When you children are no longer kids.

Pollycat

whitewing wrote: »

They could do more to acknowledge the ways she feels and to help her feel a valued part of the family.

From various things bagpuss has posted, it's only the 22 year old daughter who doesn't feel a valued part of the family.

Her full brother doesn't seem to have any issues with the family structure.
In fact, if anybody ought to feel hard-done-to, it's him:

bagpuss38 wrote: »

I'm always picking up little bits I think she would like.
She actually gets far more than her brother ever does.

Maybe it is all about her childhood and perhaps her brother wasn't affected as badly (or even at all) as she was.

It sounds to me like she's punishing everybody in the family.
She's even not spoken to her brother for 4 years.
She's creating a warring atmosphere in the household and if it's because of what happened in her childhood then she needs to acknowledge that and get help.

hgotsparkle

I havent read all of this thread, just the first 2 pages but here is my input:

I'm 24, I have my own place, pay my own bills, pay for my own everything. If I go round my mums and she gives me a bag of sweets that she bought for me when she was out shopping, it makes me happy. Sometimes you just want to be treated like a little kid by your mum. If I'm sick and don't want to spend a sick day on my own, then I go round to hers and she'll make me all the things I like.
That doesn't make me immature as I don't expect anything from her, its just nice to not be an adult sometimes, and the only person capable of making you feel like that, is your mum.

And, my dad has 2 other kids from his 2nd marriage, they arrived when I was 8 and 10. I ahted it, I instantly felt like I wasn't his child anymore, but more just a visiting relative. I found it hard and I didn't even live with him so I can't imagine what its like to have to live around a new family unit that your parent has made for themselves.
I felt as though I was just baggage that clung on to him.

I don't think the OPs daughter is immature, but wants to know that she is included in the family.

Savvy_Sue

whitewing wrote: »

They could do more to acknowledge the ways she feels and to help her feel a valued part of the family.

Possibly. Or possibly NOTHING will be enough to make her feel a valued part of the family - or nothing reasonable.

That's why I suggested finding out what the DD thinks would make things 'right' for her. That's when you find out whether or not you are dealing with a rational adult, or an irrational child in an adult's body. I truly believe the response you give to an irrational child in an adult's body should be different to the one you give a rational adult.

whitewing

Surely a rational adult would be able to have had a proper conversation about it before now?

Starrystarrynight

Haven't read all the replies, but have been quite surprised at the sympathy for the spoilt, 22 year old child.

I really don't think the OP should be feeling bad. The daughter is an adult and needs to start behaving a bit better. How will she learn to deal with the disappointments she'll encounter throughout life, when she's got no-one else to pour her resentment on to.

Pollycat

whitewing wrote: »

Surely a rational adult would be able to have had a proper conversation about it before now?

I agree.

So bagpuss isn't dealing with a rational adult, she's dealing with an irrational child in an adult's body (to quote Savvy Sue).

I think that nothing bagpuss can do will change her daughter's attitude.

Mojisola

Pollycat wrote: »

So bagpuss isn't dealing with a rational adult, she's dealing with an irrational child in an adult's body (to quote Savvy Sue).

I think that nothing bagpuss can do will change her daughter's attitude.

I think that the more effort bagpuss puts into her daughter, the more it will feed her sense of entitlement and confirm to her that Mum wasn't doing enough before.

The daughter isn't behaving like a reasonable young adult - she needs to go to counselling to sort out why she's feeling as she does. If it will help, perhaps bagpuss would go to joint counselling; if not, I'm sure she will support her as stuff comes up in individual sessions.

No matter what happened in the past, the world doesn't owe her anything - if she keeps on blaming other people for the way she feels, she will create exactly that situation. There's only so long that other people will put up with being "in the wrong" in her eyes when they aren't in reality (and nothing they do is ever enough) and she'll find herself alone.

It's not fair on the younger children to have one person causing this sort of trouble in the family home.

Pollycat

Mojisola wrote: »

I think that the more effort bagpuss puts into her daughter, the more it will feed her sense of entitlement and confirm to her that Mum wasn't doing enough before.

The daughter isn't behaving like a reasonable young adult - she needs to go to counselling to sort out why she's feeling as she does. If it will help, perhaps bagpuss would go to joint counselling; if not, I'm sure she will support her as stuff comes up in individual sessions.

No matter what happened in the past, the world doesn't owe her anything - if she keeps on blaming other people for the way she feels, she will create exactly that situation. There's only so long that other people will put up with being "in the wrong" in her eyes when they aren't in reality (and nothing they do is ever enough) and she'll find herself alone.

It's not fair on the younger children to have one person causing this sort of trouble in the family home.

Mojisola
I think the single word I've highlighted is key.

The daughter feels that she's owed something.
Maybe to compensate for the childhood that she doesn't feel was perfect.

Person_one

Pollycat wrote: »

Maybe to compensate for the childhood that she doesn't feel was perfect.

Hang on, from what the OP has told us its not a case of her feeling it wasn't perfect, its a case of it actually being very far from perfect.

People can be affected well into adulthood by the things that happened to them when they were in their earliest years. Its not as easy as some seem to think to just shrug it all off at the age of 18 because you're a grown up now.

Mojisola

Person_one wrote: »

Hang on, from what the OP has told us its not a case of her feeling it wasn't perfect, its a case of it actually being very far from perfect.

People can be affected well into adulthood by the things that happened to them when they were in their earliest years. Its not as easy as some seem to think to just shrug it all off at the age of 18 because you're a grown up now.

You're right but, if you have reached adulthood and you haven't come to terms with the rotten experiences you had as a child, you have to do something about that - not just keep blaming others for the way you feel.