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Help! 19yr old daughter out of control!!!

Started by Maricus, March 25, 2013, 06:59:40 PM

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Maricus

March 25, 2013, 06:59:40 PM Last Edit: March 25, 2013, 08:04:11 PM by luise.volta
Hello everyone, I am new to this and seeking some help and perhaps shoulders to cry on and tissue. I am a single 37yr old mom with a 19yr old daughter. Her father and I were married many years ago and were divorced in 1996. In 1999 my daughter and I relocated to California from the midwest leaving everyone and everything behind to begin a new life. Her father passed away in 2001 and I have no family here to help me with what she is doing. She has a 9mo old son and the father and her have since split up. My daughter has been staying with me for over three months now. She is completely irresponsible! She comes home to crash out and stays approximately 4 hours total in my house everyday. I cannot remember the last time she bathed him or took him to the park. She is so very disrespectful to me its unbelievable! She takes my cell phone without asking, has cracked it numerous times! (Its and iPhone 4) even though I have given her a MetroPCS phone which only costs $25 a month! Invites people to my home without my permission, smokes marijuana in my bathroom! Has taken my bank card and spends my money like its hers, and when I confront her about it she threatens to leave, even telling me to pack her stuff. The problem is she doesn't have anyone but me and we were always very close until she was around 16. I would not allow alcohol or drugs in my home and so she ran away. Staying with friends and telling their parents what an awful mom I was to her. She forgets the mom who enrolled her in ballet, took her to girl scouts, baked cookies and let her stay home and eat them with me, helped her with her homework etc etc. I feel used and though everyone tells me to give her tough love, she is all I have. This kid is killing me! She spends her money on drugs and clothes for herself but when it comes time for her food handlers card or her drivers license that also falls on me. She told her ex-boyfriends mom she didn't need diapers when in fact she did and does not worry about her son's needs. She tells anyone who will listen that she was home all the time watching her siblings while I was out and neglects to say that I was working a full-time job, going to college full-time and paying all my bills. I have tried to talk with her explaining that at her age I owned my house and car, that her father and I worked full-time to keep the roof over her head and food in her stomach but it falls on deaf ears and now I understand she is snorting cocaine! I don't know what to do or where to turn. I don't want to lose her and I hate learning about all the horrible lies she tells people about me and it hurts me so deeply! Last month she spent over $500 of my money and when she got her money she gave me $30 for the electric and bought me lotion and lip balm. Aside from that she expects me to pick up the tab while she loudly announces to her friends that I complain all the time. She is not employed and lies to everyone saying she is, I have had enough of this and feel like moving out of state somewhere far away!

luise.volta

March 25, 2013, 08:00:39 PM #1 Last Edit: March 25, 2013, 08:13:51 PM by luise.volta
Welcome - Please go to our Home Page and read the three posts under the category Read Me First. Our site is monitored and it's important that you find it to be a fit. There are no hate responses here. I have altered your first post to comply. It may sound prudish, but the only way to handle four letter words, or abbreviations of four letter words that we can figure out, is to not have any on WWU. Otherwise there is no place to draw the line. Let us know if you have any questions.

My take on your situation is that you are being controlled and manipulated by someone breaking the law. To continue to hope there is a solution when your daughter is making the choices she is, seems unrealistic to me. Abuse is what it is called and self-respect is the only suggestion I can offer. To tolerate the situation in the name of love isn't working and I doubt it ever will. Just my take, others here may have another approach. That's why I love our forum. Wishing you well.
Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible. Dalai Lama

Pen

Welcome, Maricus. You might want to get help from Al-Anon or some other support group for family members of drug addicts. Through them you may find resources to help you disentangle from your out-of-control DD and still be able to help your GS. We are not professionals and can only offer an ear, occasional advice and lots of cheerleading as you progress towards healing and empowerment.

There are people on this site who have struggled with similar issues with their AC, so keep reading and posting. Perhaps something will click for you. My advice is to get immediate help to get your DD out of your home since allowing her to take advantage of you isn't helpful to her or to you. I understand that having a GS complicates things, but you've got to take care of yourself first or you won't be able to help anyone else.
Respect ... is appreciation of the separateness of the other person, of the ways in which he or she is unique.
-- Annie Gottlieb

herbalescapes

Wow, you've got a lot going on there.  Having a GC involved makes it so much more complicated.  You've got to balance your needs, your DD's needs and your GC's needs.  Does your DD have siblings?  You mention her telling everyone how she had to stay home taking care of her sibs while you weren't home, but then you say she is all you have.  If she's telling such an outrageous lie - she had to take care of non-existent siblings - you should trust than anyone worth knowing won't judge you based on her lies. 

My suggestion is finding some professional counseling for yourself.  You've been told you need to give your DD tough love, but you are not up to the task.  Your DD will continue to take advantage of you and be a threat to her DS as long as she can get away with it.  Why should she change?  What's in it for her except hard work?  It's easier to take advantage of you.  Unfortunately, being irresponsible (a mild term, I know) will eat away at her self esteem and continue a vicious cycle of bad behavior. 

Looking at the info you've given about your DD, I'm not surprised she's in such a situation.  She's only 19 yet already a mother.  Her parents were young themselves then divorced when she was 2 or 3.  She moved away from everything familiar when she was 5 or 6 then her dad died when she was 7 or 8.  You don't mention how involved he was in her life up until his death.  Not having a father in your life is a risk factor for risky behavior in your teens and onward.  The fact that your daughter was a "good kid" until she hit 16 is a testament to how well you parented her. 

I'd like to suggest not trying to get her to turn herself around by pointing out what you were capable of at her age.  That was you, not her.  Most kids of any age tune out when mom or dad starts off with "Back when I was your age..."  It may be - and I'm just playing armchair poppsychologist here, so don't take this too seriously - that she is acting out against what she sees as an impossible high standard.  You were the perfect teen mom and managed to get through college and raise her and keep a job and pay bills.  Since she has no hope (in her own eyes) to meet that standard, she might as well fail spectacularly. 

Of course the bottom line, as always, is you have to take care of yourself in order to be of any help to anyone else.  Find a way to extract yourself from the current situation.  Good luck. 

bosscat

Hello there - Boy are you having a tough time!!  Your daughter is and will always be your baby - butsometimes we have to exercise some tough love and some of it may not go amiss with her.  She is an emotional bully
who is taking advantge of you and who can sense that you will be devastated if you dont do her bidding.
I think you should focus more on the innocent GC who did not ask to come into her world.   He is a defenceless
baby who needs your care.  It sounds like your daughter is a totally self willed yong woman who will happily tell anyone
daft enough to listen what a ''victim'' she is.  She is lucky to have such a caring mother but sadly it seems
you will have to take charge of your GC while the mother goes her own way  Be strong and tell her a few
house rules.  Remember you have a life too and your daughter has a lot of growing up to do.

Good Luck

fangle

Hello,  Are you able to assist your DD by making yourself available by keeping your GC in your care whilst your DD goes to rehabilitation of some kind?  Or seeks some sort of treatment from a Doctor?  I can't really think of any other ways that you could really help her.  The activities that you have described that she is doing are disrespectful to you and harmful to herself and very harmful to your GC.  I hope that you will take care of yourself first, because if your GC needs your help, or your DD for that matter, you would need to be in a 'place' where you would be able to do it, if you would want to, that is.  It sounds like a very tricky situation and I really feel for you and especially the little one in this situation, and I hope that your Daughter can straighten herself out.  I feel for her too.  I wish you all the best of luck.

Pooh

I'm going to be the very "tough love" post.  I would be contacting an attorney and start the process to protect the GC even if that meant seeking temporary custody until she straightens herself out.  If she's as reckless as you're describing, and bringing illegal drugs into your home, plus doesn't take care of the baby, my thought would be to protect the child.  I know you love her, but unless she's willing to help herself, the child would be my major concern.
We must let go of the life we have planned, so as to accept the one that is waiting for us. -
Joseph Campbell

Didi.lost

I have to agree with Pooh.  The child is the first priority.  Your DD really sounds like she needs help but I don't think that is going to
happen until she agrees she needs it.  That's the problem with my DD.  She won't admit she has done anything wrong so won't do a thing to change and has already lost custody of her ds
Tough love is what we are doing with her.  Had to stop her abuse and disrespect of us.