Any advice on what role I, as a parent, should play in helping my daughter (a 1st year at a great college) address what seems to be significant unhappiness at school? She is fine with her classes and enjoys them but phone calls and texts from her (especially phone calls) are usually very negative. It’s been very rare for her to share a “happy” event. She’s a student athlete and that experience also has been negative (not because of coaches or teammates but I think simply because she is looking for the negative and she is finding it). I suggested counseling which she rejected. It’s been tough for me to listen and then try to counter her negativity and point out all the good in her life - I’m burned out by it.
I do think she needs counseling but I’m not sure if that’s something we as parents can insist on. Any pointers?
I think it’s really, really common for kids – especially first-year college students, especially young women – to use their parents to vent their complaints and frustrations, without giving their parents an accurate, well-rounded picture of their lives. It’s like talking down a well – it doesn’t poison the environment where they are. In fact, it may de-toxify the environment where they are, and help them to be happier and more positive there. There may also be some element of trying to assure the parents that their child is not so happy being far away from them, and that their child still needs them. Whether or not the parents actually want to be assured on either point – the kid could think they want that, or wish they wanted that.
Unfortunately, it’s horrible and nerve-wracking for parents when a child does that. If they respond and try to intervene, it’s likely that will be a mistake, and their reaction will not be viewed positively by their child or anyone else. If they don’t intervene, there’s a small but meaningful chance it is signs of a serious problem that in a few months they will wish they had confronted now. It’s hard to be a parent. Do your best, recognize that whatever you do, it’s not guaranteed to be the right thing, and live with that.
Unless she’s constantly bringing up transferring or trying to come home all the time… what @JHS said. Very frequently I’ll lose sleep over some really negative stuff a child will lay on me, and then, the next day, the kid seems surprised when I bring up the situation. What? Oh, THAT. Nah…
Well, you know your child best so is she normally a happy person? I agree w/above comments and will add that I also have a student-athlete and this commitment was the source of some freshman unhappiness. It was a huge commitment and was no longer fun. He plays at a private high academic D1 school- a great opportunity for sure but also a grind at times. Not sure if this factors in to your daughter’s unhappiness as well but I know I had to take a step back and really understand what my son was going through.
My son is one of the happiest people I know so going through this freshman year was hard for all of us. However, sophomore was much, much better in so many ways! Change can be hard especially when they were used to much of the same for so many years at home. Good luck to you in trying to figure this out!
Give her time. So many college kids react like your daughter – use mom as a dumping ground for complaints. (One of my friends was so fed up with daughters between-classes calls, she stopped answering!) Talk to her a lot about school during spring and summer break to gauge her moods. But don’t be surprised if this, too, passes. For some kids it simply takes longer to get used to college.
Agree with all. I realized when the kids were in college that I did this to my mom when I was in college. A very eye opening realization. I did have one transfer, but we saved that conversation for when he was home…and the opener was “You often seemed aggravated and unhappy when you called me, have you considered transferring”…then I listened. It took him a year to wrap his mind around it because he liked his classes…it was just everything else so I had TWO years of yucky phone conversations, but he finally took the bull by the horns and got himself transferred.
I agree with the others – I know my daughter is really liking her school/team - she is also a student athlete and a freshman but yes I hear all the issues and challenges; which professors she dislikes, when the coach makes decisions she doesn’t understand, the drama llama girls etc. But I see posts and such they also show me she is having fun, she is also getting good grades. Maybe you can figure out how to ask her something to elicit the positives so you can try to get the good stuff too??
Thank you for all your kind responses. Overall, my daughter tends to be on the serious side and that’s always been the case - not happy go lucky as some kids are. I guess the wait it out approach is the best for right now and in reality, that’s the only one available. There’s so much young adults need to figure out! And yes, I will try to steer the conversations to the positives - even if it’s just weather, or TV related!
Is she on an athletic scholarship? Wondering why she’s continuing with the athletics if she dislikes it. And it IS a huge time drain, if you don’t need to be doing it or don’t like it. I’m assuming that at this point the plusses must outweigh the minuses?
My daughter is very cheerful, and well-liked at work. Still, she calls me at least once a week to say, “Mom you wouldn’t believe how awful XYZ was today!” Then I say something along the line of, “Oh my! XYZ is an even bigger idiot/problem/random-awful-thing than ABC.” I get to be a supportive mom. She gets to continue to be the token level-headed person in her work place and doesn’t turn her work frustrations into road-rage. Everybody wins.
Good idea to wait it out. An old approach that parents have used is to send “care packages” on a regular basis. Back when I was in college, these were real packages of things that our kids could share with dorm-mates and friends – cookies, etc. The main purpose was just to remind kids that parents cared about their personal well-being. The parents didn’t just send the kids off; they were still there for them. Nowadays, I suspect a little package of money or equivalent “to buy something extra or special you may want or crave” beyond “necessities.” Could be clothing, entertainment, or whatever.
It’s so hard to know what to do…my kid (the happiest, most confident kid I know) is having an awfully rough time in his first year at his non-dream school (a sprawling state university that we chose for financial reasons) while his sister – who i thought was going to be the one with a tough path ahead – has loved her college from Day 1 and is thriving in her junior year. All I’ll say that it weighs on my mind and I know it does yours as well.
I agree with others that she might just be dumping, and you’re hearing all the bad stuff and none of the good stuff.
What seemed to help our unhappy D2, was to back off. After some initial unhappy phone calls first semester freshman year where she wanted to transfer out (we said no), we shifted to texting, and eased up on the frequency.
We asked few questions because we would only get a salty response. We sent pictures of the dog, or send some light hearted update from home, and we’d wish her well.
By Spring Break of freshman year, she seemed a little bit better, but still not enthusiastic about going back to school.
She still complained to us a lot. I don’t know what she was telling her friends, but it amused me a little when I ran into a HS classmate’s mom at the store and she remarked that she had seen my daughter over break and was so happy to hear that she loved her school! I mean, you’d never get that impression if you were in our house listening to her complain about everything.
By time freshman year was wrapping up, and she’d gotten news she was accepted into a pre-professional major, her grades were looking good, she had secured roommates and an apartment off campus for the following year…we began to see signs she was perking up.
Sophomore year has been a 180. She seems much happier. Like a different person. I think, for her, she is really happy to be so independent, and to feel like we are not up her grill.
Best of luck! Things can really change dramatically!
I’ll confess that back in the day, I’d gather up my quarters and call my mom and just pour my heart out over the pay phone. I never thought to call her and tell her how terrific things were going. Dump, dump, dump. Sorry Mom!