For the past four years, my oldest daughter has given me a web link for Mother’s
Day. No card, no personal message, just a “Happy Mother’s Day! I thought you might like this.” Then she attaches a link to some site she considers inspiring and I consider New Age crap.
That’s okay. We are different generations after all, I am interested in her world view and I also recognize how very well intended New Age carp is. So I briefly & dutifully look at the website and then get on with my day.
The last two years she has upped the ante, and sends me sites about How To Be A Better Person (Because You’re Really Not.) And I am thoroughly annoyed. IMO I am not perfect, but I’m not so bad either. I dislike undeserved self-serving advice from my daughter.
If I get another website this year I am going to be extremely irked.
This daughter (my oldest, from my first marriage) always has her hand out to me. I gave her money for a down payment on her house. Parents do this sometimes, so I wasn’t that concerned. I gave her money to help buy a car, twice. I bailed her out financially when she crashed & burned living on her own in Arizona. Over the years I have given her money for various emergencies on an annual or semi-annual basis. I have bought her many airplane tickets. Still, her hand is always out.
When my mother passed away a few years ago she left a small bequest for my son with autism, about $20,000. Daughter was made conservator (or whatever you call it) of this bank account. I considered this a practice run for her future involvement as a long-term guardian for my son. She embezzled the money, every cent, within a year. I was so disappointed.
Two years ago she had an idea for a business that was perfect for her, very suited to her talents and background. I agreed to invest about $10,000 in this business, expecting it would be a little bit more. Daughter totally took advantage of our partnership and would not listen to our (Tom’s & my) business advice. (Tom is a CPA, MBA, and banker. He knows business for Pete’s sake.) She did what made sense to her at the time. The business is getting by, by the skin of its teeth. It may take off; it may not. Anyway, to cover her financial ass and commitments cost me about $35,000 and I still worry about continuing liability.
So now I’m done. Mom will not be providing any more money, and only my grandson gets Christmas & birthday gifts. Daughter & her under-employed husband will get cards.
Also during this time she eavesdropped on a phone conversation I had with Tom wherein I criticized her work ethic. And this? Is the high horse she is now riding. I am a bad person because I meanly criticized her. I need to improve myself.
So, if she sends me another New Age website I am going to send this back to her:
http://prairiehome.publicradio.org/features/deskofgk/2006/old_scout/05/02.shtml
(not sure how links work. I tried to stick one here but nothing shows in Preview mode.)
I don’t think you have to log in to read this, but I will paste the text into the first comment box, just in case you do.
I love Garrison Keillor! He’s my hometown boy. His columns are usually great, but this one just really hit home with me. ‘What You Owe Mom is a Sonnet.’
Daughter probably won’t get the message. She will likely just get self-righteously angry. But I don’t really care just now. She needs to pull her head out of her ass and look herself in the eye, lol, or at least take a good look in the mirror.
So. Does this make me a Bad Mother?
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Let's Talk About You and Your Mother
April 25, 2006
Garrison Keillor
I'd like a word with you about your mother, and I want you to read this column all the way to the end, otherwise I will slap you so hard your head will spin.
I realize that Mother's Day is a fake holiday perpetuated by the greeting card industry and the florists, but it's here to stay, so make the best of it. The president is a fake, too, but we still pay our taxes. And it's time you did something nice for your mother.
I bring this up well in advance of Mother's Day so you can plan a little bit and not roll out of the sack on SUNDAY, MAY 14, and fritter away the morning and then dash over to Mom's and on the way pick up a cheap box of chocolate-covered cherries at the gas station, or a gallon of windshield cleaner, or whatever you were planning to give her.
Cheap chocolates are not appropriate for your mother, nor is a bouquet of daisies marked down 50 percent at the convenience store. What you owe your mother is a sonnet. A fourteen-line poem, in iambic pentameter, rhymed, just like Shakespeare's "When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes, I all alone beweep my outcaste state." Look it up. You can do it, if you try.
Your mother loves you, she has loved you from Day 1, she loves you on your good days and your bad. She was on her way to Broadway and Hollywood was taking a look at her when your father got her in a family way and she put glamour and fame behind her and had you instead. Think about it. All that pain, and then out you came, not the high point of her day, believe me.
She changed your poopy diaper when the stench was such as to make strong men dizzy. And when you hopped up and ran off, leaving a brown trail behind you, she mopped that up, too. At a certain age, you put everything into your mouth - dirt, coins, small toys, cufflinks - and when she stuck a finger down your throat, you refused to vomit. Nothing would come up. All she could do was pour Listerine in you and hope for the best. But if she tried to coax you to eat green leafy material, then you would throw up quarts of stuff. And she'd clean it up and take you in her arms and comfort you although your breath was rancid.
You were not a bright child. I realize that you think you were in the accelerated group, and that was your mother's doing. Her great accomplishment was to protect you from the knowledge of your own ordinariness. The rest of us knew. You didn't. Nor did you realize the extent of your bed-wetting. Three a.m., you sat in a stupor, while Mom changed your urine-soaked sheets, tucked you in, and sang you to sleep with "If Ever I Would Leave You" from "Camelot."
She loved you through the dark valley of your adolescence, when you were as charming as barbed wire. You surrounded yourself with sullen friends who struck your mother as incipient criminals. Her beloved child, her darling, her shining star, running with teenage jihadists, but she bit her tongue and served them pizza and sloppy joes, ignoring the explosives taped to their chests.
When you were 17, when other adults found you unbearable and even your own aunts and uncles looked at you and saw the decline of American civilization and the coming of a dark age of arrogant narcissism unprecedented in world history, your mother still loved you with all her heart. She loves you still today, despite all the wrong choices you've made. Don't get me started. Go write your mother a sonnet.
It costs you nothing except some time and effort. Do not buy her chocolate. She doesn't care for it. She only pretended to, for your sake. Do not take her out to dinner. She has eaten plenty of dinners with you and one more isn't going to be that thrilling. She might prefer to snuggle up in a chair all by herself and watch "Singin' in the Rain" and have a stiff drink. (You do know your mother drinks, don't you? Ever wonder why?)
Get out a sheet of paper and a pencil. Here's an idea for a first line: "When I was disgraceful and a complete outcaste." You take it from there.
Amen, sistah. When a child reaches the age of, oh, 20, I would think they'd realize parents aren't just for handouts (I can't believe an adult child would ever ask more than once). And for pete's sake, show more appreciation for mom than an effing website email.
*kicks Swami's daughter*
Someday she'll come around.
Wow she is being a bit selfish isn't she?
A question about her being in charge of your son's bank account. Don't you have another daughter? Could she be put in charge?
My other daughter is much less full of herself. I had hoped to have my two daughters be joint guardians so they could help each other. But not anymore.
It's a big burden for my middle child but I think she has been expecting it all her life. I think Tom and I will have the son set up well enough financially so he won't be a financial burden, but somebody has to be there to keep the vultures away (sadly, there are 'professionals' who are very good at stripping assets from the unguarded handicapped) and to just be family. Everybody needs family.
Awwwwwwwwww Swami, you don't deserve that crap! *HUGS*
How old is she?
34
I know exactly how you feel. *sob and hugs* Get on with your life without including your daughter.
Wow, Swami. Every parent's nightmare. Fortunately, not every parent's WORST nightmare.
Too bad the message would be lost on her if you sent that link.
FTR - I hate Mother's Day more than any other day of the year.
*hugs* I'm so sorry you have to deal with this Swamilove.
It's harder to walk away than to keep bailing them out. Our situations with our children are different but the root of it is that it is the most difficult thing you'll do to draw the line. But it's still the right thing to do. Stay strong. *more hugs*
It is not mean to stop bailing out your daughter. It's the right thing to do. It will be much better for her in the long run.
Granted, I'm a little biased. I was brought up on a steady diet of "When you are 18 and move out..." When I was 18 I moved out. My parents didn't intefer and didn't rescue (I got a small sum (less than tuition) each year).
I'm happy being my own person and going home for Christmas.
Poor Swami. :(
It seems that with her attitude, the best thing to do is exactly what you are planning and not help out anymore. I know it must be really hard to come to this point, but it's for the best.
...for both you and her.
{{{hugs}}}
*big hugs for Swami*
Will you be my second Mom? But I don't want any money from you. Just the rest of you. You're awesome.
And I loved the article. I shook my head through the entire thing. Saying to myself "yep, I did that to my Mom, and did that too and that too" My poor Mom. *grin*
Wow.
If only your daughter realized just how lucky she is to have a mom around, who gives a shit and is willing to make her life bearable.......
*shakes head*
You are entirely within your rights, and justifiably so, to cut your 30-something able daughter off from the bail out mode she seems to be in, especially since she is a mother and has a significant other. But then again, I'm also of the mind that at a certain point, children become adults, even though they will always be "my child" and have to learn to deal with life themselves.
I agree with everyone else. It's time to let her stand on her own. I'm so sorry that Mother's Day has been made unpleasant by her thoughtlessness and selfishness.
{{hugs}}
Does that make you a bad mother? Nope. It makes you a good mother who recognizes what has to be done for the sake of the child. Even if it doesn't get through to her, you have to try.
I must admit that I wasn't a good Mother's Day daughter. I am sorry now but it's too late. My kids aren't very good Mother's Day sons but that's ok because I understand that.
You've been a great mom to your daughter. You've helped her many times. You are right that it's time to let her fend for herself. It's right for her and it's right for you and your other kids.
I've cut my 21 yr old off for his good and for my 18 yr old. I've given and given to the 21 yr old and it's the 18 yr old's turn for some maternal assistance (money, I've always given the support and love).
I'm shocked about the trust. *sigh*
*jaw hits floor*
I would have cut her off as soon as I realized she embezzled from your son's account. Even more, I would have had her prosecuted.
I'm sorry she puts you through all this. You deserve better.
*hugs*
I have to agree with HD. I kinda missed that on the first read. I also assumed she paid the money back, but now I'm not sure.
*big hugs* to you Swami. You deserve a lovely Mother's Day, every single day of the year.
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