Teenage Daughters

[Segdude]

As the father of 3 girls, eldest now 21 and 17 year old twins, the issue of body image takes on a new meaning when one of your girls is diagnosed with anorexia. I'll not go into the details, this is not the place, but now she's on the mend I tend to be a bit more relaxed in my views. She's here, she's alive and looking towards a bright future. Funnily enough, it's her older sister that nags her about "too much flesh".

[arosiem]

I’d try not to get mad. I’m 23 now, and undoubtedly wore clothes my parents didn’t particularly approve of when I was 15 (probably made worse by the fact I’ve always been tall - so everything looked short on me) however I can’t particularly remember having conversations with Mum about me not wearing certain things - as long as everything was covered it was fine!

Why don’t you try Mum and daughter shopping days, and a different tactic... I remember when Mum took me shopping before my Florida holiday (I was 15, turned 16 out there) and I tried on this really lovely maxi dress. However this really lovely maxi dress pushed my boobs right up to my chin! I can remember Mum making a jokey comment, us both laughing about it and then choosing another dress. I think, from my experience, your DD will be more likely to listen to you with that approach, whereas shouting will make her even more stubborn on the matter, and possibly end up making her want to wear more revealing stuff to make a point.

I think this is something that every generation goes through though. My nana has a photo of her in a teeny tiny skirt - so short she made matching knickers!

[sammykitten]

Originally Posted by windsor_hills

My DD, 15, is generally a good kid. She may like her bed lol, but tries hard at school, does her homework, mixes with a small group of friends shopping etc, but doesn’t go to parties, hang about on the streets etc like some of the other girls in her year at school do. (I kid you not).

The problem we’ve now hit is about clothes. In the house she lives in shorts /tshirt or tracksuit bottoms/tshirt, jeans etc...so no issues there.

However, trying to get clothes for our upcoming holiday where she needs dresses / nicer clothes for the restaurants (to meet the dress code) is turning into a nightmare.

The things she is choosing .

If it’s not very short she won’t entertain it. It’s not the kind of things I would choose, but does seem to be ‘the fashion’ these days, even if it is a bit too ‘grown up’ for my liking. Cue awful rows about what is appropriate and what isn’t. Her dad loses his temper really quickly, shouting at her (and then me because I’m too soft on her in his opinion). the atmosphere at times in the house is awful over this, to the point where if this is what it’s going to be like, I don’t want to go on holiday anymore. She shows me pictures of what other girls in her year wear, and gets really upset over it all when i say tough, our house, our rules. She says we are making her feel awful about herself because of what we think of her style / choice of clothes and was extremely upset last night about how dad spoke to her.

I’m trying to be reasonable, and give a little...after all there are far worse things we could be arguing about, but dad is adamant and is saying either no or just washing his hands of it all. I feel stuck in the middle and downright miserable.

Any advice on how to handle this please? Where do you draw the line and how can we find a compromise?

I know this is quite trivial, but the rows it’s causing is awful

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I've just gone back and read your OP - what does "dad is just washing his hands of it all" mean? To be honest, it sounds like that would be the better option for all 3 of you!

My DD is 17 now, we are a family where her dad has been brought up with very different views on a lot of things, including whats respectful for a young lady to wear. When we were getting into these "discussions" (read arguments) I make no apology for not siding with my husband. My daughter, at age 15, had her own voice and her own opinions. She wasn't showing everything to the world, if she's showing anything, she went with (and still does) either legs on show ie short skirts or shorts/short playsuits, or cleavage on show, but not both. Very occasionally a bit of midriff (and I'm talking an inch or so above her jeans). If she was choosing clothes that meant she was literally spilling out of them, top, bottom and middle, I may have felt differently - but she wasn't, and so I left it up to my daughter and my husband to discuss it, but anytime my husband and I were talking about his concerns, I re-iterated that she wasn't dressing inappropriately, she has a lot of self-respect, she is choosing what she wears for her own reasons, and, like your DD, ours is a good kid, who knows what she wants, is prepared to work towards her future goals in life, and she's not out getting drunk and partying (yet - that will be another interesting family discussion ).

At 15 did you want or welcome your mum and dad's input into your choice of clothing? I think its easier for us mums of daughters with this kind of thing - I can remember being 15 and how I felt, I think it must be a lot harder for Dads, as they are literally guessing.

[Guest]

Originally Posted by novocastrian

i'm impressed!, a lad in our street does cars on a sunday im pretty sure he dosnt let HMRC know hes probably trousers more on a sunday than i do

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The big difference here is that the other posters daughter needs public liability insurance in order to be covered for dog walking (and probably some Vet insurance for injuries animals might incur whilst in her control) It's difficult to get these without either being a company or self employed and the insurers pass their "self-employed" lists onto HMRC

A local lad getting paid "pin money" by his known acquaintances to do a chore isn't something that HMRC consider employment (unless the payments are not trivial - note they don't define trivial anywhere)

Of course the local lad probably should have liability insurance for when he rams the lawnmower into someones car and they want him to pay for it - but thats another point..

[MrsMouse93]

My DD is 15 and doesn’t tend to wear anything too skimpy but I don’t have a problem with short shirts of crop tops. Anything showing too much boob I wouldn’t be too happy with, or butt cheek hanging out so while I pay for her clothes that would be a no 😂

[Feebee2]

My DD now 39 has never flashed an inch of flesh. Her cousins, 4 girls between 16 and 21 are a different story. Ladies of the night cover up more flesh! They are all lovely kids though. I suppose that's all that matters.

[duchy]

Originally Posted by Feebee2

My DD now 39 has never flashed an inch of flesh. Her cousins,** 4 girls between 16 and 21 are a different story. Ladies of the night cover up more flesh! ** They are all lovely kids though. I suppose that's all that matters.

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What a horrible thing to say about your own nieces... it does raise a few questions including where you obtained your familiarity in how prostitutes dress, if your middle aged daughter's covering up from head to toe all her life is symptomatic of something else or a choice of faith and if your siblings are aware how you comment on their children and their personal choices on a public forum .
Still I'm sure you think you are lovely and that's all that matters !

[Snowball24]

Wanted to add completely normal for girls this age to want to wear things parents might not approve of! Id be more worried if my 14 yr old dd didn't want to wear these things , yes she likes skimpy things or tight but they all seem.to, i know where to draw the line! My dd at just 14 does the most amazing make up , knows far more than me 😉

[danisleigh]

My nieces are the exact opposite, especially the 13 year old she lives head to toe in black and even on a hot summers day wears jeans and a hoody and won’t show her legs...we couldn’t even get her in our hot tub! I think my sister wishes she could get her into a dress
Or shorts!

[duchy]

I think with teens it's easy to forget that at that age we too were either experimenting with finding our personal style ... or not wanting to look different to our peers.
There's also the question of teaching our kids that it's OK to judge people by appearance . Is that a lesson you want to give to your children ?