Of course hurtful words matter, but that’s not what I am referring to. I am talking about how our kids treat other people, more specifically their family members (per OP latest post), they learn by watching how their parents behave. Even if OP’s daughter is not that kind to her grandparents now, if she sees OP treating her parents well then the D will learn over time.
FWIW, I think that the way OP’s D treats her grandparents and younger brother is a DIRECT reaction to her feeling completely unable to control her own life and that she is not valued by her own parents. It’s probably quite far from the truth, but 12 year olds make up a reality in their own heads about things. Being mean to grandparents and a smaller siblings is a way to lash out without attacking the parents she seeks validation from.
@carolinamom2boys, I think I clarified that I did not expect her to be the best in sports - quite the opposite, I think being the best in any sport leads to sacrifices I frankly don’t want for my kids, and personally I don’t think it’s healthy to push the body beyond its limits. Quitting something because it becomes more difficult and requires more effort is not on the list of virtues in my book, but since I had a medical concern backing up her decision to quit, I supported that decision. She takes tennis lessons now, but only recreationally - not competing and probably never will. I tell her it’s ok, I know she is far behind kids who started playing when they were 6 or 7, and I just want her to attend all practices so that she gets regular exercise.
Academically - she was always earning A’s except for the brief period when she skipped a grade mid-year (she was so bored in class, she started acting out and showing off, and her teacher couldn’t handle it/challenge her enough, so she was transferred from 2nd to 3rd grade. Initially it was quite a shock for her to go from 2nd grade learning to write vocabulary words to writing essays - we supported her, told her it’s ok, hired a tutor and were praising her a lot for obviously making an effort and catching up by the end of the year). After that earning A’s became routine. I don’t know how to explain it - almost like praising your little one when potty training, but then you accept it as a norm by the time they are 5 year old that they don’t soil their pants, right? Is it snobbish? I don’t know. I never asked why did she get 95 instead of 100, again, I am embarrassed to admit I was not involved at her school at all. And no, I was not disappointed she got 670 - I was in fact glad that she didn’t get 770 like some of her peers, because it would have given her a false sense of security. And if she has received 570 like some other peers, but after studying for it, I would have been a lot more supportive.
And yes, I think there is a huge difference between being the best in what one does and having materialistic success - I can’t shed away my up-bringing. To me, becoming a stellar teacher and getting a “Teacher of the Year” award is much more meaningful than becoming a lawyer and getting a “Lawyer of the Year” award, but these are my values, not hers. I think my daughter senses that, because she says she wants to become a Human Rights lawyer, but while I sense some interest in the lawyer part, I am truly not so sure about the human rights part. But I tend to keep my doubts to myself and just tell her what an honorable profession it is to fight for those who can’t fight for themselves.
@oldfort, I too hope that my daughter will change. I recognize that my parents sometimes become part of the problem, i.e. unable to ignore some rude teenager remarks that I just ignore and “demanding respect” for themselves - “kids should never talk to adults that way”. From what I remember, I had rather painless teenage years so my parents “lucked out” and are having harder time accepting the norms of teenage parenting. I do wonder if I should have defended my daughter in private instead of in front of her, but that is totally off-topic. I wanted my daughter to feel protected and wanted her to see I’d come to her defense on the spot, so no regrets there.
@sseamom, just to be clear - we as parents are not immune to her lashes out. I just don’t take them personally, or try not to. When she was getting braces, I took her to two orthodontists to get a 2nd opinion. She liked one of them better (and I could see why, the first one, recommended by our dentist, looked kind of sleazy to me, too), but the nicer one was also about 1K more expensive. My husband said we need to pick the first one, no brainer, and our daughter had a tantrum, saying among other things that we don’t love her enough and don’t want to spend any money on her. A spoiled entitled little brat? I don’t know, I still love her. I suggested to her she builds a solid argument for her dad why the second one is better - i.e. he is more concerned about hygiene and nurses report to parents whether the kids brush well enough, and she would make more effort to brush and wear retainers, etc. etc… And yes, I convinced my husband to spend that extra 1K. And changed our dentist, btw. Foolish?
I didn’t read all the posts but I want to share my 2 cents because I had a similar situation when my daughter was younger. I would suggest to praise her effort and tell her how blessed you are to have an intelligent daughter. Tell her how lucky she is to have a strong start. Tell her she might be ahead of so many people in her “race of life” already but people smart like her are standing next to her. If she wants to stay ahead she needs effort to pass them. And that will be her true race in life. Without effort, she can only go so far because the smart kids who are willing to spend more effort will be leading.
I practiced this parenting and it worked for my daughter because straight As kids in her middle school were falling behind when they stopped trying in high school. Leaving behind the true winners who are smart and HARD WORKING getting all the accomplishments. Ask you daughter where she sees herself in her race. Does she want to stay in the front the whole time or she is alright being in the middle? I always told my daughter there are always someone smarter and better than you. I don’t know if she understood it at the moment but I kept putting it in her little brain ;)). I also took the opportunities to praise effort from people we know, we heard and we saw as a family small talk in a car ride, during a vacation or the boring commercial time during a movie. Then she wouldn’t feel being lectured to.
We always stress that talent and intelligence are a blessing and we need to be grateful about it but effort is something we should always be proud of because no one can create it but yourself.
@kchendds, I remember having similar discussion with my daughter when she was still on the swim team but started to find practices difficult and wanted to skip every chance she got. I explained to her that due to her height she had a natural advantage - when she just touched the water, she was already a foot ahead of her competition, and partially that’s why she typically made better time than her teammates. But if she stops coming to practices, her teammates will soon overcome her because they will be stronger and faster. And once she goes on to compete in Junior Olympics and possibly beyond, there will always be kids who are better for variety of reasons, maybe they practice more, maybe they are just naturally more athletic, etc. I told her we (mom and dad) don’t care how far she gets in terms of competitions or what trophies she gets, we just want to see daily exercise because we want her to stay healthy, but if she wants to keep winning, she needs to put in the effort.
I am being careful, though, about praising others around my daughter. Last year my friend showed me a video of her daughter in a ballroom dancing competition. Our girls started in the same class two year prior, and while being better initially, my daughter dropped out because she didn’t feel comfortable dancing with boys shorter than her (practically all the boys her age or slightly older at the dance school are shorter). I was genuinely happy for my friend and her daughter and openly praised the tremendous progress the kid made in a year. My daughter overheard and later that day said to me something along the lines of “oh, don’t you wish you had a perfect little dancer like N.” And I said no, I love my tall beautiful girl, and if she wants to pick up dancing in a few years down the line when boys catch up a bit, I’ll support that, but if she never learns how to salsa, I won’t shed any tears, either. But since then I practically stopped praising other kids in front of my daughter (with the exception of our son, but I don’t know how to get around that).
Oh i didn’t mean praising kids or people her age doing the same activity. I tried to praise people at our workplace, celebrities or athletes whose effort was too amazing not to mention. I don’t try to create unhealthy competition among her peers but I will praise her for setting a good example for trying her best.
It also only works when your child already has an ambition at this age. My daughter wasn’t competitive at all until she lost all her recognition in the year of transferring from a small private school to the GATE program in a big public school. She realized her intelligence could only take her so far and there were more areas she needed to work on.
@kchendds, I hope for some transformation for my daughter once she goes to high school. Not that she becomes competitive, but that she finally falls in love with a subject, or likes a teacher, or finds something she’s willing to go an extra mile. Not for my sake, but for hers.
I am sure she will. I believe she is only going through some stage like I experienced with my daughter a couple times at a different age…not too fun but well they passed and things turned out better. I wish you all the best with your amazing and intelligent daughter!
It can be pretty trying sometimes not taking the teenage lashes personally. Today it was “I will never forgive you for not making me stick with piano…you are horrible parents.” This from an 18yo… She did apologize later, though. 
@kchendds and @choirsandstages, thanks for your support:) I too know things will be ok in the end. I’ll make more mistakes along the way, but we’ll both live 
There’s a phrase coaches use that’s appropriate to this sentiment: “Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”
OP - I am only getting your view based on what you are sharing with us, but the fact you feel you can’t praise another child without getting a back lash from your D is not normal. Of course, if you were praising the other girl by saying “I wish my daughter has stayed with dancing…” then your D may be resentful.
As far as wanting to go to a doctor she is comfortable with, I don’t see anything wrong with it, except unfortunately it translated into more money for you. My older daughter didn’t like the first Ob-gyn we found for her because she felt the doctor was judgmental and cold. We found another doctor within our network she was a lot happy with. I applauded her for speaking up.
Your D sounds like an intelligent person with a strong mind. It is a fine balance in raising a young woman who is strong and can be outspoken when needed vs an entitled brat.
Happy Mother’s day to all the wonderful mothers on this board supporting each other!
I say be nicer to her with the praise, but don’t let her be rude to the grandparents. Ever!
Interesting combo of too strict/too lenient.
Your daughter is at a tough age, and probably part of what is going on in your dynamic reflects that. It sounds like a lot of what she’s doing expresses a desire for your attention and approval. I don’t know if it’d work, but maybe the two of you could plan to do something alone once a week (or every other week), like going for a manicure or having brunch. Through that, maybe you can let her “get to know you” (sounds weird, doesn’t it?!) a little bit by explaining why you feel the way you do – why you value certain jobs more, why you want her to do the things you do, why you don’t like the idea of “praise” – and also get to know her a bit more. If she says she needs more affirmation from you, you can talk about what that would look like and how that would change how she’s feeling. It’s clear that you love her, and whatever you do would have to be something you were comfortable with (so that you can follow through), but it could be a balm to her to feel like you’re willing to work at your relationship with her as well. After all, all relationships involve communication and compromise, and that’s hard work. But it’s certainly easier when you actually care about the other person! And I’m guessing that as she gets older, you’d prefer that she come to you when she needs help with issues, so this is also a good way to set the stage for that.
Particularly at this age, it’s helpful to kids to see their parents modeling constructive interpersonal relationships. You’d be helping not just with your relationship but every relationship that she’ll ever have. She can see how to address issues in a healthy way rather than how to fuel a bad dynamic. (There’s enough of the latter on reality TV!!)
that’s a big price difference. I would have kept looking until I found an ortho she liked at a price I liked. There is validity to the argument of not going to a doctor that creeps you out.
We have this problem with my mother in law. She constantly praises her brother’s daughter in front of my daughters. They are all the same age (teenagers). She NEVER praises my daughters, and my daughters, as a result, are sick to death of hearing about grandma talk about the cousin who apparently walks on water. She is destroying any chance of a lasting relationship with her only two grandkids because she has no idea how to praise, and according to my husband, she never has. She sends congratulations cards in the mail, but she never says the words.
They had a very hard time finding mother’s day cards for her because most of the grandma cards were all about doting and spoiling, and they have no idea what that feels like.
I think it’s very astute of you to recognize that this attitude may contribute to communication problems.
I’m not very good at communicating with other people, and when I was a teenager, I was even worse. Often, when I tried to talk to my mother about things that were important to me, she would cut me off by saying that I was being disrespectful. I wasn’t actively trying to be disrespectful; I was just too inept to express myself without crossing that line, especially when my views disagreed with my parents’. I ended up keeping a lot of things to myself even though I could have benefited from my mother’s input because every conversation turned into a fight over disrespect. I wish I had learned how to be tactful as a teenager, but that skill didn’t kick in for a couple more decades.
As a parent, I allowed my kids to speak to me disrespectfully because I didn’t want to close off communication with them, but maybe that wasn’t the best solution, either. My son, in particular, could have used some guidance on how to express himself in ways that don’t offend older people and those in authority. But I was too afraid of cutting off communication to give him that guidance.
Hope everyone had a wonderful Mother’s Day! I was spoiled to a French Toast breakfast which I praised genuinely and at length. It was a good day, everyone at ease. I even convinced her to call her Grandma to say Happy Mother’s Day (as a favor to me). I don’t entirely blame her - my mom doesn’t watch what her say, especially when she is agitated, and while I accepted this long ago, my daughter has yet to learn not to take these things personally. So a few more details - my mom is seriously sick for over a week and begged to talk to her granddaughter multiple times. I’d pass on the message, would explain again and again that when people are older, sick and vulnerable, they especially need our support (and yes, she knows I talk to my mom every day when she is sick so “do as I say and not as I do” doesn’t really apply in this case). My daughter wouldn’t call until finally on Friday I called in front of her and passed on the phone, asking her to say a few nice words (my daughter hates talking on the phone with everyone and always prefers texting). My mom’s words to her beloved granddaughter - “we must not be related, since you couldn’t bother to call me all week.” What can I say - we don’t choose our parents any more than we choose our kids, need to love them nevertheless, but it makes the task of fostering respect for elders and extended family all that difficult. @Marian, I totally hear you, and I wish my parents wouldn’t take teenage insecurities and abrasiveness as a sign of disrespect, but every time i feel I make progress, a situation like above comes up and erases all that…
@MotherOfDragons, I know, I too wanted to look for another orthodontist, since the price difference was significant. But she put her foot down and said she doesn’t want any other. This one had a wall board with kids pictures,and apparently treated many kids from her school, etc., etc. By the intensity of her reaction I guessed there are reasons why she wanted this particular orthodontist, but she obviously didn’t want to say what those reasons were because they probably would have sounded silly to grown ups. I remember when I was her age I wished my mother would accept an answer “just because” so I let it go and helped her come up with “legitimate” reasons for her dad - more as an exercise.
My grandma used to compare me to my cousins - the other way around, though, I always was “better” in her eyes, but I hated it, especially when I learned from the cousins that grandma used to do it in front of them, too.
As for praising a friend, I didn’t mention my daughter at all when I simply said “all those practices really paid off, you shined on that dance floor”. Anyway, since that incident I started really watching what I say. I wouldn’t share in front of my daughter the news that my friend’s daughter got nominated, applied and was admitted to a prestigious summer program at an elite university nearby. I am now concerned that if I share that, my daughter might think I am disappointed she wasn’t similarly nominated, even though she is not as interested in sciences as the other girl.