sick at midnight. That friend wasn't being influenced by any 'new friends'.

I have a teen and tbh I think she wanted to get caught. I think that any teen will lie if they're in trouble, (even tho mine know I can spo a lie a mile off!) but to arrange to meet you was really cruel. She must have known that you would be frantic so why didn't she say she was stopping over at her frinds. You wouldn't have known any different and she could have been up to god knows what. Why did she set herself to get caught? I would be angry too but the more you brood on it, the angrier you'll get and you still won't know the truth. If it was just mean, then come down hard on her but inho I think there's a deeper proble. Hope you sort it (and do the talking away from your mum's house). Go somewhere nuetral.

FORTYPLUS - how do we know the exisiting friend actually lied?

ELESBELLS - says that she now knows she didn't go to the friends - but does she KNOW that or is that an assumption because her phone was 20 miles in the other direction?

It doesn't take long to drive 20 miles if she is with someone with a car and the trace on her phone wasn't done until gone midnight.

So, (unless she's admitted otherwise) she COULD have been with existing friend, left at 10pm and then been driven off somewhere else

PonderingThoughts - just by reading the op... 'she wasn't with the friend she had said she was with (she had got her to lie)'

fortyplus - yes i see that too, but I'm just wondering if that IS what DD2 actually admitted or if that is what the OP is filling in.

(ie. if DD2 says that she wasn't with that friend, did she mean during 10pm and 6am OR did she fully admit to never being with that friend in the first place and getting the friend to lie for her)

I have no idea what the DD2 is up to....I'm just trying to show that by not actually speaking to find out the truth, and only going on assumption/third party whispers/ circumstantial evidence all manor of other possibilites could be true

pondering; it still leaves the cold hard fact that she knew her mother was expecting her at the station and would think the worst when she didn't show and that her mother never minded her staying at friends houses so she could have simply rung home to say, 'sorry mum, i ended up staying at x's house after all, sorry for making you drive to the station, i'll be home in the morning' (whether or not this was what she was in fact doing)

PinkTulips - don't get me wrong, I do agree with you completely. It's horrible just thinking about how you'd feel, so the OP actually having to go thruogh that for real...it is terrible!!

I just think it needs pointing out that there may be a 17 year old girl who desperatly needs her mother because she may have been through her own living hell that night.

If the OP continues to stay away because she's so angry and then discovers that actually what happened is the DD2 trusted someone untrustworthy and was actually subjected to a night that scared the living hell out of her....the OP's going to wish she'd put her anger to one side for 5 minutes & found out the truth sooner.

Of course, if it was a cruel prank or thoughtlessness...THEN the OP should follow the advice to that nature on this thread (which I do agree with!)