Teen’s rejection extremely triggering

[Call Me Cordelia]

My teenage daughter (14) is rejecting me. She expresses contempt constantly, rolls her eyes at me pretty much whenever I speak, accuses me of hypocrisy and whenever I attempt to stand up for myself I get more of the same and that I'm trying to control her. We have talked to the pediatrician about depression and she's seeing a counselor, but it's early days. This has been building over the summer with the depression but the outright rejection started about a month ago. She's decided I am the reason her life is so hard.

I'm worried that I've been too much of a perfectionist and not very warm as a mother and I'm reaping what I've sown. She says she can't wait to grow up and never talk to me again. I'm feeling every bad thing I've ever feared about myself is true and my daughter is actually the one who sees me accurately. Sometimes I get mad and yell at her for the disrespect, and she comes away feeling completely justified because see, mom can't control herself so why should I? Every time I try to express that I love her or anything positive it's met with a flat "ok" and she doesn't allow me to touch her. Except when she wants me to fix her hair. She still expects me to shop and cook and clean for her. In fact she was completely indignant this week when the clothes in the hamper were still there the following evening. Like what am I even doing all day if not her laundry? And yeah, that kind of fits with how I've historically seen myself as a person who is put on this earth to serve and serve and serve and maybe I can earn my oxygen allotment for the day.

She's never been very affectionate. My younger children are and I with them but I do fear I've just ruined her attachment. I know my own is not healed very well.

Putting this in this forum because I don't think she has a PD and because my post is more about me. The daily rejection is just so hard to take and I have no idea how to handle it. I'm responding from my scapegoat syndrome and my daughter is making me a scapegoat for all her problems. I feel guilty that I feel relieved when she's at school, and defective that I just can't handle her emotions. I should be in therapy myself. I need to overcome the inertia and fear of putting myself and all the broken mess out there to another person. Just nothing feels safe. Hiding behind a sort of anonymous forum is a step, maybe. Thanks for listening.

[bloomie]

Call Me Cordelia - I think your responses to your dear daughter are calling you to gently prioritize your own healing. I hope this makes sense, but sometimes our vulnerability and our living out disempowering false beliefs about ourselves brings out a kind of push back from others.

It can bring contempt or disdain or disrespect from a beloved child, or other family member, because they don't want that for you, don't understand it because they have been raised in a loving home, and don't want that for themselves. This is from my own experience raising a 14 year old beginning to differentiate.

Their discernment is sharp, their comments can be targeted to our most vulnerable spots, uninformed and cruel and their compassion and understanding has not caught up.
 

I've historically seen myself as a person who is put on this earth to serve and serve and serve and maybe I can earn my oxygen allotment for the day.

Deep inside I so get this. What I now know is this lie, unaddressed, leads to rejection amongst other relational dynamics I do not want in my family of choice. 

There are many practical things I could suggest, but I am pretty sure you already know that a 14 year old can do their own laundry, can be held to the standard of respectful communication. You also know how to drop the rope and leave disrespectful conversations and not to engage or take in immature behaviors like eye-rolling, ect. 

My deepest sense is that as you move toward stability and health, empowerment and a renewal of inhabiting your true worth that is not found in another person (I know you are a woman of strong faith) and prioritize yourself, it will be a reassurance to your dear daughter and all of your family that you are stronger than they could ever imagine and you are going to be okay.

Call Me Cordelia - you get to be human. You get to misspeak or respond in frustration and make mistakes and then model what loving repair looks like with your family. You get to need a private, compassionate, healing place of your very own to share your story and struggles in real life. I often pray over my efforts as a mom that like the loaves and the fishes, God will multiply what I have because I recognize it is limited, I am limited even on my best day.

Sending you strength and grace for each day. Thank you for sharing this with us. Let us know how you are as you are able. 

[NarcKiddo]

I don't have children so I can't offer anything in the way of practical advice. But I will say that it seems to me the fact she feels free to behave in this way probably demonstrates how safe she actually feels with you. I could not in a million years have done anything like that to my uNPD mother. Of course this is scant comfort in the face of unpleasant and triggering behaviour and I hope you can work it out.

[Call Me Cordelia]

Thank you both. On the outside I probably look like I'm mostly handling things more or less okay. Like I don't usually take the bait of the eye rolls, etc. And I have addressed being "a human being not a human doing." But... time for another layer. It does feel like life sends me back to the beginning over and over.

To your point, NK, I think part of my fear and panic when she behaves disrespectfully is because I'm anticipating something terrible happening to me as a result. My brain and body are identifying with what would have happened to me when I pushed back against my father at a similar age. I'm responding as if the immediate backhand to the face, shoving, hitting, and screaming rage he would have given me were about to happen. Of course my husband and I will never do similar, but my body doesn't believe that yet. All it would have taken for me is "that tone" real or imagined or an eye roll and WHAM. At a deep level I have not yet believed that things can be okay. When I look at my writing and pretend it's somebody else, I can see how over the top it is, but even in not an immediate panic mode I still find it hard to believe that WE will be okay and that I AM an okay mother. Happiness is still for other people.