<p>I think you should back off, by about a mile. You want your daughter to be sympathetic to <em>your</em> stress over the fact that she is not a grade machine. You say <em>her</em> lack of desire for your college dreams is hurting your relationship. Perhaps the student who isn’t working hard enough for you is, inside, stressed as well over your admitted anger and resentment toward her.</p>
<p>My daughter left this morning for her sophomore year at a selective college 3000 miles away (similar stats to your D’s in fact). Our relationship was not always easy while she was in high school, but I love her more than life itself. Of all the thoughts going through my mind as I hugged her long and tightly at the station this morning, “I wish I had worked you harder” was not one of them.</p>
<p>Hey, I really just want to give you a hug. None of us are born “blank slates.” Our children are individuals who grow and make their own choices often despite positive modeling and best intentions. These are teenagers and teenagers make mistakes… and they are supposed to make mistakes. This notion that we should control everything they do only assists in developing a generation of kids with little internal drive and no self-management skills. Sometimes they have to flounder and pick themselves up and all we can do is offer help when they are ready to accept it.</p>
<p>My D is on an upward trend but her sophomore year was lost to apathy and anger. She snapped out of it, found her drive, started controlling her media habits independently, found a better school and is doing great but it’s unlikely she’ll get into any of her top picks. However, she LEARNED something about herself, what she needs, how to work through problems, self-control and that’s invaluable. She won’t make the same mistakes again. She’ll likely go to a lesser school in our price range but I don’t doubt she’ll thrive.</p>
<p>You can only do what you can do. If her choices keep her from top colleges and merit scholarships then she’ll have to find a different way… and she will. Take heart.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone for the insightful posts and support. I did need some perspective on this. I really don’t want her to be a “grade machine”, just take advantage of the opportunities she has and be grateful for them.</p>
<p>A lesson that has been very painful for me to learn, and something I am still trying to accept is that our children get older and move along the way to being independent, we can’t control as much as we used to be able to control. And things like making sure the homework is done and double checked and in the right place, and studying for a test is being done, is now up to the student. It hurts when a parent has taught and patterned the student to know all the right things, and then as more and more of the responsibility is put on the student, s/he decides simply not to do them. </p>
<p>Some of it is a conscious choice too. I made some decisions at crucial crossroads that have cost me a certain life path. I did not want to spend the time it would have taken me to do a lot better at school at the college level, and I did not want to go to law school because of the time/work commitment it entailed. These were deliberate choices that I made. So some things might be mistakes that the student regrets and decideds to retool in future endeavors, and some just don’t put her on a path that she really doesn’t want. </p>
<p>As for grateful…that’s a tough one. It’s human nature to get used to a situation and then grateful is something is often not felt when that happens. I can give lip service to “grateful” all I want and know when it’s the right thing to say, but feeling true gratitude instead being used to certain things is a bit harder. I work hard at just staying out of feeling entitled, but being used to it, yeah, I ;m there even though I know some of those things are true privileges and luxuries.</p>