BiblioCat, I certainly wish you the best of luck with your daughter! I know that mine has caused untold struggles; finally, when I felt I couldn’t handle it anymore, I just turned it over to God. I do the best I can day by day, and trust that God will give me the strength to handle what may come; believe me when I say that I’m entirely grateful that my 13-year-old has no signs of heading in that direction!
CheeseMonster, I’ve never heard of DBT, but will definitely look into it. One big problem we’ve had is that my daughter has flat-out admitted that she’s not willing to do the work it’s going to take for her to get better. She just won’t do any kind of introspection. When she sees her therapist, the talk is all very shallow (or total bs), and I don’t think it accomplishes much of anything. The meds do help, but I don’t believe that meds alone will be her salvation. She thinks her home life sucks, and I believe the only way she’ll find out differently is to get out on her own, and see what life is really like.
a35362, thanks for the book recommend. I’ll have to look into it. Again, though, this stuff is only going to help her if she’s willing to do the work. I hope one day she will be, but right now, I don’t believe she is.
Perhaps she needs some kind of stress reliever? I know that my main sources of stress release are riding and theatre, and without them, I’m much less happy. See if you can get her involved in some sort of physical activity, as that may help, or something else that may have interested her for awhile that she might want to try.
Doesn’t sound like a good idea. In the can’t-recommend-it-enough book to which Green Bean linked, the author strongly advises against sending police to “chat” with someone they don’t have cause to arrest. If they show up and don’t do anything to him, he’ll draw the conclusion that he has nothing to fear from cops.
Been there, tried that, and failed miserably. We joined the Y, partly because she wanted to be able to go work out, but now she never wants to. We enrolled her in choir and painting (and an algebra) class at the community college, but she blew off classes to hang out with her friends. At this point our money situation is very tight, and we’re hesitant to invest any money in anything else that she very well might not follow through on. Oh, also, she wanted a homeschool drawing program. We spent about $60.00 on supplies, including a book called “Drawing for Dummies”. She did the first exercise in it, was pleased with the results, and never did another thing out of it. When I started insisting that she do more, she confessed that she had left her $30.00 pack of art pencils at a friend’s house, and she never did get them back; we are understandably hesitant to replace the pencils.
Scotti, she doesn’t really want to take a closer look at Paul. For one thing, he’s 23 (he’s a friend we met through church); for another thing, he’s probably moving to Kansas next month. If he were a little younger, it’d be a good idea, though.
I agree this guy sounds like bad news. And you seem to have your head together about it. You’ve received good comments from so many others, I thought I wasn’t going to post, but this makes me think of something I learned recently that was quite a revelation.
There’s been a big change in the way kids perceive “dating” since I was a teen. Waaaaaaaay back then, it was ok to be a young person who went out on dates with different people and keep things really casual. Some families even had rules such as no dating the same person two or three times in a row. If you want to go to a movie Friday night and a dance Saturday night with Luke then you best figure out a way to have a tennis date with John Saturday morning. Teens who do this these days, girls in particular, are likely to be labelled by their classmates as promiscuous. I don’t feel exclusive dating is necessarily a “good thing” for teens. But I can sure see why a young woman would practice serial monogamy rather than be accused of being promiscuous.
At the risk of sounding unpopular let me offer a solution other than the ‘live out your knight in shining armor fantasies by bullying the shit of this guy’ ideas you are getting.
Sadly, i can relate to that guy. I used to be similiar to him, very needy and lonely so i think i can offer some insight and i can relate to what he is going through. I can assure you bullying him to feel good about yourself will not solve the situation, just piss him off and humiliate an already traumatized person.
If i were you, i would let your daughter and him know that both of them are seriously mentally ‘ill’ (mentally ill isn’t the best word for it, but you get the idea. maybe ‘confused’ or ‘mentally unfit’ are better) and that both of them need to look at themselves objectively to see what they’ve become and where they are going in life.
As for the guy, let him know that how he is acting, although normal to him, are signs of serious personality problems and serious dependency issues that will never let him be happy. Tell him that after he learns how to address those issues he will be able to have happier, healthier relationships with other people.
Needy and desperate are personality traits that can be worked with, if you really like someone. Jealousy and violence, not so much.
I don’t think I ever said anything about bullying him. When I was talking about Paul wiping up the street with him, that wasn’t bullying, that was Daniel getting all jealous and violent, and Paul defending himself (well, that’s what it would have been, if the fight had ever actually happened). While Daniel and my daughter were dating, I was very careful about what they were allowed to do, because I saw the potential for violence; but I was never less than polite to the guy. I invited him for dinner, went to his house to meet his mother (and their 10 cats; oy, my allergies, my allergies!).
This is territory I’ve been over and over with my daughter; however, I would never take it upon myself to tell some guy I barely know that he’s mentally ill and needs to look at himself objectively.
Well, cause usually men hit on women… though there are exceptions…
And, sometimes this is gender reversed: a man and woman I know of: the woman started hitting on the guy, saying he was he 'soul mate" and how they were 'destind to be together" and for him to date anyone else would be a “sin against the almighty.”
It’s not only insecure guys hitting on vulnerable girls, though this is likely the majority, it goes the other way, too.
Telling someone who is mentally ill that they are mentally ill isn’t necessarily going to make sense to them. After all, it is the brain that is not functioning correctly.
norinew, I know a psychiatrist, a woman, whose daughter has borderline personality disorder and some other psychiatric problems. The psychiatrist does the best that she can for her adult daughter – manages her money, requires the daughter to work for her (rather than not working at all), etc. But her daughter will never be able to function completely normally. It’s not the mother’s fault or the daughter’s, for that matter. You sound very, very dedicated. Your daughter is lucky to have such abiding love.
I hope that you are giving your daughter and abundance of praise for acting so wisely. Give lots of positive feedback – verbally and otherwise. Reinforce this good behavior.
Bibliocat, it is the job of an adolescent to rebel. That is how she becomes her own person. I know it is really frustrating for the parent. One trick is to let her “get away with” things that don’t cause any lasting harm – like turning her hair blue or piercing her navel.
Teenagers with depression often have very, very low self-esteem and feel guilty. Do what you can to allow her to make choices for herself. (Within limits, of course.) Take her seriously, show approval and acceptance. Let her know that you love her no matter what. And educate yourself and her about depression. It is not a character weakness. She is probably thinking that it is.
Well, we do try, but it’s so hard, because so frequently, she’s made really harmful choices. For instance, yesterday, we let her go to visit a friend (Anna) that we trust implicitly, provided that Paul would walk with her to Anna’s apartment. Well, Paul had other things to do, so he just left daughter off in front of Anna’s, and went on his way. Last night, Anna called, asking if daughter had tried to come visit her because she hadn’t been home all day :eek: So, when daughter came home from her meeting last night, I said “How’s Anna doing in her new apartment?” (I wanted to see if she’s outright lie to me, or if she’d come clean right then), and daughter said “Fine, but she’s having some stuff to sort out and that’s why I didn’t stay long today”. When confronted with the facts, daughter admitted that, when Anna wasn’t home, she had gone to visit some friends who live in a known drug-house; she is specifically not allowed to be there, which she well knows. So we’ve got the reigns pulled in pretty tight right now.
When she makes good choices, or acts in a way that shows initiative (this seems very hard for her to do), both her father and I do praise her. I don’t know if it helps; OTOH, who’s to say how much worse she’d be if we only criticized her bad decisions and never praised her good ones?
Done on a regular basis. In fact, she asked me not long ago if I was sorry I had her. I told her that all kids are hard work, and I knew that going into the deal. If I didn’t want any hassle, I wouldn’t have kids; I told her I don’t regret any of them (my kids, I mean).
Sorry I’m so late to the thread! I’m glad your daughter has wised up in regard to this particular guy, and I hope y’all are able to work through her other problems safely. Everyone else has been so helpful, there’s not a lot left for me to say, but I want you and your daughter to know you have my best wishes.
Yes, I think she is going through a “finding herself” phase. She wants to get blonde streaks in her medium brown hair, and I told her she could over the summer.
The place she had been going for treatment is no longer accepting patients with private insurance (only indigent patients), so we have had to switch doctors and therapists, and will see the new ones starting next week. I just hope they keep her on the same meds, as they seem to be working. I’ve heard all kinds of horror stories about switching depression meds.
To the OP: You must never assume it’s over, even though your daughter told the guy it was. He will keep calling. If she has email, he will send it to her. Heck, he may send her Christmas presents. Or he may just catch her alone sometime and beat the crap out of her for daring to think she could say no to him.
Please, be extra careful with her for a while. Until he finds somebody else to control, I think. Or until he goes to jail for some related offense.
norinew, I think you have been doing all that you can do, and are doing the right thing! I’m 18 and I’ve been told by people, my own mother included, that I’m more mature when it comes to the dating workd that most people my age and older. But you know what? I had to learn from my mistakes to get there. I put up with things in past relationships that I know better than to put up with now. And I’m no expert by far, but your daughter will learn what’s acceptable and what’s not acceptable in a boyfriend. If she’s lucky, someday she’ll be able to look back on her life and realize how stupid of her it was for her to put up with a bad boyfriend. If she never learns that lesson, then, she’s in for some more rough times.
Oh, believe me, I’m aware of this. In fact, a couple of times since the breakup, she’s wanted to walk to someplace alone, and I’ve said no! Not only could she be confronted by him, but maybe by one of his buddies, and even more frighteningly, by him and his buddies! Cumberland is a very small city; you run into people you know all the time. And because he’s unemplyed, there’s an even greater chance of her running into him, because all there is for him to do is hang out downtown with his friends. And to get from our house to almost anywhere else around here, guess where you’ve got to go through? Yup. Downtown. As far as calling here, that doesn’t worry me. We have caller ID, and are familiar with the two or three numbers he calls from. We don’t answer calls that have the caller ID blocked. If he starts calling from a different number, well, we may have to have him charged with harrassment. One of the good things about living in such a small place is that the cops actually have time to deal with stuff like this!
One of the things that bothers me is that she doesn’t seem to learn from her mistakes. But, as I’ve said before, I just had to turn that over to God. I mean, sure I do all I can. When she wants to talk, I try to be available to listen. I do my best to be supportive of her. Unfortunately, what she sees as supportive is us letting her do what she wants; what we see as supportive is being firm (as gently as is realistically possible) in order to keep her safe.
Nightingale, thanks for the kind words. I really appreciate it.
Or until he goes to jail for some related offense.