# Validation?



## Ynot (Aug 26, 2014)

I don't know. I am coming up on some "anniversaries" so that might have something to do with it. But yesterday I spent most of the day with my daughter and SIL. I was showing them houses. In one of them there were wall stencils. She mentioned how much she hated them. She felt that people that put them up are "trying to hard". My ex (her mother) had polluted every room in our house with that stuff. My daughter grew up in that house, so I can only guess where she got that idea from.
Later they were talking about whether they would be able to take a vacation if they bought a house. My daughter said she would go anywhere as long as it wasn't a beach. Apparently she hated the annual trek to the beach that her mother insisted on.
She also mentioned how she gave up FaceBook, because it was just so fake. This was another thing her mother did. She would actually compete with our teenage (at the time) daughter. Bragging about how many "likes" or holiday greetings she got from her friends on FB.
Later we went to a music festival. We watched a band. On the way home she commented about the "drunks who feel the need to get up and dance". Which was another thing her mother did regularly. 
I don't know. I felt some validation about some of the things that really bothered me on a day to day basis while I was married. Sometimes I get those "if only" thoughts that make me feel bad about myself. Maybe I am reading too much into her comments. But the totality of them makes me think, she was talking about her mother, without mentioning her name.


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## Satya (Jun 22, 2012)

Probably. It's likely her way of processing and forming/honing her own value system. She's not outright laying insult on her mother it sounds like, which is a good thing, but she is forming opinions of what is and is not OK with her, and using her mother's preferences and actions as the basis for what she will not do or be. 

I think it's pretty normal. I went through the same phase with my mother. She had some angry and bitter years I never liked, so I dedicated myself to never living or thinking like her. She got over that phase eventually, and my opinion of her has changed since.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

Has your daughter ever overheard you talking about those things? It seems like she pretty much knows what about her mother bothered you. Maybe your body language gave it away. Or maybe just little comments you made.

I take on it is that perhaps your daughter was bonding with you by talking about things that she knows bothered you about her mother. Like she was say, "Yea dad, I get it. It's all ok."


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Ynot said:


> I don't know. I am coming up on some "anniversaries" so that might have something to do with it. But yesterday I spent most of the day with my daughter and SIL. I was showing them houses. In one of them there were wall stencils. She mentioned how much she hated them. She felt that people that put them up are "trying to hard". My ex (her mother) had polluted every room in our house with that stuff. My daughter grew up in that house, so I can only guess where she got that idea from.
> Later they were talking about whether they would be able to take a vacation if they bought a house. My daughter said she would go anywhere as long as it wasn't a beach. Apparently she hated the annual trek to the beach that her mother insisted on.
> She also mentioned how she gave up FaceBook, because it was just so fake. This was another thing her mother did. She would actually compete with our teenage (at the time) daughter. Bragging about how many "likes" or holiday greetings she got from her friends on FB.
> Later we went to a music festival. We watched a band. On the way home she commented about the "drunks who feel the need to get up and dance". Which was another thing her mother did regularly.
> I don't know. I felt some validation about some of the things that really bothered me on a day to day basis while I was married. Sometimes I get those "if only" thoughts that make me feel bad about myself. Maybe I am reading too much into her comments. But the totality of them makes me think, she was talking about her mother, without mentioning her name.


Kind of reminds me of the stuff I have read on here.


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## Cooper (Apr 18, 2008)

Ynot just be careful how you react to what your daughter says. My kids make many comments I can easily interpret as them disparaging their mother, they are both semi estranged from her and sometimes I believe they actually try to draw out negative comments from me. I always let the comments go, I don't want to be allies in a war against their mom. Truthfully it makes me sad knowing they don't have a a positive relationship with her, even though I know it's her fault.

Also understand just because your daughter doesn't like stenciled walls or beach vacations doesn't mean she associates that negativity with her mother, it may be her expressing her own taste as she matures.


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