Send her a gift card for something she is interested in. Maybe include a clipped news item from some local happening. You’ll get a TY text. And realize that the blip on the radar that has you concerned will seem insignificant in the grand scheme.
I interact with my adult kids periodically on facebook, through emails, texts, etc. Sometimes I’ll be all busy with life and they will initiate a “hey, wassup”.
Chill. 
She may just flat out forget to reply if she’s too busy to reply at the moment. My grandparents text me a lot (and in l33t sp33k) during the day when I’m at work. I’ll be too busy to reply then will forget until days later that they even texted me at all. Has nothing to do with them, I’ve just got a lot on my mind.
This. Texts are like conversation. Make one comment. Ask one thing. Then wait for a response.
“How’s the new car?” That’s a text.
I appreciate everyone’s opinion. But I call bullshit on this. Let’s see what is going on. A month ago she bought a new car, for which we gave her the downpayment as a graduation gift. I guess I’m selfish or unrealistic or something for hoping my child would share with me the joy of her new car.
And she’s planning on driving that new car full of her possessions from IL to CA in a month or 2. As a parent, I guess it is totally off base for me to be concerned that she is comfortable with the car and that it is giving her no problems before a single young woman embarks on her first ever extended trip of the sort.
And I also guess as a parent that it is unreasonable for me to hope that she tell me so much of her plans as the frigging week that she expects to do this drive - or any other info.
Sorry, but if she isn’t going to involve me in any portion of the planning - or give me barebones info as to her plans, I’m not all that interested in getting a call should something go wrong. Maintaining relationships requires some minimal amount of effort on both sides - not simply reliance when convenient or self advantageous.
And since when is “How ya doing?” a complicated, open-ended question as opposed to a greeting? I suppose when someone on the street says “How are you” you tell give them a detailed explanation?
So if she offers of silence as to things as significant as a new car and a move across country, how am I to express interest/concern/support on things less mementous? Of course I didn’t express a full response in 5 seconds, but she could surely text, “Busy, wil resp l8tr” But I don’t get even that. If it is inappropriate to ask 3 questions in a single text that garners no response, ought I pose them in 3 separate texts which receive 3 separate no responses?
I realize I’m sounding bitter or worked up here. I’m not, realy. But I find this “too busy” excuse bullshit to pull on your closest family.
No, you send one text asking “how’s it going” and if she responds, follow up with the car. Sending 3 texts in a row is the same as sending one big text, especially as most text services have a character limit and will break a big text up anyway. If you’re chatting to someone face to face, you don’t shotgun questions at them or yell them at their back as they leave, do you?
I don’t know what to tell you, though, if you consider not responding within an unspoken timeframe a rejection of your relationship. You know your daughter better than the rest of us, but I am surprised at how quickly you jump to that POV. I really suggest a sincere and pleasant phonecall soon about preferred methods of contact and expectations re: returning calls and texts. It’s possible she doesn’t realize how important it is to you.
Deleted because it’s duplicated below. I somehow double posted.
Dinsdale, I understand what you’re saying.
I don’t hear from my son all that often, but I DO before he does major things (e.g. going underway), moving, driving from one end of the country to another - and expect those kinds of details. When we got him his first car (we didn’t pay for it - we bought it- he sent us the paperwork, we got it all arranged, we picked it out at the dealership, we shipped it to SC - everything BUT pay for it) he was in regular contact. When he drove from New York to here to see us, again, regular contact. When he left New York for Georgia, again driving, regular contact.
Hell - when he flew to Veas with his friends, he was texting me pictures of the various casinos - it was big thing in his life and wanted to share it with me.
During a regular month, I may not hear from him at all if nothing big is going on - but when big things ARE happening, it’s nice to know he wants me to be aware of them.
So yeah - I understand where you’re coming from and I’d be put out if I were in your position.
Fair enough. She’s not “too busy,” she’s just wrapped up in her own world. That seems pretty normal to me. I’m pretty close to my parents, but there are times in my life where I’ve gone several weeks without talking to them (my normal communication for most my life was once a week.) I have close friends that sometimes just disappear for months at a time. I don’t take it personally. It happens. I sometimes drop out of contact with friends the same way. I get wrapped up in my world and, next thing I know, it’s been 6 weeks since I phoned or emailed someone I’ve been meaning to email.
As to the OP and email protocol, there is no “message received” protocol I have with anyone. The closest is my wife texts “please confirm” when I have to acknowledge receipt. Otherwise, I respond or don’t depending on if I feel like it, and the same with whomever I text.
I guess there are a couple of things that kinda bug me about the current situation. First, this is the one of my kids who is the most “of the same mind” as me. We’ve got 22 years of not assuming any poses with each other. And it has been really fun thinking so similarly as someone.
Three weeks or so ago I missed a call from her and texted “I was at a jam and missed your call. N e thing up?”
Response: “Nope.”
I later learned that she had picked up her new car that day. I texted her “Surprised that didn’t merit a mention when I asked if anything was up.”
Then, when I saw her that weekend I hugged her and said, “Just to be clear, I hope we have a relationship where something as significant as buying you first fucking car merits a mention. And I’m sorry, but I care about you, and would greatly appreciate if you would acknowledge my texts if only with a simple “K”.”
Then a week of silence followed, and my text of yesterday. So there’s a bit of a pattern of what I would consider less than optimal communication. And I have a hard time figuring out how to express my concerns more directly than face-to-face while hugging someone, as well as in plain words in a text.
Well, for what it’s worth, my first (and strong) impression agrees with others. What you wrote is a reasonable piece of communication, but not at all via texting. What you wrote should have been an email.
Think about the situation from her side of things. To her, you have done something out-of-etiquette, and that’s what I think you are looking to learn in this thread. Remember, there’s no logic to etiquette, and putting your sensibilities from other settings onto this one might go awry.
From your daughter’s perspective, your text is strange. Saying “Too busy now; will respond later,” sounds to her (if not you) rather dismissive and rude. Why? Because that’s automatically assumed on texts anyway. Actively saying you aren’t going to respond is more rude because it’s not expected.
Texts are quasi-one-way communications. You send them into the wind, and you forget about them. The reply might come fast or slow. The reply might come via text or via a different channel. They are the equivalent of chess-by-post. Among friends and family, they represent a single, long, lifelong conversation that needn’t be rushed because, well, we’ve got our whole lives to continue this conversation, and we will.
They are often short yet they should not be trite. An honest reply to your text would be a multi-paragraph email or a phone call, and that needs to be composed, not merely texted. You might have wanted her to say something back like, “Car’s great! Plans are progressing!”, but to her (if not you) that would be a rude and dismissive reply rather than the reply that you actually want to receive and that she actually wants to give. So, she doesn’t even think to reply since the honest, heartfelt response is not suitable for texting. But it’s the original text that set what sort of reply she should give. And she is not out of line by not replying back by text.
If you want more nuanced staying-in-touch conversation, send her emails more than texts.
How did she respond to this? What did she say/how did she react/etc.?
Y’all are right about the text etiquette. But in what world does any of that require a paragraph response? You can answer each of those questions in one to three words. “Fine. Drives good. Going great.” Or, since the answer to all of them is almost certainly the same, “Everything’s going great, Dad.” Or, if pressed for time, “It’s fine.”
Maybe I’m weird, but I would meet my parents halfway in all this. Sure, etiquette says you don’t need to respond when you are busy, but that’s to short things like “what’s up” or “you busy” or to texts that aren’t questions. And usually whatever it is is time relevant, so you’d feel stupid responding later. Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever texted anyone a direct question and not gotten a response. Granted, I ask them one at at time, but still.
Anyways, I’d suggest to the OP that he forget about this time, and try to ask only one question at a time. If she shows a continual pattern of not responding, then maybe get that idea. And I do like the idea of calling if she doesn’t respond, when it’s an important question.
Just some random thoughts:
Is it possible she thought you’d go all “Dad” about the car? You know, if she said she loved it, you’d respond with “Great. I was really worried about [thing you advised that she ignored]” or you’d respond with “Great. I am glad you went with [thing you advised that she followed your advice]”. And if she had complained, would you have tried to fix it? Suggest she call the dealer, tell her to try something, tell her she needed to do whatever? If she’d told you it was $300 more than expected, or the color was off, or something, would you have gotten upset with the dealer for mistreating her, or at her for not standing up for herself? Would you have reminded her to call her insurance agent or that she needed to start saving more each month so that she could meet the higher premium when it was due? It’s shit like that that keeps adult kids from talking to parents. They don’t want advice–even good, reasonable advice–and there is literally no way to have a conversation that isn’t advice because that’s what the parent/child relationship has been about. And I am an advice giver, so I know how hard it is to change that. But it’s the truth.
I also think you have a weird sense of hierarchy here, that the more important events are the ones that should be shared. That seems logical, but it’s not really how relationships work. Relationships are all about the little things, the passing events. The best thing you can do to build a mre adult relationship with her is share the events of your own life–your work, the house, your hobbies, politics, whatever. The sorts of things you’d talk about with another adult. In a very real sense, the one thing you shouldn’t talk about is what is happening with her, because you can’t be neutral on that, and she isn’t going to talk to you about anything if it always turns into the Dad Tells It Like It Is show. Let her volunteer details, because she’s only going to bring up Big Stuff with you when she wants you to tell her what you think she should do.
Honestly, I think it’s not going to go well that you are placing expectations on her when she is trying to figure out her own adult life. It would piss me off and I would be passive aggressive in not responding.
If it were me, I would keep the lines of communication open from your end, but not expect anything from her. Send her a text every so often just telling her some random or important thing, but not asking or expecting anything from her. Maybe eventually she will do the same.
I am 24 and I have this problem with my parents, I feel like they confuse text messages with email.
Generally I like to use text messages for short, purposeful conversation like to confirm a time or location of something or to tell a friend about a funny moment in my day.
The text described contains a lot of questions and receiving a text like that can be rather overwhelming in a strange, first-world-problem kind of way. Do not be offended that your daughter did not respond, I would hate to think that my parents would ever be offended that I do not respond to all of their texts (as it is true, I do not respond to them all because they send texts like the one you described).
There is a certain hierarchy in responding to text messages that I had not actually realised until just now:
I generally only get texts as described from my parents and it often takes me longer to respond to them because I need to think of an answer that provides sufficient information in the least amount of characters (as there are only 260 characters per text message or something). By the time I have put that off at least a few hours and then thought about a response for at least another few hours (all up could be about 3 days by this stage) I have often seen or spoken to my parents so I do not actually need to respond to their text.
I must emphasise that I am not deliberately ignoring my parents, I am just trying to comprehend and respond to the long, overwhelming text. I guess in my opinion the best solution is to send text messages that contain fewer questions. On the occasion that I receive those texts from my parents, I am much faster to respond.
I hope this was helpful 
OP, I’m around the same age as you with kids of similar ages as yours, and I tend to agree with this post.
I’d back off a bit, give your daughter a chance to miss you. Ring her when you really want to talk, or need a question answered. Otherwise just send a text now and then but don’t expect an answer. Give her a bit of an update on what you’re doing, not a wistful enquiry about what she’s doing. Let her feel she has the option to respond, not that she HAS to respond.
From reading your posts, I feel as though you’re expecting a bit too much and I think the harder you try to hold on, the more she’ll want to let go. You say you aren’t bitter, but you do sound it to me. Maybe you’re sounding bitter to her too? She’s an adult now, you don’t get to decide unilaterally what ‘optimal communication’ is.
I think it’ll work out if you relax a bit. 
You know, sometimes I don’t pick up the phone when my parents call, even when I’m not doing anything earth-shattering. Sometimes I’m really into whatever piddly thing I’m doing and don’t want to interrupt it. Sometimes something else is about to happen and I don’t want to delay/interrupt that. Sometimes I just don’t have the mental energy for the Full Mom Experience. I love my mom a lot. I like my mom a lot. I generally enjoy talking to her and spending time with her. But she has her little ways just like everyone else on this planet, ya know?
And **Manda Jo **is totally right–there’s a lot of stuff I just flat-out don’t tell my mother, because she won’t be able to stop herself weighing in on the subject and I Don’t Want to Hear It. I’m a grown-ass woman, and if I want her opinion on whether I’m doing it Wrong! All Wrong!! I’ll ask. (And yes, Og love her, her first instinct is to be certain that I’m doing it Wrong!! All Wrong!! Worrying about and pointing out potential problems is part of how she loves people. The fact that it comes from a place of love doesn’t make it not annoying as all fuck.)
Gullible is right, too. You do sound bitter as hell. And you don’t get to dictate what your relationship with your daughter will be. It’s okay to want a certain type of relationship with her, but as the wise man said, you can’t always get what you want. My mom wants the sort of relationship where we talk about everything, up to and including our sex lives. I want the sort of relationship where I can tell her about some decision I’ve made and she doesn’t immediately start telling me all the pitfalls as though I haven’t considered the matter carefully and maturely. We both have to live with a certain amount of disappointment.
My sisters and I all went through a period where we didn’t spend much time chatting with our parents. There was a little bit of “its uncomfortable to talk to my parents about grown up things” and a little “I want my independence” and a little “I don’t seem to have much in common with these people who are so much older” and some “they still treat me like a child” and some “I’d rather do just about anything than talk to my mom.”
My baby sister was the worst - and still is. My mother finally had to have a heart to heart with her - some sort of contact, every other week, initiated by my sister was the compromise. Sometimes its a phone call, sometimes an email, sometimes a text. Sometimes its a link to something she found on the internet. Sometimes its a card in the mail. But once a week my sister is suppose to reach out to her parents. My sister agreed to this because she does love my mother, and came to understand that to my mother, radio silence was rejection and that was hurtful. Honestly, frequently the communication is still about as impersonal as it gets - a forwarded joke, or a text “hey Mom, I’m fine.”
My other sister and I, we have kids - and when we had kids we started having regular contact and LOTS in common with my parents :).
I can be a hard person to get a hold of. I don’t have a cell phone. Sometimes I forget to check my messages. Sometimes I forget to respond to messages. Sometimes I procrastinate responding to messages for no rational reason. I’m a hot mess, communication-wise.
Whenever my parents feel frustrated because they can’t reach me, they will direct one of my siblings to track me down. A couple of times you with the face has hunted me down here on the board and let it be known in the middle of a thread that our parents have been trying to call me. Embarrassing but it is well-deserved!
So I would use her siblings–particularly her closest one–as a resource. Maybe you can even talk to them and feel them out. Ask them if there’s something going on. Just asking that question may signal a sibling to give her a gentle nudge and say, “You may want to talk to Dad.”
I am sympathetic towards your feelings. I think she is being rude, even if your texts are a lot to chew on. If she’s mad at you, for whatever reason, she needs to be a grown woman and put it out there so you know what the deal is. If she’s busy, she needs to tell you she’s busy…and not just leave you hanging. That is rude, IMHO.