Teenage girl rolling her eyes in front of angry parents

Ask Rene:
How Can We Get Our Daughter Back?

 

 

Hi Rene,

Wow, I remember when you were local here in Dallas! Good to know you’ve done so well. I’m sure you must tire of these mother/daughter/boyfriend questions but I have one. My daughter, who was actually a very well behaved, responsible, senior in high school, of course, has a boyfriend, who is 20; no ambition, lives with parents, works part time, loser guy. She turned 18 one month ago and the next day WITH NO WARNING of this coming, moved out of our home. She has been accepted to three different universities, is still working and has been keeping her grades up… but I am so worried and concerned for her future. Even more confusing is this; do we help her with college if she actually goes? We did not let her take her car and hardly any clothes. We turned off her phone. Do we sell her car? Do we help her at all? She clearly believes she can handle all this alone, she says her plans are still in place. I’m so confused about what my new role should consist of? Please HELP.

 Desperate in Dallas

 

Hi Desperate:

Hey thanks for the nice words; it’s always great to hear from folks back home and yeah, I consider Dallas to be that. And I see home is the theme here in your letter. You’re right about this much, I do get a lot of these letters, more than I ever thought I would. Having said this, please understand they never get old nor do I get tired of answering them because I know there are real people with real problems on the other end. So, let’s dive right into this one shall we? Here are the things I’m thinking and what I would do if I were you.

4. What Would You Do?

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And now two quick things: you say your daughter's boyfriend is a loser? To you, he very well may be but he's 20; how many of us had our acts totally together at that age? I know I didn't. Perhaps your daughter sees something in him that you don't, something she is willing to grow and nurture. I would suggest you stop harping on him because being negative is only pushing her closer to him. If you have nothing nice to say, say nothing at all.

You want to get your daughter back? You can do that... by letting her go. One of the great parenting paradoxes is that we work for 18 years to teach our kids to be strong enough to make their own decisions and then when they do that, we freak out a little. Your daughter's future belongs to her. Period. You can be concerned and you can worry about it, but there's actually very little you can or should do. She's going to make mistakes and she will learn from them.. if you get out of her way and let her.

Trust that she's smart, learned from the best (you) and will ultimately figure it out. Just like we all do.

Good luck, Mom!

That’s my advice. What would you say? Have you ever been in a situation like this? How did you handle it?

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