Also the ferocity of the emotions in the letter might have been concerning for her, hence why she shared it.
My daughter once dated a man who was in the police academy. He had to be in training Monday through Friday with no cell phones. They dated for a while. After one weekend, he snuck his cell phone and texted her when he should not. She was very concerned about this behavior. He needed to follow the rules or risked being thrown out. I think that there is some desperation on the part of the person not around. Daughter broke up with him after this.
I think you have been given some good advice above by @CollegeMamb0@Knowsstuff , and I agree that it’s good that she shared the letter with her sisters.
I think talking about it as a family (not a huge crowd, just siblings, mom, dad, and step-mom if you are comfortable with her there). If you can do it in a conversational way that shows concern and not appear to be ganging up on her intervention style, you may be able to get through to her. One thing I would try to make her think about: Do you want to marry the kind of person who wants you to lie to, and “trick”, your family? Is that the kind of person you want as a spouse?
Agreed. Oldest was very high needs with behavioral and mental health issues. We were just getting things under control in high school and his dad threw a sucker punch out of left field during the kids junior year. Oldest kid directly affected ended up back in therapy. Oldest is now in college but Im dealing with how my middle one has indirectly had to deal with me focusing on my time on “fixing” his older brother.
I agree that sometimes kids who have seen family go through emotional drama develop coping mechanisms that arent exactly healthy.
@CollegeMamb0 Thank you – I will look at all of that. Adding to the stress I am sure is that my ex is a serious alcoholic and he now has Stage 3 Cirrhosis which is not likely to have a positive outcome. He is apparently drinking again as well.
Yes it was pretty horrible - my ex has an alcohol problem, we were at odds over it as you can imagine and his solution to that was to start an affair with someone else. Of course I eventually found this out - my daughter was 10 at the time. She and her sisters were old enough to know exactly what was going on. And my ex dragged me through custody court and threatened me with taking the kids - it was really really bad. It was all I had to keep it together, keep working and try my best to keep custody of my daughters.
@powercropper - its the Marines and it is pretty long. I want to say 16 weeks. I am a bit worried he won’t make it but I guess we will see. 2 more letters arrived today, I have not idea what is in them as they are sitting on the counter unopened as of yet.
@toomanyteens - this is really tough for you all. I commend you for getting out even if it was hard. Now the work must be on making your family unit feel more safe and secure than life with the fiance. Even if she marries him, she will know at the back of her mind that she has somewhere safe to go. You don’t need to say anything, she needs to feel it in her nervous system. Sounds like lockdown has been good for you all to do that. Keep working on it and keeping her close.
I would suggest getting your daughter someone to talk to that maybe is not family while he is away. This will give her perspective. Especially with her family history this is just a bad situation waiting to get worse. I only wish the best for her.
Thank you @CollegeMamb0 - It was a seriously rough few years and I guess even now although the girls have lowered their expectations of their father. Sad though.
She has sought counseling in the past. I am unclear if she felt she got something out of it or not. I wish there was something I could have done to make it less difficult on them but I am not sure there really was anything – I needed a lifeline myself, it was the hardest thing I had ever gone through in my life.
@toomanyteens . Lots of teens went to therapy as teens and very few will admit that it helped…IE: ME!! But it most likely did.
I think your a great mother. You had your kids talk to someone when their life and yours was upside down. Your reaching out for suggestions. This is very hard but getting a professionals advise might be what she needs. Someone not connected to the family and a non biased opinion. Hopefully confiding with her sisters will help her see what this story is becoming. I have just seen this type of scenario go in a bad direction and really don’t want that to happen.
OP- my therapist would have asked, “Have you tried being honest?”
It would go something like this:
You- “I want to know what you need from me right now. If you’d like me to be all “mother of the bride” and look at magazines and dresses with you- let me know. If you’d like me to listen when you talk about how great Bobby is and how excited you are to start your life together- let me know. if you want me to listen without judging when you talk about how stressful it is with him being away, and communicating by letter all the time- let me know. If you’d like me to point out that you seem much more relaxed when you are with your siblings and friends now that he’s in basic training I can do that-- or I can keep my mouth shut and just let you feel your feelings. The one thing I cannot do-- just letting you know upfront- is listen to a plan that involves you dropping out of school. I know too many women who ended up broke, or in broken marriages, or unable to do what they had dreamed of doing-- because they dropped out of school to follow a husband or to let their spouse fulfill THEIR dreams. So that I cannot do. But I will try to listen with no judgement or help you in any way I can if you let me know what you need from me”.
And then see what happens. If she shuts you down, you still have plans B, C etc (the sisters, her dad, her friends) but she may surprise you. And she may be more willing to admit to some anxiety once you’ve opened the door.
The key- you really can’t judge if she does share. You can say “I wish we knew Bobby better” when she points out that he’s immature. You can say “boy, the army is tough” when she complains that he’s clingy or brags that he’s more in love with her than ever now that he’s gone. But you need to let her talk so she can sort out in her own mind if she’s in an inflection point or not.
This is very challenging- big hugs to you. I know many, many children of divorce who end up in early marriages, some good, some bad, some very ugly. And I don’t think it’s inappropriate for you now to point out to her that if it hadn’t been for your financial independence and career, her life would have turned out very different and not in a good way.
But teenagers aren’t always so good at connecting the dots.
Whatever you can do to keep her talking to her friends-- wow, what a gift. Her girlfriends are not going to let a guy get away with behaviors that would have been OK back in the 1960’s.
@blossom - Your post is so spot in and applicable to almost every situation. I think so often we are all quick to try to be the “fixers” and often times that’s not what the person is looking for.
Credit my therapist (of blessed memory) who kept me on the straight and narrow! I would have these convoluted conversations in my head with fifteen arms and legs of complexity and she’d quietly ask “have you tried being honest?”
Hugs to all of us struggling with stressful situations right now…
@blossom I hope you are right – the weird thing is that she is very over the top critical of one of her other college friend’s controlling boyfriend and yet doesn’t see to see her own is just controlling is a different way.
She and I DO need to talk because yesterday things went from bad to worse. 4 more letters arrived and thus far he hasn’t made it past day 1 of basic training. (this she told me).
He apparently sprained an ankle and has been in medical tent for a week. This she told me. What she DID NOT tell me (and her sisters heard a conversation with a friend she was having on the phone) is that the young man now says the marines are not for him and he plans to ‘quit’ - and what that means is feigning more injury than he has when they clear him to go back to basic until they give him a medical discharge. He then apparently is going to go back to Walmart to work for 6 months and try to enlist again but this time in the Air Force which he deems ‘easier’.
It is all so immature - he always has a reason to not follow through on anything at any time. I was really hoping for his sake even that the service would man him up a little bit but apparently not happening.