Disrescpectful Adult Child, How to Deal with Her?

I couldn't say it better than Suz and B.

The parenting is done. She is how she is. She's either gotten away with it, or she's had some sort of mental health crisis. You cannot fix it. You are not the parent. Be sad but don't get involved with what you cannot change.

it's too late to start disciplining, teaching or influencing her now. this didn't just happen overnight.

she sounds awful, but someone raised her to be that way.

if you don't want a relationship with her, then go your husband's route and cut her off and ignore her.

if you do then you can keep the door open but with boundaries. and your boundaries should include not assuming that she's going to spend a day with you unless she has said already that she wants to.

treat her the same way you would any other rude adult with whom you have ties of affection and family.

i myself would say 'if you want your birthday money you can stop off here and get it. it's $50. i hope you enjoy it because it'll be the last birthday money you get with that attitude.'

keep the door open, without being a doormat. don't try to drag her through it.

it may well be that in a few more years she'll wise up and be a pleasant person.

khairete
S.

Well, you could laugh out loud.
She wants what she wants, she wants it NOW and she wants someone else to provide it for her.
She might be an adult but she still has a lot of growing up to do.

There's no way you or your husband should take that attitude seriously.
Let her go - don't call or pursue her - let her come back to you.
When she's ready (or hungry enough), she might view coming around for dinner in a different light.
In the mean time, she's made her bed, she needs to lay in it.
'No' is a complete sentence when ever she makes any ransom demands.

Yeah, we all love our kids but doing everything for them seems to make some of them think they are entitled to everything always.
It's hard but Hubby's first born baby girl is way too old to be throwing a tantrum like this.
Best thing for you and Hubby to do is to take some weekends together and enjoy some nice bed and breakfasts and travel a bit.
Disengage with this child and go enjoy yourself.

I’m going to come at this from another angle. My daughter is 19. She joined the military straight out of high school (completely her choice). I watched her through bootcamp, 2 different A schools and now she’s stationed on the east coast.

The past year has been very hard for us. In her quest to demonstrate her independence she barely communicated with us. Sometimes I was so discouraged and wondered why she was acting like she was. I took it personally at times. I continued to text her telling her I hoped she had a good day and encouraging her. Always told her that I loved her. I wanted her to know, no matter what, I was there. I had a feeling she was having issues adjusting to military life and I was right. I never wanted her to think she was alone.

She was home on leave recently. She stayed with friends mostly (which I think is normal) and a couple of nights with us. While she was home she apologized for some past behavior. I told her not to worry about it, I knew she was figuring things out. No matter what choices she made, adults can agree to disagree and nothing would EVER change how I love her. We had such a great time together.

So maybe your stepdaughter thinks she’s not measuring up. The comment about chump change was meant to hurt you, more than likely because she’s hurting and not liking the choice she made to land herself where she is. Admitting you’ve screwed up is harder for some people. I’m not saying you should be a doormat or a bank, but maybe recognize she’s flailing and doesn’t want to seem that she is.

Hopefully she will turn things around soon. In the meantime, it stinks.

Ditto to what Suz T said. She laid out the options well. I just want to add that it must be painful to see a young person whom you care about behaving so poorly and not building a good future for herself. It seems like you two need to guard your hearts with her, and you made the right choice to tell her that she couldn't live in the home with your family any more. Thinking about your earlier post, your younger kids definitely don't need to see her example of how to be an adult! Wishing you all lots of luck with her process of becoming an adult.

ETA: I do like what B said too. Don't take her temper tantrum to heart.

How would I deal with it if my adult child acted like this? I'd ignore those texts. They don't dignify a response. She feels entitled, and by making an ongoing 50.00 amount known to her, it's become a simple expectation, like a contract. It seems neither your husband nor step daughter really understand the concept of a "gift" I suggest you just stop gifting her ANY money, period.

I'm sorry your husband is hurting, but is this really new behavior for her? Was she always so ungrateful? If it's a new, sudden personality change, perhaps it could be related to substance use, or mental illness. It would be hard to tell if you aren't seeing her in person frequently.

She is an adult. And her behavior towards you and your husband is very unkind. Maybe you and your husband should take a little break from reaching out and doing things for her and to "help" her when she asks or demands for awhile. Then after some time, go see her in person to see if she's doing OK. Offer your emotional support and love, just not financial support and basic things she should be doing for herself as an adult, like arranging and funding her own transportation. If she doesn't want that kind of support, it will hurt. But I'd accept it and hope that as she matures and has more life experience, she will come around. You say your husband has done everything possible for her that he could. Well maybe that is the problem. In order to grow up and act like a grateful person, she needs her parents to stop fixing, funding, and doing so many things FOR her. You can only control yourselves, though. You can't control what her mother does for her. So I think you have to accept your limited influence under the circumstances.

Then like B said, if she continues to be rude, demanding, and/or dismissive of you and your husband, disengage and go out and enjoy yourselves. Good luck!

Updated

How would I deal with it if my adult child acted like this? I'd ignore those texts. They don't dignify a response. She feels entitled, and by making an ongoing 50.00 amount known to her, it's become a simple expectation, like a contract. It seems neither your husband nor step daughter really understand the concept of a "gift" I suggest you just stop gifting her ANY money, period.

I'm sorry your husband is hurting, but is this really new behavior for her? Was she always so ungrateful? If it's a new, sudden personality change, perhaps it could be related to substance use, or mental illness. It would be hard to tell if you aren't seeing her in person frequently.

She is an adult. And her behavior towards you and your husband is very unkind. Maybe you and your husband should take a little break from reaching out and doing things for her and to "help" her when she asks or demands for awhile. Then after some time, go see her in person to see if she's doing OK. Offer your emotional support and love, just not financial support and basic things she should be doing for herself as an adult, like arranging and funding her own transportation. If she doesn't want that kind of support, it will hurt. But I'd accept it and hope that as she matures and has more life experience, she will come around. You say your husband has done everything possible for her that he could. Well maybe that is the problem. In order to grow up and act like a grateful person, she needs her parents to stop fixing, funding, and doing so many things FOR her. You can only control yourselves, though. You can't control what her mother does for her. So I think you have to accept your limited influence under the circumstances.

Then like B said, if she continues to be rude, demanding, and/or dismissive of you and your husband, disengage and go out and enjoy yourselves. Good luck!

If she wants to be an adult and treated like one, let her. That means no more allowances either or saving her butt when she needs a ride, it's on her now, she can find her own rides and ways of financing them, I hope she understands that. She doesn't get to make demands when it comes to a gift, or disrespect people who do nice things for her. That is what an ungrateful, spoiled brat does, not a mature adult. Your husband did the right thing in putting his foot down when she showed disrespect. I wouldn't give her anything anymore at this point either. If she wants to get away and needs money, he can tell her she can work for it and save up, like the rest of us adults do!

She's 20 so she's an adult who need to be treated like an adult. Of course being an adult means that you have certain rights but they all come with responsibilities. This means you can invite her to a special birthday dinner but its her choice not to attend. This means that if she wants a ride somewhere she can figure it out. If she calls or texts for a ride let her know that its not a good time and you trust that she'll make other arrangements.This means that you choose how to interact with her. If she's being a jerk then don't respond or let her know that when she feels like acting her age instead of being a spoiled child you would be more than happy to talk.

This behavior didn't come out of nowhere. Somewhere along the line her parents dropped the ball and didn't teach her how to get along well with others. Time for you all to grow a backbone and stop enabling her bad behavior.

Personally I'd probably drop her card in the mail with a $50 check because that's what you both agreed to do for birthdays.

She's a grown adult. She can fend for herself. She's made choices and now has to live with the choices she made.

She doesn't want the family dinner? Then she doesn't get her "gift".

She needs to be told that a GIFT is just that - a GIFT and is NOT an entitlement. NO ONE is entitled to gifts on their birthday - people do it because they are NICE and want to celebrate.

If she needs money? tell her she needs to come to the family dinner to get her "GIFTS". If she doesn't? that's on HER.

Personally? I would tell her "have a great life. You're an adult and have made adult decisions. Good luck with those decisions!"

Your husband's daughter has been allowed to use her dad for a long time now. He should have been tougher on her when she was younger about being a "piggy bank".

I don't really agree with the comment that she didn't want to come over because you are disrespecting her lifestyle. She has made it clear that the money is all she cares about, and finally your husband has stood up to her. It's about time.

It's time for tough love. She is acting like a spoiled 14 year old and until she has to figure out what working is about, what it's like to have trouble paying the bills and what it means to be an adult, your husband shouldn't be willing to bail her out. That's not what family is for.

Well ....

When I read this, I see that your husband doesn't agree with gift giving to start with. You probably don't agree with her dropping out of college and that she's only making min wage (which is understandable). She probably feels the disappointment from her parents on both sides - as well as dad is not really into celebrating birthdays with gifts. Honestly, kids like gifts (who doesn't?).

You say "I had planned to have her ..." come over, have meal, etc. but that she had not been over in a while and had told you she didn't want this.

So what were you expecting?

So right off the bat - poor communication, and you're not agreeing on what is really her birthday. She probably feels not supported. I am just thinking how she probably is feeling.

Her self esteem is probably at an all time low. She probably has two sets of disapproving parents.

At that age, I just was a miserable, self absorbed, teenager (yes adult, but still teen) quite frankly. I had some growing up to do - but I needed my mom to say "suck it up buttercup" kind of thing. My mom didn't take it. She also supported me, but not in an enabling kind of way.

So don't stand for disrespect. That - no of course not.

But I agree - keep door open, but don't insist she be someone she isn't right now. She sounds lost and between a teen and adult right now - in short, this is a phase. Don't indulge her, but also, don't give her lots of negative attention for this. Just ignore it, but have that 'when you can be kind, and respectful' approach - we'll be here - like you would anyone.

As another mom said, don't be a doormat. She'll come around.

Remind her - she's a great person, when she's ready to hear it. Don't do the 'she's promiscuous' thing or make her feel like a loser. She already knows that. That's a sign of a troubled person finding their way.

Yes, she is being rude and you do not have to put up with her behavior. On the other hand YOU are being very judgmental of her lifestyle. You all but called her a tramp. She is an adult and if she wants to sleep around it is none of your business. Maybe this is why she didn't want to come over for her birthday. She didn't want to heat the judgmental remarks, no mater how loving you think you are toward her, it's not your place to judge her.
I honestly do not mean to sound harsh but I grew up with 2 very judgmental parents and it hurts. No matter how loving you think you sound.