Care and Feeding: Why Is My Family So Mean to My Daughter?

[colorwheel]

Dear Care and Feeding,

I’m a single mom and my daughter is 4. She’s bright, funny, generous, and headstrong. Like most 4-year-olds, she occasionally cops some attitude, like shouting, “Everyone stop talking!” when she wants to say something. Sometimes she melts down into a sobbing mess in response to setbacks or difficulties, but I think this is pretty normal. I don’t love it, but I accept it and we deal with it as best as we can. I’m pretty sure I’m doing this parenting thing all right.

The problem is my mom and sister. They react in pretty negative ways to her behavior. On Christmas Eve, for example, while we were all together in the car looking at light displays, my daughter started crying because we didn’t get out and walk around. It was totally my fault; I wasn’t wearing warm-enough shoes. But my sister snapped, “If you don’t stop crying, Santa won’t want to come tonight!” Of course, she cried more. My sister is constantly trying to take food off her plate or stare at her across the table because she thinks it’s “hilarious,” which of course causes my daughter to become more upset. I ask her to stop but she still does it anyway. (She did these things to me as a kid too because she has absolutely no respect for personal boundaries.)

When my mom comes to our house and my daughter makes even the slightest noise that sounds like it could turn into crying, she immediately tells my daughter, “I’m just going to leave!” or “That’s why I don’t like coming over here!” or “Your mom never acted this way!” It’s so painfully obvious that Mom doesn’t really enjoy being around her most of the time.

This hurts my daughter in many ways and I’m busting my buns to counteract it for her with tons of positive reinforcement and love, so for me, it’s excruciatingly exhausting. I feel like I’ve got three children (two of them demon spawn who should know better) and no help. I don’t have a partner to share my concerns with or to help me get my daughter through rough patches, and the rest of my family seems to be intent on making her feel like shit if she isn’t “perfectly behaved,” which makes me feel like shit too.

Good luck with family therapy. Mom doesn’t want to and my sister doesn’t understand she needs to. I’d be happy to go on my own, though. We live five minutes away from them, so getting distance isn’t an option. My dad tries to stay out of all family issues, so it feels like it’s just me against the world. Any advice beyond getting a mani/pedi sometimes to cool off and loving my daughter with the power of 1,000 suns?

—Grow Up!

Dear Grow Up!

I’m so sorry! Your daughter sounds like a perfectly “normal” 4-year-old to me, and you seem like a thoughtful and overextended mom trying to do it all. Where is your fun sitcom montage??

The answer, I think, is that you need to go find yourself some more friends. Friends who also have young children, and therefore have reasonable expectations for their behavior. Hit up the internet for local mom groups, chat up more parents at whatever sort of activities your kid does outside the home, and generally just treat this like online dating until you have at least two friends you can call after your sister leaves you in a puddle of frustration.

As for your mother and sister: Do your best not to call them out in front of your daughter. It’s much better to grab them in the hallway and say, very clearly, “Don’t threaten my child with Santa not coming.” If they get mad, let them. As my best friend’s grandmother used to say, there are people in this world who are radiators and people who are drains, and I am sure you can tell where I am going with this.

You have a lot on your plate. I’m cheering for you.

Comments

[colorwheel]

the santa threat is one thing; because of its specificity, in a way it's easier for the LW to decide how to handle it. i was surprised and sad that nicole didn't address this part:

When my mom comes to our house and my daughter makes even the slightest noise that sounds like it could turn into crying, she immediately tells my daughter, “I’m just going to leave!” or “That’s why I don’t like coming over here!”

that's something a kid could really absorb, especially since it's not a one-off. i understand that they live 5 minutes away, but i wanted boundaries with consequences drawn around the family members talking to the kid that way.

[quinfirefrorefiddle]

Yeah. On the one hand this isn't a bad answer, really. LW needs more friends before she can start saying to Mom, "don't bother coming over, we know you hate it, you don't have to." Clearly neither of these adults want a positive relationship with this kid and therefore they don't need to have one at all. (And if Dad wants to, he can put on his grown up pants and show some spine.)

But LW, you've got one more year before your kid's memories start really settling in- or at least I remember very little before 5. What do you want her to remember? Try Adopt A Grandparent, you'll probably have better luck than you did in the genetic lottery.

[ambyr]

I am actually wondering from this if Sister is also a minor (she seems from the letter to still be living at home, at any rate). That wouldn’t make her behavior any less damaging to Daughter, but it might suggest a different tact for addressing it.

[tielan]

LW can't do anything about her mother and her sister, so I'm with the Columnist: external friends. Local external friends in the same stage of life. She needs to spread out her social group so it's not just her (negative nellie) family.

Actually, a child just getting into school age is a pretty good way to meet other mothers/caregivers.

Of course, I don't know how the stigma of 'single mom' will play out socially in her locality, or her personality type (the fact that LW has clung to her rather awful family for emotional support suggests to me that she's not very good at casual friendmaking - a child's infancy/toddlerhood tends to be one of the most productive times for women to make contact with other women in the same life stage, because she doesn't have to talk about herself, she can just talk about her child and build things on from there).

So, yes, distance herself from Mom and Sister, maybe see if Dad will do things with her and her daughter (if he cares to), otherwise find a social group that isn't family, even if it's only a mother's group. (Do they have mother's groups in the US?)

[conuly]

When my mom comes to our house and my daughter makes even the slightest noise that sounds like it could turn into crying, she immediately tells my daughter, “I’m just going to leave!” or “That’s why I don’t like coming over here!” or “Your mom never acted this way!” It’s so painfully obvious that Mom doesn’t really enjoy being around her most of the time.

"There's the door. You can come back when you're willing to act your age."

[rosefox]

Do your best not to call them out in front of your daughter.

Hell with that. Call them out in front of your daughter so she knows you're standing up for her. And invite them over less, or not at all. If your family makes you and your kid feel like shit, you do not need to be around them.

[cimorene]

Exactly! She needs to protect her daughter from their weird sadistic attacks and she definitely shouldn't sit there and watch her sister teasing/bullying her child over supper?!

[rosefox]

The sister used to do the same thing to her, so I'd guess she gets stuck in that kid mindset of "I'm helpless and no one is stopping the torment" without realizing she has power in that relationship now.

[cimorene]

You're right, that must be exactly what's happening. Ugh. I really hope she protects the kid.

My parents failed to adequately protect my sister from our sadistic grandfather (he liked to tickle) and she was stuck sneaking around trying to avoid him or his attention, but of course they would still make her stay at his house.

[cereta]

Yes, this. When I was a kid being tormented by my older brother, I'd be e given anything for someone to be on my side, and one of my best memories is my mother sticking up to the grandmother who had decided I was an awful person.

[jadelennox]

Call them out in front of your daughter so she knows you're standing up for her.

this this this this this this.

[kaberett]

I'm... really surprised by the advice to not say, very calmly, "you don't get to say that to us" to people being awful.

[the_rck]

I think that it might be reasonable to talk to the 4 year old about the fact that her aunt and grandmother are out of line. The kid might repeat that them, but she also might not, and really, if they're acting like this, them getting upset about it might mean they stay away.

I'm more concerned about the kid having support in the face of relatives. I'm pretty sure that, at 4, she knows that something's wrong.

[cereta]

To hell with geographical distance: you most certainly can and should keep your daughter's contact with these people to a minimum. Yes, make some adult friends, with or without kids, but you need to take ownership of your own little family and protect it from these poisonous people.