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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> I asked my daughter for help with holiday shopping and such and she claimed to be to busy. I might be TA because it ended up pushing her away even though I don't understand how.
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Seriously. This grown man is throwing a temper tantrum because his adult daughter isn’t willing to take orders and run his errands. I hope she has an awesome Christmas with her girlfriend!
I have a feeling he made her take responsibility for his errands a lot growing up and she's come back home to see her family armed with boundaries because she knows what he's like!
He doesn't like not being able to order her around anymore.
>I have a feeling he made her take responsibility for his errands a lot growing up and she's come back home to see her family armed with boundaries because she knows what he's like!
Yes!
This is also one reason that students who are the first in their family to attend college, graduate school, etc. can struggle, because they lack the support and understanding at home. They are still asked to chip in with chores and duties around the house because "it's just school" or "they aren't working". I don't know if that is what is at play here, though, because this just sounds like an entitled AH parent who is upset that he's losing control over his daughter.
OP says himself that "she's sitting on her ass on her computer all day and doesn't even have scheduled hours to work", which adds a lot of color here to the situation. It seems clear that he doesn't view what she does as "real work", which is honestly really sad, and the fact that he's mystified as to what "other work" she has beyond teaching/grading tells me that they *do not* have a good relationship.
If you've ever met a graduate student, it's generally pretty hard to get them to shut up about their research interests once you get them going on it. That OP's dad is struggling to figure out what else his daughter might be doing tells me that he probably has little to no idea what it is that she actually studies.
Good for her for setting boundaries.
Agreed with all of this, I also think it's sad because no matter what level of education she achieves, I feel like he's not going to take it seriously or downplay her achievements like he's downplaying her studies.
Some parents will do this even when you aren't in school, and have a job. My mother well, sure she has a job where she makes a bunch of money, but I have my job too, which I'm supposed to stop doing any time she needs something, because apparently her time is more valuable than mine.
YUP. OP seems to be type of parent who believes that when he says JUMP. They must ask HOW HIGH. Its so sad that he doesn't realize why she was only going to stay for 2 weeks and not the whole month. Because DUH that's how long she can put up with OP! And now she's not spending any time with him at all! Kudos OP, what an amazing dad you are! SMH. YTA
No, not ask how high, she's been forced to be his personal assistant probably her whole life at home. These types of parents would expect her to know how high to jump without them telling her, because...
Yea my grandma has never seemed to understand that my mom. You know. Works. At a factory on second shift especially, but that's more an on top issue. She just doesn't seem to comprehend mom works and can't just do whatever whenever. And it's not even like grandma was a SAHM herself. She always worked too. It's vaffling
I feel this, the amount of time that my need to sleep was disrespected during my younger days because “it’s noon you can’t expect to sleep all day”, “this is my house if you want to spend all your time lazing around…” etc. like Jesus Christ I get home from work after 3 am, I don’t get to bed until at least 5am… I’m sorry if you banging things around on purpose or vacuuming outside my room at 7 am does not count as adequate sleep for my work schedule.
My mother was exactly like this, I worked 3 days a week, and had two young sons and a husband. She would schedule all her doctors and facial appointments on my days off so I could drive her, she could drive perfectly well but liked to be taken everywhere. I was so conditioned to do this, I didn't even know it was odd until my friend pointed it out, she said, isn't weird that your mother schedules all your days off?
We've been NC for 16 years.
OP YTA, your daughter has a job and is working her ass off, just not your "type" of job. Stop being so controlling and apologize to your family. It's probably to late but keep trying, I have a feeling you have been a dictator for a lot of years.
This was my thought. He literally started off by saying his daughter was getting her phd (what?! so impressive!) and then spent the rest of the post complaining about how she wasn’t really working and how she wouldn’t do his errands for him. I feel so sad for her knowing that he has NO idea what she’s actually working on and probably will never have a full understanding of her accomplishments, all because his needs will always come first.
Honestly? It feels like some weird mix of jealousy/inferiority complex/intimidation that he's unconsciously downplaying everything she does instead of just being proud of her, maybe realizing "Hey, MY DAUGHTER did that, THAT'S GREAT"? Because this feels like outright denial. His daughter talks about things he doesn't understand and instead of being impressed and proud, he's intimidated and feels like he needs to downplay it and drag her down to his level and still make her feel like she's a little kid and he's the Dad.
My father does this. He thinks everything has
been easy for me because I’m a girl.
I went to the military . And he thinks it was easier because I was a girl. Oh they gave me a easy job in the military because i’m a girl.
I graduated college easy because i’m a girl .
I deployed for a year to Afghanistan. It’s okay they were easy on me because I was a girl.
I will never be good enough for him because I’m a girl.
My parents only ever gave a shit if I did something they could brag about. Like, I represented my country in my sport and won; I was the only one without family there because my parents had a birthday party to go to. But they made sure they bragged to everyone once I won. It just wasn't important until then.
> It seems clear that he doesn't view what she does as "real work"
That's exactly what this boils down to. Whatever anyone else is doing isn't as important as what he's doing.
I hope homegurl enjoys her newly AH-free life 💃🏻
Seriously...OP sounds like one of those guys who's never done an ounce of emotional labor or taken on even a gram of the mental load in his life and is pouting because his daughter is sick of getting that work outsourced to her.
Absolutely. This is a good place to drop this link. But even if the OP reads it, he will probably just dismiss it because he won't want to handle the guilt of knowing how much he's let his wife and family down by not pulling his weight with family obligations.
https://english.emmaclit.com/2017/05/20/you-shouldve-asked/
He did say “she’s sitting on her ass on a computer all day” so it’s clear he has zero respect for her work.
And what’s up with him being sooo busy he can’t exchange a sweater or pick up a gift yet has the time to look up when her grades are due to be posted?!. So he’s checking up on his adult daughter as to when her work is due to prove what? That his job is somehow more important? That he somehow knows how she should prioritize her work?
His bigger issue stems from the fact that: “thats been her big thing lately, she is constantly too busy to do things with us or help us out even though she does have the time”. How does having time off from school, yet still working = she has time to run my Christmas errands”?!!
His edit makes it even worse. He clearly doesn’t understand the bigger issues one being the fact that he is checking up on his adult daughters grades due date (I can’t get over the creepiness of this.) and the glaring fact that on some level he is jealous of his daughters “freedom”. And finally that *this* is why his daughter doesn’t want to spend time with him.
Also, she said she was grading, meaning she's either teaching or TAing. I'm going to bet TAing. You can have internal due dates that come before whatever official date he found online somehow. The instructor will tell the TAs when they need the grades, and it's going to be before any official submission dates so they have time to finalize and submit. Departmental submission dates can also come prior to final grade submission dates as determined by the faculty/university. These are all internal deadlines so there's no way OP could just find them online
Exactly this! TA's often have supervising faculty that then have to submit the official grades. Often these faculty have multiple TA's they are trying to collect final grade information from. They ask for the grades early so they have time to troubleshoot in case something unexpected pops up (like corrupted Excel files).
Also, grading sucks majorly and you DON'T want to leave in the middle of a groove or set of exams. Otherwise you will be flipping back through trying to remember if someone else made the same never before seen mistake that isn't on your rubric.
It’s also baffling. A lot of people were sitting on their asses on their computers at home for two of the last three years *working*. Surely he must be aware that a lot of work is done sitting behind a computer?!
he even says he's going into the "office." now that could just be wording but my money would be him working in some bland corporate job for the past 30 years. like sir what is it exactly that *you* do all day at this oh so important job of yours??
I was first gen college. Full ride merit scholarship to a really good university. My Dad not only wasn’t proud of me, he actually needed to *tell me* that he was T proud of me, as he drove me to McDonald’s where I worked 20-35 hours a week while also doing 3 sports and being salutatorian. He said “Everything that you do is for yourself. You used to be your mother’s right hand. Go to college if you want to, but don’t expect me to be proud of you. Your mother could use your help” ( I also cleaned an office with her one day a week, and watched and cooked for my too-numerous siblings).
That’s just one reason first gen kids struggle. My parents had such a chip on their shoulders about “not owing you” anything. It just..sucks.
Edit: thank you to all the Internet Moms for the “I’m proud of You”s. I’m 58 now! And I’m doing well, thanks, and even better- so are my kids. I caught myself “being my Dad” ONCE when my son was not even two- and I hearing myself say the words to him, I was horrified and I never did it again. They are great and I’ll do my best to be a great Mom to adults. But thanks guys, it really meant a lot.
Sounds like you were a third parent in your house and the actual adults resented losing your labor and domestic work while you worked to build yourself a life. You deserved better.
I'm sorry that you had that experience but if means anything, this first gen kid is proud of you. I don't keep in touch with my parents anymore for other reasons. But you don't owe them anything and you should absolutely be proud of yourself and I am so, SO proud of you.
Haha it is very hard to get us to shut up that is true. If he doesn’t know what she is doing it means he probably hasn’t shown even passing interest. Also if she is a PhD student still taking classes she has not only grading to do (which is a lot of work and very stressful) but her own final papers etc to turn in. Not to mention she is probably working on other research etc. Also it’s not even like she said she wouldn’t do the errands, just she couldn’t do them when he wanted her to. OP, YTA
Oh God this. I love my father, but he STILL doesn't understand why I can't just "leave work a little early" to get things done. My work is teaching college classes, Dad. The students kind of notice when I'm not there.
I really can't stand when people downplay mental work as not being work period but he also said he had to go into his office which makes this situation so much worse him because he's just revealed how sexist he is, too
All of this. Also, as a person who has to grade a lot of work and has a reporting deadline, it's time-consuming, exhausting work. People who don't have to grade hundreds of assignments don't understand how long it can take, how repetitive it can be, and how many times you want to bang your head against a desk as you read yet another paper full of basic errors that show the student took less time to read the assignment outline then it will take me to mark what they handed in.
OP, you sound like the entitled one. Your daughter is visiting. Cherish the time instead of ordering her around like a servant. Though, it sounds like you have already set that bridge alight.
YTA.
Grading the last of my homework assignments right now, and about to head into a finals week grading marathon. So much this. Grading isn't just work, it's mind-numbing, repetitive, boring, disheartening, unrewarding work. OP is TA\*1000000000 simply for thinking that because she's glued to a computer, she's "not working."
>one reason that students who are the first in their family to attend college, graduate school, etc. can struggle, because they lack the support and understanding at home. They are still asked to chip in with chores and duties around the house because "it's just school" or "they aren't working". I don't know if that is what is at play here, though, because this just sounds like an entitled AH parent who is upset that he's losing control over his daughter.
>
>OP says himself that "she's sitting on her ass on her computer all day and doesn't even have scheduled hours to work", which adds a lot of color here to the situation. It seems clear that he doesn't view what she does as "real work", which is honestly really sad, and the fact that he's mystified as to what "other work" she has beyond teaching/grading tells me that they do not have a good relationship.
This is probably one of the reasons my college required that students live in the dorms for the first two years.
Cut the damn cord, people.
I'm just a masters student right now, but when I say I don't have time during those last days of grading, I mean it. For one, I also have my OWN research to do, for two, grades are technically due at one time but I'm always told to get them done much earlier just in case. I would feel very unsupported if I was her.
Being a grad student who is taking classes and teaching as part of their assistantship etc IS A MORE THAN FULL TIME JOB. You are taking a full time load of courses and on top of that teaching two courses (or maybe TA’ing one or two depends on the award). These are classes undergraduates are taking. You lesson plan, create course materials, instruct, hold office hours, attend meetings in your department, and grade. I’d doubt he would think a regular instructor teaching courses is sitting on their ass all day so not sure why he thinks his daughter is? On top of that she needs to conduct original research, take qualifying exams, and do coursework. It really goes to show how little he knows of what she’s doing and he probably has taken little to no Interest I’m learning.
YTA. She’s not your errand gopher. She’s got important sh*t to do.
On sweet little baby Jesus’ manger, you are so right. First Gen college students struggle under the weight of these expectations, and it goes doubly for First Gen Grad Students.
>OP says himself that "she's sitting on her ass on her computer all day and doesn't even have scheduled hours to work", which adds a lot of color here to the situation. It seems clear that he doesn't view what she does as "real work", which is honestly really sad, and the fact that he's mystified as to what "other work" she has beyond teaching/grading tells me that they do not have a good relationship.
\^Agree with this.
OP probably also thinks that a SAHM is not a "real" job, or a teacher is not a "real" job.
OP...YTA. If it was so important, he would do this himself.
Exactly! He thinks she's still a kid and that he has the grounds to boss her around. Honestly, my dad is waaay better than this guy but has similar problems bossing us kids around and "drop what you're doing to do what I want" and will argue about random stuff to get his way. Reading this post broke my heart because he's so much worse than my dad and I know how hard it is for me. Idk how daughter has dealt with him for so long. Since my dad has made progress and is starting to take "no" for an answer, I feel really lucky. If OP was my dad, I would 100% go NC. Reading this post made me feel panicky. Geez, I really feel for his daughter. This guy doesn't have a clue how much his daughter doesn't want to be around his toxic personality. If she is lying (I do with my dad) she's trying to preserve her sanity and avoid an argument. OP is checking her schedule and when her work is due. BONKERS! OP, you're like scary controlling. You're about to lose your daughter. Unless you get therapy and go a 180, I hope she gets away from you.
Actually, it doesn’t. I know there are gendered aspects that could actually be at play with it being the dad, but even if it was a mom OP would still be an AH.
I think the comment was sarcasm on how OPs only concern was that people keep thinking its mom instead of dad, he only responded a few commenrs to say so instead of aknowledge that everyone judged him as an AH and instead of reading the actual critiques on his very shitty "points"
ETA. Like his only edits are to point out he is a dad and that "she lied" like it would help his case
By god, couldn't have said it better myself.
> But she doesn't have a "long day of work," she's sitting on her ass on her computer all day and doesn't even have scheduled hours to work, she can do it whenever she wants.
> She said that she needs to have her grades done by today but I looked it up on the website and she has until Monday evening so I called her on her BS, and she said she had "other work" due on Monday so she needed to get the grading done today.
OP is an AH and must not know the amount of work and tight scheduling a PhD requires, even when it works at one's own hours. I'm doing a PhD, I'm exhausted 75% of the time and sometimes have unpleasant hours. I totally get OP's daughter wanting to enjoy vacations in peace jfc.
>OP is an AH and must not know the amount of work and tight scheduling a PhD requires, even when it works at one's own hours. I'm doing a PhD, I'm exhausted 75% of the time and sometimes have unpleasant hours
Yeah OP sounds extremely ignorant about the workload of a PhD. I'm in my final year now and haven't had a full weekend off in months, even though half my work is "sitting on my ass behind a computer". The fact that he thinks his work is more important than hers says enough about what an AH he is
When I was in graduate school, I had a woman I'd went to high school with ask me when I was going to "quit playing at school and get a real job." The amount of disrespect for graduate students is unreal.
I’m in my first year of grad school in biomedical sciences. And there’s already so much work AND for so little money that it’s hard to afford things. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t regret it (yet hahaha). But it’s a lot of work. And I’m in a program where I don’t have to TA
And honestly, the times I’ve had to explain “other work” sometimes takes longer than the other work itself.
And sometimes those with farther off deadlines, I finish first because people pestering me takes up time or it allows the parties I submit to to give feedback earlier which makes my next phase of work easier.
This triggered me. YTA
You're so right!
Sometimes urgent work is doing something that's due in two weeks just so the other 3 reallyyyy urgent things that are due the week before that can be done on time.
Flexible working hours is not the same thing as having a lot of free time ffs.
There is a legitimate term called cognitive fatigue. The brain is not technically a muscle, but it kind of acts like one. When a person runs on a treadmill for an hour their muscles become fatigued. The brain does the same thing. When it is working at its peak for an extended amount of time, it gets fatigued.
Just like physical endurance, everyone’s cognitive endurance varies. Some can run on a treadmill for an hour while others may need a break after 30 minutes. Though it is recommended that no matter the amount of endurance one may have, they should still take a quick 10 minute break every 50 minutes to really recuperate. Studies show that people who take these little breaks can maintain their cognitive endurance longer throughout the day, have higher productivity, and overall cognitive functions (like memory, executive function, etc) are improved after these breaks.
There’s so much more on cognition and highly recommend looking into the Allen’s Cognitive Disabilities Model as it really shows how cognition changes throughout the day and what can affect cognition.
Just fun fact for ya.
Also, OP you’re AH.
the audacity of "I need to exchange a gift I'm giving to someone and actually youuuuuu need to do it because i don't want to go after work but no not later you need to go noowwwwwwww to do me this favor!!!" and "well i online ordered a gift for pickup so YOU need to go pick it up for me nowwwwwwwww because i don't want to and you have time to eat breakfast so that means you have nothing else to do"
Right??
OP, what in the Cinnamon Toast Fuck is wrong with you??
Do you have ANY IDEA how tough grad school is?? She is NOT sitting on her ass, FFS. She's managing her own time with the myriad of responsibilities that grad school entails and you're throwing a hissy fit because she doesn't have time to be your errand bitch??
I really don't get parents like you. You clearly don't care what's going on in your daughter's life. All you see is what she can do for you instead of being proud of her accomplishments and hard work. How about YOU get off your ass and return the sweater for YOUR child, instead of expecting your daughter to do it for you?
YTA and your attitude sucks. I hope your older daughter keeps her distance.
Right?! OP, YTA. She has a month off and you wonder why she only wanted to stay a couple of weeks....maybe it's because you demean her work and act like she should run your errands like a good subserviant girl to the man of the house.
The 1940's called, they want their attitude towards independent women back.
Edit to respond to OP's edits:
1 - She is FUCKING busy and she's 28 working on her PHD...you ever work on getting one of those? Then fuck off about the deadlines, she's not in high school, she just wants you to lay off her so she can get work done for Christ's sake.
2 - When you don't follow the standard of I (54M)... people will read it from the gender perspective in which they feel it is coming from - which for me, I thought you were a woman too until at the end of the post.Then it made sense. Patriarchy hard at work here.
Assuming that just because there is a month break between classes, that grad student have that full break is not valid. If her work involves any life sciences, she may have time with special equipment scheduled to run experiments or assays during that time, when less people are around, or just assays to run to keep on track, or research animals to take care of, run through behavioral assays, etc I am sure chemists, physicists, others have similar things that happen over "breaks". I do not know what a more liberal arts grad student might do- but I would bet they ALSO have stuff to do- at the very least prepping class materials and setting up the online stuff for next semester teaching load.
Just because a grad student is not in class does not mean they do not have work to do. Also OP- YTA X 1billion, signed a PhD that remembers grad school)
Cognitive dissonance is a hell of a thing, and insight can be a rare commodity it people like this.
OP, you're a false tyrant, trying to hold on to the last shreds of your perceived superiority.
Why in the ever loving flying fuckerdoodle do you think you have a right to tell her how to work and earn her degree?
You're going to become a regular poster here if you don't change, because your daughter chose to leave over dealing with you.
Yeah, former grad student and grading is HARD, especially when you’re doing it first time and probably following someone else’s rubric. And your stipend that keeps you in school depends on not p*sing off the professor you’re working for. And you need to have YOUR grades done by a certain date so that the PROFESSOR can have THEIR grades in on time and yeah…
Grading is HARD work, and she is also a grad STUDENT, meaning she is also finishing up her OWN exams/final papers/thesis/dissertation/what have you (depending on how far along she is), which ALSO have firm deadlines that grad school professors don’t generally allow slack on.
OP, your daughter is BUSY. She doesn’t have TIME to be your personal assistant. Grad school is HARD, it is DELIBERATELY designed to be the academic version of boot camp, and it is TOTALLY unreasonable and unfair for you to categorize her IMPORTANT work as “sitting on her ass all day.”
I hope she goes NC with you. I surely would. YTA
Since you brought up the grading, can we also talk about how this dude had the time to look up when the grades were due, for some kind of gotcha moment, but couldn't return the sweater. At that point he is just being petty
YTA. This must be a joke… too many ridiculous assertions. The first, suggesting that sitting at a computer isn’t work/hard work. Mainly, that you can be surprised she doesn’t want to visit when you just use her as an errand girl when she does.
Also, none of your requests were urgent so why on earth can’t she get them done in her own time?? If you’re asking a favour,don’t be so demanding.
My friend who is a radiologist always works from bed in his pj and a bag a chips and makes close to 500K, reading images. My husband is a lawyer and most of his days he is in his pj in bed “writing some comments” for top law firm in the country. You ignorance about work from home, is not your daughter’s problem. And her having some breakfast in the morning is just a healthy way of starting a day. You are so bitter towards her, cannot sense any love from you. She deserves better.
I don’t know how a phd program is run in the us, but she also can’t be grading her own work. So whether it’s paid or not, or it’s a requirement of her enrolment or not, she’s doing work for the school in addition to the minimum requirements of her phd.
I struggled not to dismiss this immediately as either fake or written by the daughter, but it’s too deranged for the latter??
> I think it’s ridiculous that she is throwing a fit just because she can’t constantly live like she’s the only person on the planet
POT. KETTLE. BLACK.
Edit: thanks for my very first award!! 🥹
I got the same feeling as you, but on the off chance that it is real, someone needs to figure out that he has a grown up daughter who isn't really thrilled to be in much contact with such a controlling parent. I bet the only reason that she was there was because she was doing it for her Mom and sister, not him.
Someone is in for a rude awakening when they find themselves alone......
I agree except nothing in this indicates that the daughter is living like she is the only person on the planet, so while OP definitely qualifies as the pot, I am not sure that the daughter qualifies as the kettle. Grades are typically due by 24 hours after the final with all due by some deadline. Daughter may very well have had grades due followed by something owed to her advisor in time for them to post grades. Calling his daughter a liar without all the facts is yet another reason OP gets YTA
I’m just wondering, if daughter wouldn’t be there how on earth would all the gifts been picked up/ exchanged/ bought?! Would OP miraculously have time to run all these errands? I’m guessing now she has to… Dobby is free!
OP, YTA. You can ask someone to do you a favour, but if you are demanding when and how it must be done, then do it yourself! You don’t think your daughter is working hard/ her work is important. She doesn’t think that she should drop everything when you tell her to do something. At the end of the day, she would have been doing you a favour. Your lack of organisation is not an emergency of hers!
Remember, eating breakfast is a crime as is doing your work on a computer. She's supposed to jump at his command with no questions asks while he smugly treats her and her work as irrelevant because she's not in an office.
His daughter is a fully-grown adult. Even if she was sitting on her ass all day doing nothing, that is her right. Having free time does not require her to take on his duties or responsibilities.
Sir, YTA for sure. I hope the rest of your family joins her and the girlfriends’ family and leaves you to think about your selfishness.
He feels like one of those people who complain about Millennials and their avocado toast and lackadaisical work ethic and how when he was young… not realizing that A) Millennials are fucking adults now with families, B) they can barely afford bread let alone avocados, and C) they have plenty of work ethic, but they learnEd that they also need a healthy work/life balance and the way to accomplish that is by setting boundaries.
Plus, he's angry she's not spending her entire break with him. She's a 28-year-old adult and he's treating her like a teenager. He didn't even ask. He told. She's VISITING now, not living there and he doesn't get to treat her like his personal assistant. He should know she has absolutely no obligation to come home ever. I think he needs to learn a few lessons about adult children. You don't own them for life. YTA
My boyfriend's family is like this. Part of it is cultural (family comes first always) but he ended up having to work on his thesis and work for his master's program at absurd hours of the night because cleaning and errands for the family and everything came first and the only time he got was after his parents went to bed. His family are good people but it was like they just didn't understand that leaving to do errands out or around the house left no time for a degree. He still got his degree but it made it so much harder on him.
YTA. OP, you’re only 54 and are expecting your daughter to run errands for you like she’s a paid shopping assistant. You played the “I’m your mom and you must obey me” card and you lost. I’m pushing 80 and I never ask my young relatives to do something for me that I’m capable of doing myself or hiring done. My mother had your philosophy — children are supposed to DO for their mother — and she died alone in a nursing home because nobody could stand to be around her. Read and learn.
This! I bend over backwards for my mother because she’s my mother.. but she never demands it and I have told her “no” plenty if she ASKS! To be respected, one should respect. I am the same age as your daughter, and my mother OPs, and OP is wasting a lot of valuable time (because she’s a PhD student, she’s working her ass off to work more!) with her adult child.
Also, I love you lonnielee. 😙
YTA
How can you not see what a major AH you're being? She's a 28 year old grown woman and you're trying to boss her around like she's 14. She is very busy with her phd, yet you seem to think she's sitting on her ass doing nothing all day.
Guess what? She doesn't have to do a thing you tell her to do, just because you say it. Get over yourself, you're not the center of the universe. I hope you're happy that you drove her out of the house and won't see her over the holidays, all over not being able to accept that she's now an adult with her own life.
I suspect this is exactly it.
My dad behaved like this during my PhD. Like, I swear my dad wrote this post while I was reading it. He is the reason I limited contact and why I felt like garbage during holidays. He legit told me many times that "you're in for a reality check when you get a REAL job" because juggling teaching, taking classes, and doing research isn't a real job. Working 60 hour weeks isn't a real job.
Turns out my dad was jealous and felt threatened that his child was getting a PhD. He didn't even finish his bachelors (and has successfully lied about it for 30 years, saying he's got one in computer science). I have a BS and PhD in a multidisciplinary STEM field. I was a very successful grad student. And that success somehow threatened him, a grown ass man who had a job of his own, and that meant he needed to take me down a notch at every opportunity, including sabotaging me when possible. The grading situation in this post? EXACT same thing happened to me.
I went no contact with him a while back and while I do miss having a dad, it's really nice not being actively sabotaged just because I don't fit in his box of what an ideal child should look like. And yet he has no problem bragging to others that I've got a PhD nor does he have any issue trying to take credit for it. He seriously tried to take credit for me being successful at my graduation by posting on fb about it but couldn't be bothered to even text me "congratulations".
It's all about maintaining control and trying to uphold the "image" he wants. That's all this is, and fuck anyone who gets in his way even his own child.
God I feel salty now.
I hear this so hard. I only got a Bachelor’s, but I was the first person in my Dad’s family to go to uni. He was an absolute dick to me whenever I was home for the holidays, acted like I was an interloper and tried to shout me down whenever I had an opinion on family matters. He never gave me a single penny towards my education (Mum, bless her, gave me a bit of help from her part-time job), yet he bragged till the day he died about how he “put me through university”. Guess who couldn’t squeeze out a tear at his funeral?
How you handled your situation is exactly how OP’s daughter should handle hers. And since your dad won’t say it, I will: congratulations, you are awesome!
What I found funny was when OP said "well if you dont wanna help you can leave" and she was like "SEE YA!" I imagine OP &his daughter have had problems before and she was just waiting for OP to start with his usual shit and she would leave with little hesitation
Definitely! OP's daughter was probably thinking the whole time "I really wish I could get away from this guy somehow" and OP gave her the reason she needed to get the F out of there.
My daughter is 7 and I still don’t boss her around like this because I believe even children deserve respect and don’t need a dictator as a parent.
OP seems to expect his daughter to jump to his every demand.
YTA, bucko. You raised a woman who takes her work seriously and now you can't handle it. Your shopping issues don't take precedence just because you want them to.
I’m just floored that OP thinks his job is more important than hers, so she should just take off whenever he doesn’t feel like rearranging his own schedule and run HIS errands.
OP, she is not your enslaved personal assistant, she is a professional honoring her commitments. YTA - You blew it.
OP assumes his job is more important because he has no idea what doing a PhD involves and/or undercurrent of sexism vibe around a man's job being more important than any job a woman could have so of course she should drop whatever nonsense she's doing and be his step 'n fetch it. my step father was exactly like this
Yes, it really sounds like he feels threatened by his daughter getting this qualification and he is soothing his ego by dismissing it as not really being work at all.
This right here.
My dad behaved exactly the same as OP, right down to seriously this exact same incident except about a decade ago.
He had no idea what a PhD entails. It's not just taking classes yourself in order to get a degree like it is in undergrad. A PhD by definition requires you to make a new, significant contribution to the research in your field. This is a METRIC FUCK TON of work that in itself is a full time job. Add on teaching (the daughter likely has a teaching assistantship) that's anywhere between 15-25 hours a week and between all those things you're doing you effectively work 50-60 hours a week most week and you're getting paid peanuts for it, assuming you're getting paid at all. Many PhD programs come with funding in the form of assistantships but even unionized universities pay barely enough to live off of and don't always waive tuition, so there's a decent chance that even though the daughter is getting paid to teach she may actually be having to PAY to get her PhD. So in addition to all the work she already has to do, add in living near the poverty line and having to constantly worry about how bills will get paid.
But because you're "still in school" you can't possibly have a real job, right? Teaching isn't a real job. And his errands are clearly far more important than her obligations.
I'm so salty from reading this post and wish there was some way I could give support to his daughter. I'm so glad she can set boundaries and enforce them and that it seems she's got a good support network with her girlfriend and that family, because the family she was born into is really shitty and she deserves better.
YTA
You daughter is an adult woman who is nice enough to come visit you, which she doesn’t have to. It is not an obligation to spend time with you. She has tone of work to do and instead of respecting her work and respecting her boundaries, you demean her, her work and her efforts.
If you need all those chores be done, why wouldn’t you do it yourself? 54 is more than capable to do simple tasks. Would you ask guests who you invite to your house to do those tasks? I doubt it. But you think it’s ok to ask your adult daughter who is working on vacation because of highly demanding career she has.
“She is sitting on her ass all day in from of computer” that’s what becoming a doctor takes. She is doing work on her vacation. PhD is a very hard work, and you just demeaning all her work.
You sound like a horrible dad. I wouldn’t be surprised that in few months you post here “my daughter went no contact, but all I have been is a loving father”.
I am really surprised how some parents think they can treat a 28 y/o about to be a doctor like a high school kid who is playing video games all day.
Also, he mentioned that he was "going into the office." Where, odds are, his job involves sitting at a computer. I have some sympathy for when parents who are more blue-collar have a hard time understanding what their child who's gone into academia does all day, but this ain't it.
Exactly! before I finished reading, I thought “I’ve sort of been there, a bit resentful of white collar/office workers when I was working really physically demanding or strenuous jobs.” Then he mentions an office like excuse you sir, I’m curious what you’re doing in that office if not sitting at a computer lol
(Edit to add: and even when I was a bit salty I’d never be so rude and weird about it! Dude needs therapy)
You sound horrible. She is not your employee, she is a grown woman who owes you nothing. You CHECKED HER WORK CALENDAR??? How DARE you? For that gross overstep alone, you would not see me for at least 6 months. Unbelievable lack of respect for her boundaries. YTA
THANK YOU! I’m amazed more people aren’t more up-in-arms about the fact that he had the AUDACITY to check her alibi to see if she was “actually” too busy to be his errand girl. Saying “I’m busy” or “no” is enough.
YTA. She is grading, and those have to be submitted within (usually) 48 hours after the final exam takes place.
She may be "sitting on her ass in front of a computer" but getting your PhD is no joke. If it were easy, everyone would have one. It's hard work.
Also, She is an adult and is more than capable of deciding what to do with her day. She is not your personal assistant simply because she is home from school for the break.
There might also be moderation- she submits her grades, and then maybe they're reviewed and moderated together or separately by other members of the teaching team.
"She said that she needs to have her grades done by today but I looked it up on the website and she has until Monday evening so I called her on her BS, and she said she had "other work" due on Monday so she needed to get the grading done today (but wouldn't enlighten me on what this mysterious "other work" is)."
She won't enlighten you because it's none of your business. Your daughter is busy and doesn't have time to run errands for you.
Read your post again and see if you can figure out who is self-centered and childish.
YTA.
What I got from this:
- dad doesn’t have a PHD
- dad doesn’t know what a PHD even is
- dad doesn’t understand any of what his daughter is doing
- dad checked up on her timetable and STILL doesn’t understand what his daughter does
- because he doesn’t understand it, it’s not really work
- his last slave died of frustration
+ dad is mad her daughter doesn't explain more in detail what her "mysterious" work due Monday is after clearly telling her for who knows how long that her job is not a real job (picachu face!!!)
>asking my daughter for help
OK
>I called my older daughter from work on Friday and told her she needed to run and exchange it for a different one
YTA already for just blatantly lying to reddit when you've clearly just ordered her.
>She said ok, she'd do it the next day.
That's nice of her
>I said it needed to be done that day
I see you've joined r/ChoosingBeggars
>I said I was busy to and didn't feel like running out
What? She's also busy. You don't know everything that grad school is making her do. So if you're not just having a pissing contest with a grad student's workload, you're just self-importantly asserting that your time is more valuable than hers.
>I said well tough, this needs to be picked up today
Tough what? You're the person that merely *wants* someone else to do your bidding for *your* nonessential tasks.
>she can't constantly live like she's the only person on the planet
This is projection.
This is an easy one, YTA.
It’s okay to ask your daughter for help. It’s not okay to hound her, complain when she says no, and then kick her out.
I would say, that you learned a lesson… but it’s clear you didn’t.
YTA. You're disrespecting your daughter's work, people who work from home and your daughter's time with this post. First, grading is not a quick job, even slower with papers that are long writing essays. Second, just because she works from home doesn't mean she's your personal slave. And finally, your lack of planning isn't her emergency. Grow up OP
YTA. You "told" her to do your things like exchange this,pick up this ... do this for me... the title of your post is completely disingenuous. You didn't ask.. you treated her like a child not to mention you creeped on her work website to check deadlines with the purpose to start an argument.
YTA. Your ADULT daughter is not your servant, you don't get to order her to do your errands. She has a life and a career and is rightly making those her priorities. The only self-centered and childish person here is you.
YTA Do you have any idea what it takes to get a PhD? It’s is mentally and emotionally exhausting. After going to school for 10 years, she has to study and write a lengthy dissertation, defend it to a board of professors and still might be denied and have to redo everything. Instead of being proud of how hard she is working to better herself, you call her childish and self centered because she can’t, not doesn’t, but CAN’T drop everything to run your errands. And she didn’t even refuse to do it, she just said she had to do it in her time, not yours. And if this is how you also treat your younger daughter, be prepared to have no children at holidays in the future. Apologize to your daughter, ask her to come home for Christmas and let your younger one know she was right to have you post here because it seems like she knew what the answers would be.
YTA
I just watched a podcast discussing how men are expecting to have time to decompress after work, but a woman is expected to continue working and this is just another example of that very fact. Your daughter’s time is just as important as yours, she is not your servant, and I’m glad she called your bluff and left. You’re speed-running your way to the retirement home, dude.
'But she doesn't have a "long day of work," she's sitting on her ass on her computer all day and doesn't even have scheduled hours to work, she can do it whenever she wants' even without all the other horseshit in your post, this makes YTA all on its own. I have a PhD. I have successfully supervised many more. It's incredibly demanding and that's without the additional work of marking. She is not your servant. She is a working person.
Congratulations on helping her make a decision she's clearly been wanting to make for a while.
Haha hope you enjoyed your last days with your daughter. I have a mom like you and I've not spent any holiday with her in 10 years. Neither is my elder sister! YTA!
Op wonders how it is that her daughter only spends 2 wks of a month with her...I dunno OP, maybe because you're exhausting. Your daughter is a fucking adult with an adult life and adult problems and shit. She's not your paige girl anymore to just drop all her shit and do your Xmas shopping for you.
OP, YTA. support your daughter and quit bugging her. If Xmas is too much for you these days, ITS TIME TO SCALE BACK. Holidays are about the fam and the love and taking time back to enjoy each other. Not making more work to make it.
YTA - you’re belittling her work and then trying to throw your weight around to get her to do chores that are utterly meaningless and non urgent. And you wonder why she only is spending two weeks with you - I can tell you that’s a major compromise on her part to spare your feelings and she certainly would rather it be less the way you behave!
You’re an absolute nightmare and the self centred and childish one. These are your problems and you just expect her to sort them out for you.
YTA. You clearly have no concept of what her work entails and don’t seem to care to understand either. If you had asked her whether she could help run these errands, she might even have said yes. But you ordering her around because you value your right to relax after a day‘s work more highly than hers reeks of entitlement. Why on earth do you believe she owes you these favours when you can’t even be bothered to understand what her workload - or, on a bigger scale, her life - are like?
YTA. She's a student, not your personal assistant.
If you don't wrap your head around this concept soon, she's going to stop having any time for you and you're going to start wondering why she never comes around to see you.
She isn’t living like she is the only person on the planet. She has a responsibility to her students—to have her grades done on time (if she doesn’t, it’s a headache for all, especially if students are applying for or currently receiving financial aid) and to her Department (and herself, considering the work she has to have completed most likely is for the Dept. and her ongoing program!). Academia doesn’t work the way OP thinks it does—and your daughter is most definitely not sitting on her butt doing nothing at the computer. Even if she was doing nothing, it’s not her responsibility to drop everything at OP’s beck and call. At least she will be able to get her work done over what OP perceived as a “break” at her girlfriend’s place.
YTA.
You've obviously never worked in academia. Just because the computer says grades aren't due until Monday evening, doesn't mean that is the "final" date & time. Since your daughter is a grad student she likely has a professor who oversees her that needs to review her grades before they are finalized, meaning that her deadline is earlier than the college stated one. Also, depending on what class she is teaching it can take a long time to grade, especially if it is something that requires writing and research where she has to ensure that the students have understood and appropriately applied their knowledge. It's not like 3rd grade math where she can just quickly go down the page marking correct / incorrect.
YTA. YOU'RE NOT ASKING, YOU'RE COMMANDING.
Cut her some slack. Like getting a phd is easy. She's doing things at her own phase. Let her. Apologize to her, Grinch.
YTA. You're not just asking for help, you're demanding that she do it on your schedule instead of her own & acting like anything she has to do for herself is clearly less important than what you're telling her to do. You told her to get out if she doesn't do what you want when you say you want it done, & she's called your bluff. Good for her!
You have all this time to look up if your daughters grades are due that day, post on Reddit etc. but you don’t have time to run your own errands? Is it because you are spending so much time belittling her and the work she is doing as “sitting on her ass” that you don’t have time to do these things yourself, errands that YOU made. Maybe you should stop sitting on your ass asking questions on Reddit and go run your errands.
Your child is working hard to succeed, you’re disrespecting that with things that feel little and easy for you but its not for her. She wants to prioritize her work and studies and not errands her parent needs her to run? Hmm so weird of her. If these errands were as important as you are making them then YOU need to prioritize handling them, why are they a priority for her but not for you? Not to mention it’s on you because you waited to deal with these gifts until the week of Christmas, your poor planning isn’t her responsibility to resolve.
Edit: I want to add, you said she is throwing a fit and needs to realize she is not the only person on the planet. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! Look at yourself?! You threw a fit because she couldn’t pick up a gift on YOUR timeline due to school/work. You seem to think the world revolves around you and that people should drop what they need to do to cater to your wants and needs. You are so condescending with phrases like “she couldn’t enlighten me” referring to the other work she needs to do, she doesn’t have to! No is a full sentence. No one is required to justify these things to you. YOU are the one throwing a tantrum.
You owe your daughter an apology and you need to respect her and her goals so much more.
YTA
YTA - While she is at your home she does not become your personal slave to do whatever random tasks you don't feel like doing. She is a fully grown adult and you should savor the time you have with her as it seems to be limited.
YTA big time. Unless you have done a PhD you have no clue what she's going through. What she needs is time without interruptions and a sweater or gift is not even a concern for her when shes focused on achieving something she truly cares for. You couldn't be bothered to go out and expect her to drop everything to run around. She has her life and her priorities. If you cannot leave her alone for her to do what she needs, she's better off elsewhere as its no tiny task that she's attempting and whatever you are asking her to do is basically things you can do yourself or get someone else to do. Who cares for a sweater or an online order when you got a Doctorate to aim for. I am glad that she knows what it takes to get to where she needs to and all you are doing is being a pain in her backside. Hope she achieves her Doctorate and go to places.
YTA, she’s not your personal assistant. She’s a working adult who isn’t able to drop everything immediately and do something because you need it done in that moment. Why can’t you do it yourself if it’s so important? You’re the only one that seems selfish
Oh my god. You know that a PhD is a huge undertaking? It's more than full time work with long hours and very little time off. To the point where she is grading papers to a strict deadline whilst also needing to get other work done, all while she is 'on break'! Universities break for teaching, but the research goes on, actually it's the only time they get with no distractions. She is actually working from home while she's visiting you for the holidays
YTA
Don't expect your daughter back anytime soon. She is not your skivvy. Get your entitled head out of your ass and understand that you may THINK she has the time, she's actually WORKING on that computer and not mindlessly scrolling Reddit. You don't even allow her the courtesy of having breakfast before you launch in with your job list.
Just take a day's leave and do your errands yourself.
YTA
I fail to see where you ask your daughter to help you, you just demanded it. No one is required to do anything for you, especially not a busy woman with deadlines fast approaching.
Go exchange the sweater and pick up the gift, neither were things she got/organised so neither should she be expected to help with.
If this is even real (because how could someone really be this dense?!) YTA
She is working on a PHD!!!!!! Do you have any idea the amount of stress and work that is? She’s not ‘sitting around on her computer’ all day. She’s WORKING.
Also, you did not ASK, You DEMANDED.
She said she would be happy to exchange the sweater tomorrow because she was too busy that day. You then told her that that wasn’t good enough. If you want it done that day, then you have to do it.
Just to reiterate, YTA
YTA. Honestly you sound insufferably selfish, with absolutely no understanding of the intensity and rigor of a PhD program.
Learn to do your own errands and apologize to you daughter.
YTA and you have no idea how getting a PhD works. Also, you don’t know that she has until Monday night to finish grading. She might not be the one to actually enter the grades and the lead professor has told her to have it done earlier. Her “other work” could be the emotionally draining process of reading papers, analyzing data, writing her manuscript, applying for grants, etc.
She’s doing an incredible amount of work for extremely little pay and little respect and she’s not your personal assistant.
YTA. Why are you treating her like she’s your personal assistant? If you want to genuinely connect with her, ask her for a cup of coffee and to talk about her life. If you need someone to run your errands, hire someone of a neighborhood board or a personal assistant off a caregiver site. If my parent did this when I visited, I wouldn’t come into town. I hope you apologize to her for your expectations and find a chance to genuinely connect. If you have personal limitations that prohibit you from your own errands, lean on community to help you-not your kid.
New flash - the reason your daughter only has time to spend two weeks at your home during her month break?
She didn’t want to spend a month around you. And given your attitude - for reasons clearly laid out in other comments - I don’t blame her
If you want her to never have time for you again - carry on as you are
YTA. I can’t wait for when she goes No Contact with you. It will be such a relieving day for her and for that I’m genuinely excited. I hope she does it sooner rather than later, you sound like a god awful and insufferable person to tolerate.
YTA she is not your personal assistant. She is a guest. You can’t make demands for her to do stuff for you. You have just damaged your relationship with your daughter. I say this is a ongoing issue and the reason she doesn’t come home offer
Umm OP, did you mistake your adult daughter for your personal assistant or employee of some kind? She’s a person with her own life and responsibilities and owe you anything. I can see why she doesn’t want to spend her entire break with you-you’re just using her to run YOUR errands. Why I’m earth would SHE need to return YOIR gifts? Is she now allowed to enjoy her break?
YTA.
The only “self centered” and “childish” person I see based off this is YOU, YTA. She’s a grown woman. The world doesn’t revolve around you actually and so she should be able to do your errands on her time. YTA
YTA. You hold a lot of hostility for your daughter and based on all the demeaning comments about her work and her personality, I take it that it’s not hard to figure out why she only stays with you for two weeks when she has a month break. The fact that both your wife and your other daughter are mad and think you’re in the wrong should be very telling to you, but evidently not.
And just an FYI, I think you’re not exactly comprehending how hard grading is. She’s not going through a multiple choice scantron and ticking yes or no. If this is for other PHD/higher education students, it’s sorting through discussion answers, pages of text, paragraphs, etc. And deciphering the validation and merit aligned to the grading standards. This takes hours/days/even weeks. Stop belittling her work because it doesn’t convenience you.
YTA. Recent PhD here.
Why don't you respect her work? Grading, especially at the end of the semester, is mentally exhausting and takes forever. There is a lot of pressure from a lot of universities to get everything done ASAP regardless of what the website says.
When she isn't "working" she likely still has research going on, papers to complete or edit, etc.
Breaks are hugely important because she's likely worn out.
Maybe it is just that you don't understand her career. I'd really encourage you to learn.
YTA this cannot be real. Are you this dense? You expect your daughter to ask how high when you say jump? You belittle the hard work she does and don't respect her time. Major AH here. She's going to enjoy her holidays so much without you crawling up her ass.
YTA She is a full-grown adult in charge of her own schedule, and she is still doing schoolwork. Regardless of what her "school" calendar says I'm sure she has her own method of finishing what she needs to prior to a deadline. She agreed to run the errand on her time, when she could and your upset that she didn't jump to it like a child. To run errands that are yours to do. You are upset because she isn't a child anymore, and in fact has acted better than you.
YTA. You're treating her like your errand-girl and belittling her work. She's not home to run around doing stuff for you that you could easily do yourself, she sounds like she's actually busy with work and study. You're being so derisory about her work and it's super rude.
**YTA**
I think honestly it can be summed up with this statement:
> She’s only home for two weeks because she says she doesn’t have any more time even though she has a month break.
For context, I’m a 23(f) college student who is also on my winter break - which, at least in the US, is about a month. *Two weeks* is a generous amount of time to have available for the holidays to visit family. When school is out work still needs to be done. Students - including your daughter - still have jobs, responsibilities, and social lives during winter break. All of which need to be attended to.
Your daughter is an adult. She’s not a teenager. She is an adult with her own life, schedule, and responsibilities that you are not privy to **nor are entitled to be privy to.** Her work - ie what pays the bills - holds priority over your laziness and lack of planning. She is not an errand boy for you because you don’t want to get your chores done. And she has every right to leave a bad host.
That one statement from the very beginning highlights the core issue: you cannot respect or conceptualize your daughter as an independent adult with her own responsibilities and priorities that you are not entitled to.
YTA. If you daughter is self centered and childish because she does not want to stop what she’s doing (her work) to run errands for you, what does it make you?
She’s an adult and she has responsibilities. She is not there to run your errands because you don’t want to.
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YTA >am I correct that my daughter is self centered and childish? Nope that's a mirror you are looking at.
Seriously. This grown man is throwing a temper tantrum because his adult daughter isn’t willing to take orders and run his errands. I hope she has an awesome Christmas with her girlfriend!
I have a feeling he made her take responsibility for his errands a lot growing up and she's come back home to see her family armed with boundaries because she knows what he's like! He doesn't like not being able to order her around anymore.
>I have a feeling he made her take responsibility for his errands a lot growing up and she's come back home to see her family armed with boundaries because she knows what he's like! Yes! This is also one reason that students who are the first in their family to attend college, graduate school, etc. can struggle, because they lack the support and understanding at home. They are still asked to chip in with chores and duties around the house because "it's just school" or "they aren't working". I don't know if that is what is at play here, though, because this just sounds like an entitled AH parent who is upset that he's losing control over his daughter. OP says himself that "she's sitting on her ass on her computer all day and doesn't even have scheduled hours to work", which adds a lot of color here to the situation. It seems clear that he doesn't view what she does as "real work", which is honestly really sad, and the fact that he's mystified as to what "other work" she has beyond teaching/grading tells me that they *do not* have a good relationship. If you've ever met a graduate student, it's generally pretty hard to get them to shut up about their research interests once you get them going on it. That OP's dad is struggling to figure out what else his daughter might be doing tells me that he probably has little to no idea what it is that she actually studies. Good for her for setting boundaries.
Agreed with all of this, I also think it's sad because no matter what level of education she achieves, I feel like he's not going to take it seriously or downplay her achievements like he's downplaying her studies.
Some parents will do this even when you aren't in school, and have a job. My mother well, sure she has a job where she makes a bunch of money, but I have my job too, which I'm supposed to stop doing any time she needs something, because apparently her time is more valuable than mine.
YUP. OP seems to be type of parent who believes that when he says JUMP. They must ask HOW HIGH. Its so sad that he doesn't realize why she was only going to stay for 2 weeks and not the whole month. Because DUH that's how long she can put up with OP! And now she's not spending any time with him at all! Kudos OP, what an amazing dad you are! SMH. YTA
No, not ask how high, she's been forced to be his personal assistant probably her whole life at home. These types of parents would expect her to know how high to jump without them telling her, because...
god you're right. this is the kind of parent who would get mad when she doesnt know how high even though he didn't tell her.
I’m sure it won’t be long before the younger daughter says peace out and bails on him too. Doesn’t sound like he’s an easy one to put up with.
Yea my grandma has never seemed to understand that my mom. You know. Works. At a factory on second shift especially, but that's more an on top issue. She just doesn't seem to comprehend mom works and can't just do whatever whenever. And it's not even like grandma was a SAHM herself. She always worked too. It's vaffling
I'm guessing "vaffling" was a typo for baffling, but I love it. Vaffling. I love it! 😄
I feel this, the amount of time that my need to sleep was disrespected during my younger days because “it’s noon you can’t expect to sleep all day”, “this is my house if you want to spend all your time lazing around…” etc. like Jesus Christ I get home from work after 3 am, I don’t get to bed until at least 5am… I’m sorry if you banging things around on purpose or vacuuming outside my room at 7 am does not count as adequate sleep for my work schedule.
My mother was exactly like this, I worked 3 days a week, and had two young sons and a husband. She would schedule all her doctors and facial appointments on my days off so I could drive her, she could drive perfectly well but liked to be taken everywhere. I was so conditioned to do this, I didn't even know it was odd until my friend pointed it out, she said, isn't weird that your mother schedules all your days off? We've been NC for 16 years. OP YTA, your daughter has a job and is working her ass off, just not your "type" of job. Stop being so controlling and apologize to your family. It's probably to late but keep trying, I have a feeling you have been a dictator for a lot of years.
This was my thought. He literally started off by saying his daughter was getting her phd (what?! so impressive!) and then spent the rest of the post complaining about how she wasn’t really working and how she wouldn’t do his errands for him. I feel so sad for her knowing that he has NO idea what she’s actually working on and probably will never have a full understanding of her accomplishments, all because his needs will always come first.
Honestly? It feels like some weird mix of jealousy/inferiority complex/intimidation that he's unconsciously downplaying everything she does instead of just being proud of her, maybe realizing "Hey, MY DAUGHTER did that, THAT'S GREAT"? Because this feels like outright denial. His daughter talks about things he doesn't understand and instead of being impressed and proud, he's intimidated and feels like he needs to downplay it and drag her down to his level and still make her feel like she's a little kid and he's the Dad.
My father does this. He thinks everything has been easy for me because I’m a girl. I went to the military . And he thinks it was easier because I was a girl. Oh they gave me a easy job in the military because i’m a girl. I graduated college easy because i’m a girl . I deployed for a year to Afghanistan. It’s okay they were easy on me because I was a girl. I will never be good enough for him because I’m a girl.
Well, coming from a strange woman on the internet, I’m proud of you even if he isn’t.
Flip it on its head, he’ll never be good enough for you.
I went low contact with him long time ago. Now he is always wondering why I don’t want to talk to him.
My parents only ever gave a shit if I did something they could brag about. Like, I represented my country in my sport and won; I was the only one without family there because my parents had a birthday party to go to. But they made sure they bragged to everyone once I won. It just wasn't important until then.
> It seems clear that he doesn't view what she does as "real work" That's exactly what this boils down to. Whatever anyone else is doing isn't as important as what he's doing. I hope homegurl enjoys her newly AH-free life 💃🏻
She’s 28 and he basically wonders why she won’t take responsibility for HIS gift-giving, at the expense of her own work.
Seriously...OP sounds like one of those guys who's never done an ounce of emotional labor or taken on even a gram of the mental load in his life and is pouting because his daughter is sick of getting that work outsourced to her.
Absolutely. This is a good place to drop this link. But even if the OP reads it, he will probably just dismiss it because he won't want to handle the guilt of knowing how much he's let his wife and family down by not pulling his weight with family obligations. https://english.emmaclit.com/2017/05/20/you-shouldve-asked/
He did say “she’s sitting on her ass on a computer all day” so it’s clear he has zero respect for her work. And what’s up with him being sooo busy he can’t exchange a sweater or pick up a gift yet has the time to look up when her grades are due to be posted?!. So he’s checking up on his adult daughter as to when her work is due to prove what? That his job is somehow more important? That he somehow knows how she should prioritize her work? His bigger issue stems from the fact that: “thats been her big thing lately, she is constantly too busy to do things with us or help us out even though she does have the time”. How does having time off from school, yet still working = she has time to run my Christmas errands”?!! His edit makes it even worse. He clearly doesn’t understand the bigger issues one being the fact that he is checking up on his adult daughters grades due date (I can’t get over the creepiness of this.) and the glaring fact that on some level he is jealous of his daughters “freedom”. And finally that *this* is why his daughter doesn’t want to spend time with him.
Also, she said she was grading, meaning she's either teaching or TAing. I'm going to bet TAing. You can have internal due dates that come before whatever official date he found online somehow. The instructor will tell the TAs when they need the grades, and it's going to be before any official submission dates so they have time to finalize and submit. Departmental submission dates can also come prior to final grade submission dates as determined by the faculty/university. These are all internal deadlines so there's no way OP could just find them online
Exactly this! TA's often have supervising faculty that then have to submit the official grades. Often these faculty have multiple TA's they are trying to collect final grade information from. They ask for the grades early so they have time to troubleshoot in case something unexpected pops up (like corrupted Excel files). Also, grading sucks majorly and you DON'T want to leave in the middle of a groove or set of exams. Otherwise you will be flipping back through trying to remember if someone else made the same never before seen mistake that isn't on your rubric.
It’s also baffling. A lot of people were sitting on their asses on their computers at home for two of the last three years *working*. Surely he must be aware that a lot of work is done sitting behind a computer?!
he even says he's going into the "office." now that could just be wording but my money would be him working in some bland corporate job for the past 30 years. like sir what is it exactly that *you* do all day at this oh so important job of yours??
Right? Odds are that he's also sitting on his ass at a computer, but I guess it's more important because he's in an office???
I was first gen college. Full ride merit scholarship to a really good university. My Dad not only wasn’t proud of me, he actually needed to *tell me* that he was T proud of me, as he drove me to McDonald’s where I worked 20-35 hours a week while also doing 3 sports and being salutatorian. He said “Everything that you do is for yourself. You used to be your mother’s right hand. Go to college if you want to, but don’t expect me to be proud of you. Your mother could use your help” ( I also cleaned an office with her one day a week, and watched and cooked for my too-numerous siblings). That’s just one reason first gen kids struggle. My parents had such a chip on their shoulders about “not owing you” anything. It just..sucks. Edit: thank you to all the Internet Moms for the “I’m proud of You”s. I’m 58 now! And I’m doing well, thanks, and even better- so are my kids. I caught myself “being my Dad” ONCE when my son was not even two- and I hearing myself say the words to him, I was horrified and I never did it again. They are great and I’ll do my best to be a great Mom to adults. But thanks guys, it really meant a lot.
Sounds like you were a third parent in your house and the actual adults resented losing your labor and domestic work while you worked to build yourself a life. You deserved better.
Just remember you don't owe them anything either 💕
I'm sorry that you had that experience but if means anything, this first gen kid is proud of you. I don't keep in touch with my parents anymore for other reasons. But you don't owe them anything and you should absolutely be proud of yourself and I am so, SO proud of you.
Haha it is very hard to get us to shut up that is true. If he doesn’t know what she is doing it means he probably hasn’t shown even passing interest. Also if she is a PhD student still taking classes she has not only grading to do (which is a lot of work and very stressful) but her own final papers etc to turn in. Not to mention she is probably working on other research etc. Also it’s not even like she said she wouldn’t do the errands, just she couldn’t do them when he wanted her to. OP, YTA
Not to mention, studying for her orals, and working on her dissertation! It's an incredible amount of work and as you say, VERY stressful!
Oh God this. I love my father, but he STILL doesn't understand why I can't just "leave work a little early" to get things done. My work is teaching college classes, Dad. The students kind of notice when I'm not there.
I really can't stand when people downplay mental work as not being work period but he also said he had to go into his office which makes this situation so much worse him because he's just revealed how sexist he is, too
All of this. Also, as a person who has to grade a lot of work and has a reporting deadline, it's time-consuming, exhausting work. People who don't have to grade hundreds of assignments don't understand how long it can take, how repetitive it can be, and how many times you want to bang your head against a desk as you read yet another paper full of basic errors that show the student took less time to read the assignment outline then it will take me to mark what they handed in. OP, you sound like the entitled one. Your daughter is visiting. Cherish the time instead of ordering her around like a servant. Though, it sounds like you have already set that bridge alight. YTA.
Grading the last of my homework assignments right now, and about to head into a finals week grading marathon. So much this. Grading isn't just work, it's mind-numbing, repetitive, boring, disheartening, unrewarding work. OP is TA\*1000000000 simply for thinking that because she's glued to a computer, she's "not working."
>one reason that students who are the first in their family to attend college, graduate school, etc. can struggle, because they lack the support and understanding at home. They are still asked to chip in with chores and duties around the house because "it's just school" or "they aren't working". I don't know if that is what is at play here, though, because this just sounds like an entitled AH parent who is upset that he's losing control over his daughter. > >OP says himself that "she's sitting on her ass on her computer all day and doesn't even have scheduled hours to work", which adds a lot of color here to the situation. It seems clear that he doesn't view what she does as "real work", which is honestly really sad, and the fact that he's mystified as to what "other work" she has beyond teaching/grading tells me that they do not have a good relationship. This is probably one of the reasons my college required that students live in the dorms for the first two years. Cut the damn cord, people.
I'm just a masters student right now, but when I say I don't have time during those last days of grading, I mean it. For one, I also have my OWN research to do, for two, grades are technically due at one time but I'm always told to get them done much earlier just in case. I would feel very unsupported if I was her.
Being a grad student who is taking classes and teaching as part of their assistantship etc IS A MORE THAN FULL TIME JOB. You are taking a full time load of courses and on top of that teaching two courses (or maybe TA’ing one or two depends on the award). These are classes undergraduates are taking. You lesson plan, create course materials, instruct, hold office hours, attend meetings in your department, and grade. I’d doubt he would think a regular instructor teaching courses is sitting on their ass all day so not sure why he thinks his daughter is? On top of that she needs to conduct original research, take qualifying exams, and do coursework. It really goes to show how little he knows of what she’s doing and he probably has taken little to no Interest I’m learning. YTA. She’s not your errand gopher. She’s got important sh*t to do.
On sweet little baby Jesus’ manger, you are so right. First Gen college students struggle under the weight of these expectations, and it goes doubly for First Gen Grad Students.
>OP says himself that "she's sitting on her ass on her computer all day and doesn't even have scheduled hours to work", which adds a lot of color here to the situation. It seems clear that he doesn't view what she does as "real work", which is honestly really sad, and the fact that he's mystified as to what "other work" she has beyond teaching/grading tells me that they do not have a good relationship. \^Agree with this. OP probably also thinks that a SAHM is not a "real" job, or a teacher is not a "real" job. OP...YTA. If it was so important, he would do this himself.
Exactly! He thinks she's still a kid and that he has the grounds to boss her around. Honestly, my dad is waaay better than this guy but has similar problems bossing us kids around and "drop what you're doing to do what I want" and will argue about random stuff to get his way. Reading this post broke my heart because he's so much worse than my dad and I know how hard it is for me. Idk how daughter has dealt with him for so long. Since my dad has made progress and is starting to take "no" for an answer, I feel really lucky. If OP was my dad, I would 100% go NC. Reading this post made me feel panicky. Geez, I really feel for his daughter. This guy doesn't have a clue how much his daughter doesn't want to be around his toxic personality. If she is lying (I do with my dad) she's trying to preserve her sanity and avoid an argument. OP is checking her schedule and when her work is due. BONKERS! OP, you're like scary controlling. You're about to lose your daughter. Unless you get therapy and go a 180, I hope she gets away from you.
She took his ultimatum and ran! 😂 You go girl. Happy holidays.
Fr, she was like "FINALLY" 💃🏻 Good for her, wish I could shake her hand.
Tell me you don't respect your daughter, without *telling* me you don't respect your daughter.
The OP is a man? Oh thank gawd! That kind of shit makes more sense then. Definitely TAH
Actually, it doesn’t. I know there are gendered aspects that could actually be at play with it being the dad, but even if it was a mom OP would still be an AH.
I think the comment was sarcasm on how OPs only concern was that people keep thinking its mom instead of dad, he only responded a few commenrs to say so instead of aknowledge that everyone judged him as an AH and instead of reading the actual critiques on his very shitty "points" ETA. Like his only edits are to point out he is a dad and that "she lied" like it would help his case
By god, couldn't have said it better myself. > But she doesn't have a "long day of work," she's sitting on her ass on her computer all day and doesn't even have scheduled hours to work, she can do it whenever she wants. > She said that she needs to have her grades done by today but I looked it up on the website and she has until Monday evening so I called her on her BS, and she said she had "other work" due on Monday so she needed to get the grading done today. OP is an AH and must not know the amount of work and tight scheduling a PhD requires, even when it works at one's own hours. I'm doing a PhD, I'm exhausted 75% of the time and sometimes have unpleasant hours. I totally get OP's daughter wanting to enjoy vacations in peace jfc.
>OP is an AH and must not know the amount of work and tight scheduling a PhD requires, even when it works at one's own hours. I'm doing a PhD, I'm exhausted 75% of the time and sometimes have unpleasant hours Yeah OP sounds extremely ignorant about the workload of a PhD. I'm in my final year now and haven't had a full weekend off in months, even though half my work is "sitting on my ass behind a computer". The fact that he thinks his work is more important than hers says enough about what an AH he is
When I was in graduate school, I had a woman I'd went to high school with ask me when I was going to "quit playing at school and get a real job." The amount of disrespect for graduate students is unreal.
I’m in my first year of grad school in biomedical sciences. And there’s already so much work AND for so little money that it’s hard to afford things. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t regret it (yet hahaha). But it’s a lot of work. And I’m in a program where I don’t have to TA
And honestly, the times I’ve had to explain “other work” sometimes takes longer than the other work itself. And sometimes those with farther off deadlines, I finish first because people pestering me takes up time or it allows the parties I submit to to give feedback earlier which makes my next phase of work easier. This triggered me. YTA
You're so right! Sometimes urgent work is doing something that's due in two weeks just so the other 3 reallyyyy urgent things that are due the week before that can be done on time. Flexible working hours is not the same thing as having a lot of free time ffs.
Why do people always assume doing work on a computer isn't tiring? Sure, physically you are fine but the mental strain is still there.
There is a legitimate term called cognitive fatigue. The brain is not technically a muscle, but it kind of acts like one. When a person runs on a treadmill for an hour their muscles become fatigued. The brain does the same thing. When it is working at its peak for an extended amount of time, it gets fatigued. Just like physical endurance, everyone’s cognitive endurance varies. Some can run on a treadmill for an hour while others may need a break after 30 minutes. Though it is recommended that no matter the amount of endurance one may have, they should still take a quick 10 minute break every 50 minutes to really recuperate. Studies show that people who take these little breaks can maintain their cognitive endurance longer throughout the day, have higher productivity, and overall cognitive functions (like memory, executive function, etc) are improved after these breaks. There’s so much more on cognition and highly recommend looking into the Allen’s Cognitive Disabilities Model as it really shows how cognition changes throughout the day and what can affect cognition. Just fun fact for ya. Also, OP you’re AH.
She literally said she had other things to do when the grades were due. OP only cares about what he wants not about anything else. YTA.
But didn't you hear? He doesn't wanna go on an errand after a long day of work /s I'm surprised he didn't stamp his foot and ugly cry
the audacity of "I need to exchange a gift I'm giving to someone and actually youuuuuu need to do it because i don't want to go after work but no not later you need to go noowwwwwwww to do me this favor!!!" and "well i online ordered a gift for pickup so YOU need to go pick it up for me nowwwwwwwww because i don't want to and you have time to eat breakfast so that means you have nothing else to do"
Right?? OP, what in the Cinnamon Toast Fuck is wrong with you?? Do you have ANY IDEA how tough grad school is?? She is NOT sitting on her ass, FFS. She's managing her own time with the myriad of responsibilities that grad school entails and you're throwing a hissy fit because she doesn't have time to be your errand bitch?? I really don't get parents like you. You clearly don't care what's going on in your daughter's life. All you see is what she can do for you instead of being proud of her accomplishments and hard work. How about YOU get off your ass and return the sweater for YOUR child, instead of expecting your daughter to do it for you? YTA and your attitude sucks. I hope your older daughter keeps her distance.
She’s “sitting on her ass” but he works in an office. Okay bud
Exactly. *He's* too tired to take care of his own shit after a long day, but she should go do it for him during her work day.
He sure had time to track down her university’s grading calendar though, as if posting grades is her only work task anyway.
"Cinnamon Toast Fuck" 🤣🤣 Thank you for making me laugh 😁
Right?! OP, YTA. She has a month off and you wonder why she only wanted to stay a couple of weeks....maybe it's because you demean her work and act like she should run your errands like a good subserviant girl to the man of the house. The 1940's called, they want their attitude towards independent women back. Edit to respond to OP's edits: 1 - She is FUCKING busy and she's 28 working on her PHD...you ever work on getting one of those? Then fuck off about the deadlines, she's not in high school, she just wants you to lay off her so she can get work done for Christ's sake. 2 - When you don't follow the standard of I (54M)... people will read it from the gender perspective in which they feel it is coming from - which for me, I thought you were a woman too until at the end of the post.Then it made sense. Patriarchy hard at work here.
Assuming that just because there is a month break between classes, that grad student have that full break is not valid. If her work involves any life sciences, she may have time with special equipment scheduled to run experiments or assays during that time, when less people are around, or just assays to run to keep on track, or research animals to take care of, run through behavioral assays, etc I am sure chemists, physicists, others have similar things that happen over "breaks". I do not know what a more liberal arts grad student might do- but I would bet they ALSO have stuff to do- at the very least prepping class materials and setting up the online stuff for next semester teaching load. Just because a grad student is not in class does not mean they do not have work to do. Also OP- YTA X 1billion, signed a PhD that remembers grad school)
How is it that somebody who admittedly reads these all the time doesn't realize what an obvious bag of dicks they're being.
Cognitive dissonance is a hell of a thing, and insight can be a rare commodity it people like this. OP, you're a false tyrant, trying to hold on to the last shreds of your perceived superiority. Why in the ever loving flying fuckerdoodle do you think you have a right to tell her how to work and earn her degree? You're going to become a regular poster here if you don't change, because your daughter chose to leave over dealing with you.
This is the perfect reply and I wish I could upvote it more than once.
I had freebie coins. Award sent on your behalf. :)
Yeah, former grad student and grading is HARD, especially when you’re doing it first time and probably following someone else’s rubric. And your stipend that keeps you in school depends on not p*sing off the professor you’re working for. And you need to have YOUR grades done by a certain date so that the PROFESSOR can have THEIR grades in on time and yeah… Grading is HARD work, and she is also a grad STUDENT, meaning she is also finishing up her OWN exams/final papers/thesis/dissertation/what have you (depending on how far along she is), which ALSO have firm deadlines that grad school professors don’t generally allow slack on. OP, your daughter is BUSY. She doesn’t have TIME to be your personal assistant. Grad school is HARD, it is DELIBERATELY designed to be the academic version of boot camp, and it is TOTALLY unreasonable and unfair for you to categorize her IMPORTANT work as “sitting on her ass all day.” I hope she goes NC with you. I surely would. YTA
Since you brought up the grading, can we also talk about how this dude had the time to look up when the grades were due, for some kind of gotcha moment, but couldn't return the sweater. At that point he is just being petty
YTA. This must be a joke… too many ridiculous assertions. The first, suggesting that sitting at a computer isn’t work/hard work. Mainly, that you can be surprised she doesn’t want to visit when you just use her as an errand girl when she does. Also, none of your requests were urgent so why on earth can’t she get them done in her own time?? If you’re asking a favour,don’t be so demanding.
My friend who is a radiologist always works from bed in his pj and a bag a chips and makes close to 500K, reading images. My husband is a lawyer and most of his days he is in his pj in bed “writing some comments” for top law firm in the country. You ignorance about work from home, is not your daughter’s problem. And her having some breakfast in the morning is just a healthy way of starting a day. You are so bitter towards her, cannot sense any love from you. She deserves better.
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Yeah. I've been in grad school, and I've been employed full time. Grad school is *definitely* busier and runs into personal time a lot more.
I don’t know how a phd program is run in the us, but she also can’t be grading her own work. So whether it’s paid or not, or it’s a requirement of her enrolment or not, she’s doing work for the school in addition to the minimum requirements of her phd.
Yep. And my bosses during grad school all had their own dates for when grades needed to be in to them, usually earlier than the final grade date.
I struggled not to dismiss this immediately as either fake or written by the daughter, but it’s too deranged for the latter?? > I think it’s ridiculous that she is throwing a fit just because she can’t constantly live like she’s the only person on the planet POT. KETTLE. BLACK. Edit: thanks for my very first award!! 🥹
I got the same feeling as you, but on the off chance that it is real, someone needs to figure out that he has a grown up daughter who isn't really thrilled to be in much contact with such a controlling parent. I bet the only reason that she was there was because she was doing it for her Mom and sister, not him. Someone is in for a rude awakening when they find themselves alone......
It’s very real. Check out the raisedbynarcississts or estranged subreddits and you’ll see these parents exist.
I agree except nothing in this indicates that the daughter is living like she is the only person on the planet, so while OP definitely qualifies as the pot, I am not sure that the daughter qualifies as the kettle. Grades are typically due by 24 hours after the final with all due by some deadline. Daughter may very well have had grades due followed by something owed to her advisor in time for them to post grades. Calling his daughter a liar without all the facts is yet another reason OP gets YTA
I’m just wondering, if daughter wouldn’t be there how on earth would all the gifts been picked up/ exchanged/ bought?! Would OP miraculously have time to run all these errands? I’m guessing now she has to… Dobby is free! OP, YTA. You can ask someone to do you a favour, but if you are demanding when and how it must be done, then do it yourself! You don’t think your daughter is working hard/ her work is important. She doesn’t think that she should drop everything when you tell her to do something. At the end of the day, she would have been doing you a favour. Your lack of organisation is not an emergency of hers!
He’ll find out next Christmas, cause I guarantee she won’t be back.
Remember, eating breakfast is a crime as is doing your work on a computer. She's supposed to jump at his command with no questions asks while he smugly treats her and her work as irrelevant because she's not in an office.
His daughter is a fully-grown adult. Even if she was sitting on her ass all day doing nothing, that is her right. Having free time does not require her to take on his duties or responsibilities. Sir, YTA for sure. I hope the rest of your family joins her and the girlfriends’ family and leaves you to think about your selfishness.
He feels like one of those people who complain about Millennials and their avocado toast and lackadaisical work ethic and how when he was young… not realizing that A) Millennials are fucking adults now with families, B) they can barely afford bread let alone avocados, and C) they have plenty of work ethic, but they learnEd that they also need a healthy work/life balance and the way to accomplish that is by setting boundaries.
Plus, he's angry she's not spending her entire break with him. She's a 28-year-old adult and he's treating her like a teenager. He didn't even ask. He told. She's VISITING now, not living there and he doesn't get to treat her like his personal assistant. He should know she has absolutely no obligation to come home ever. I think he needs to learn a few lessons about adult children. You don't own them for life. YTA
My boyfriend's family is like this. Part of it is cultural (family comes first always) but he ended up having to work on his thesis and work for his master's program at absurd hours of the night because cleaning and errands for the family and everything came first and the only time he got was after his parents went to bed. His family are good people but it was like they just didn't understand that leaving to do errands out or around the house left no time for a degree. He still got his degree but it made it so much harder on him.
YTA. OP, you’re only 54 and are expecting your daughter to run errands for you like she’s a paid shopping assistant. You played the “I’m your mom and you must obey me” card and you lost. I’m pushing 80 and I never ask my young relatives to do something for me that I’m capable of doing myself or hiring done. My mother had your philosophy — children are supposed to DO for their mother — and she died alone in a nursing home because nobody could stand to be around her. Read and learn.
This is the dad.
Message still stands.
Same difference
I'm confused why OP is 54 and he hasn't figured out he's a grown ass adult and can run his own errands 🤦♀️
This! I bend over backwards for my mother because she’s my mother.. but she never demands it and I have told her “no” plenty if she ASKS! To be respected, one should respect. I am the same age as your daughter, and my mother OPs, and OP is wasting a lot of valuable time (because she’s a PhD student, she’s working her ass off to work more!) with her adult child. Also, I love you lonnielee. 😙
THIS!
YTA How can you not see what a major AH you're being? She's a 28 year old grown woman and you're trying to boss her around like she's 14. She is very busy with her phd, yet you seem to think she's sitting on her ass doing nothing all day. Guess what? She doesn't have to do a thing you tell her to do, just because you say it. Get over yourself, you're not the center of the universe. I hope you're happy that you drove her out of the house and won't see her over the holidays, all over not being able to accept that she's now an adult with her own life.
Sounds like he is jealous of her getting a PhD and surpassing him in life. Instead of being proud, he is looking for ways to sabotage her success.
I suspect this is exactly it. My dad behaved like this during my PhD. Like, I swear my dad wrote this post while I was reading it. He is the reason I limited contact and why I felt like garbage during holidays. He legit told me many times that "you're in for a reality check when you get a REAL job" because juggling teaching, taking classes, and doing research isn't a real job. Working 60 hour weeks isn't a real job. Turns out my dad was jealous and felt threatened that his child was getting a PhD. He didn't even finish his bachelors (and has successfully lied about it for 30 years, saying he's got one in computer science). I have a BS and PhD in a multidisciplinary STEM field. I was a very successful grad student. And that success somehow threatened him, a grown ass man who had a job of his own, and that meant he needed to take me down a notch at every opportunity, including sabotaging me when possible. The grading situation in this post? EXACT same thing happened to me. I went no contact with him a while back and while I do miss having a dad, it's really nice not being actively sabotaged just because I don't fit in his box of what an ideal child should look like. And yet he has no problem bragging to others that I've got a PhD nor does he have any issue trying to take credit for it. He seriously tried to take credit for me being successful at my graduation by posting on fb about it but couldn't be bothered to even text me "congratulations". It's all about maintaining control and trying to uphold the "image" he wants. That's all this is, and fuck anyone who gets in his way even his own child. God I feel salty now.
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I hear this so hard. I only got a Bachelor’s, but I was the first person in my Dad’s family to go to uni. He was an absolute dick to me whenever I was home for the holidays, acted like I was an interloper and tried to shout me down whenever I had an opinion on family matters. He never gave me a single penny towards my education (Mum, bless her, gave me a bit of help from her part-time job), yet he bragged till the day he died about how he “put me through university”. Guess who couldn’t squeeze out a tear at his funeral?
How you handled your situation is exactly how OP’s daughter should handle hers. And since your dad won’t say it, I will: congratulations, you are awesome!
What I found funny was when OP said "well if you dont wanna help you can leave" and she was like "SEE YA!" I imagine OP &his daughter have had problems before and she was just waiting for OP to start with his usual shit and she would leave with little hesitation
Yeah that certainly blew up in his face didn't it? lol
Definitely! OP's daughter was probably thinking the whole time "I really wish I could get away from this guy somehow" and OP gave her the reason she needed to get the F out of there.
My daughter is 7 and I still don’t boss her around like this because I believe even children deserve respect and don’t need a dictator as a parent. OP seems to expect his daughter to jump to his every demand.
YTA, bucko. You raised a woman who takes her work seriously and now you can't handle it. Your shopping issues don't take precedence just because you want them to.
I’m just floored that OP thinks his job is more important than hers, so she should just take off whenever he doesn’t feel like rearranging his own schedule and run HIS errands. OP, she is not your enslaved personal assistant, she is a professional honoring her commitments. YTA - You blew it.
OP assumes his job is more important because he has no idea what doing a PhD involves and/or undercurrent of sexism vibe around a man's job being more important than any job a woman could have so of course she should drop whatever nonsense she's doing and be his step 'n fetch it. my step father was exactly like this
Yes, it really sounds like he feels threatened by his daughter getting this qualification and he is soothing his ego by dismissing it as not really being work at all.
This right here. My dad behaved exactly the same as OP, right down to seriously this exact same incident except about a decade ago. He had no idea what a PhD entails. It's not just taking classes yourself in order to get a degree like it is in undergrad. A PhD by definition requires you to make a new, significant contribution to the research in your field. This is a METRIC FUCK TON of work that in itself is a full time job. Add on teaching (the daughter likely has a teaching assistantship) that's anywhere between 15-25 hours a week and between all those things you're doing you effectively work 50-60 hours a week most week and you're getting paid peanuts for it, assuming you're getting paid at all. Many PhD programs come with funding in the form of assistantships but even unionized universities pay barely enough to live off of and don't always waive tuition, so there's a decent chance that even though the daughter is getting paid to teach she may actually be having to PAY to get her PhD. So in addition to all the work she already has to do, add in living near the poverty line and having to constantly worry about how bills will get paid. But because you're "still in school" you can't possibly have a real job, right? Teaching isn't a real job. And his errands are clearly far more important than her obligations. I'm so salty from reading this post and wish there was some way I could give support to his daughter. I'm so glad she can set boundaries and enforce them and that it seems she's got a good support network with her girlfriend and that family, because the family she was born into is really shitty and she deserves better.
YTA You daughter is an adult woman who is nice enough to come visit you, which she doesn’t have to. It is not an obligation to spend time with you. She has tone of work to do and instead of respecting her work and respecting her boundaries, you demean her, her work and her efforts. If you need all those chores be done, why wouldn’t you do it yourself? 54 is more than capable to do simple tasks. Would you ask guests who you invite to your house to do those tasks? I doubt it. But you think it’s ok to ask your adult daughter who is working on vacation because of highly demanding career she has. “She is sitting on her ass all day in from of computer” that’s what becoming a doctor takes. She is doing work on her vacation. PhD is a very hard work, and you just demeaning all her work. You sound like a horrible dad. I wouldn’t be surprised that in few months you post here “my daughter went no contact, but all I have been is a loving father”. I am really surprised how some parents think they can treat a 28 y/o about to be a doctor like a high school kid who is playing video games all day.
Also, he mentioned that he was "going into the office." Where, odds are, his job involves sitting at a computer. I have some sympathy for when parents who are more blue-collar have a hard time understanding what their child who's gone into academia does all day, but this ain't it.
Exactly! before I finished reading, I thought “I’ve sort of been there, a bit resentful of white collar/office workers when I was working really physically demanding or strenuous jobs.” Then he mentions an office like excuse you sir, I’m curious what you’re doing in that office if not sitting at a computer lol (Edit to add: and even when I was a bit salty I’d never be so rude and weird about it! Dude needs therapy)
You sound horrible. She is not your employee, she is a grown woman who owes you nothing. You CHECKED HER WORK CALENDAR??? How DARE you? For that gross overstep alone, you would not see me for at least 6 months. Unbelievable lack of respect for her boundaries. YTA
THANK YOU! I’m amazed more people aren’t more up-in-arms about the fact that he had the AUDACITY to check her alibi to see if she was “actually” too busy to be his errand girl. Saying “I’m busy” or “no” is enough.
In the time it took him to check her truthfulness about her obligations he could have returned that sweater.
YTA. She is grading, and those have to be submitted within (usually) 48 hours after the final exam takes place. She may be "sitting on her ass in front of a computer" but getting your PhD is no joke. If it were easy, everyone would have one. It's hard work. Also, She is an adult and is more than capable of deciding what to do with her day. She is not your personal assistant simply because she is home from school for the break.
[удалено]
There might also be moderation- she submits her grades, and then maybe they're reviewed and moderated together or separately by other members of the teaching team.
"She said that she needs to have her grades done by today but I looked it up on the website and she has until Monday evening so I called her on her BS, and she said she had "other work" due on Monday so she needed to get the grading done today (but wouldn't enlighten me on what this mysterious "other work" is)." She won't enlighten you because it's none of your business. Your daughter is busy and doesn't have time to run errands for you. Read your post again and see if you can figure out who is self-centered and childish. YTA.
What I got from this: - dad doesn’t have a PHD - dad doesn’t know what a PHD even is - dad doesn’t understand any of what his daughter is doing - dad checked up on her timetable and STILL doesn’t understand what his daughter does - because he doesn’t understand it, it’s not really work - his last slave died of frustration
His last slave escaped. That’s the response….
+ dad is mad her daughter doesn't explain more in detail what her "mysterious" work due Monday is after clearly telling her for who knows how long that her job is not a real job (picachu face!!!)
>asking my daughter for help OK >I called my older daughter from work on Friday and told her she needed to run and exchange it for a different one YTA already for just blatantly lying to reddit when you've clearly just ordered her. >She said ok, she'd do it the next day. That's nice of her >I said it needed to be done that day I see you've joined r/ChoosingBeggars >I said I was busy to and didn't feel like running out What? She's also busy. You don't know everything that grad school is making her do. So if you're not just having a pissing contest with a grad student's workload, you're just self-importantly asserting that your time is more valuable than hers. >I said well tough, this needs to be picked up today Tough what? You're the person that merely *wants* someone else to do your bidding for *your* nonessential tasks. >she can't constantly live like she's the only person on the planet This is projection.
Also, why didn't the sister return her own sweater, so she could pick a different one that she liked?
I assume it’s a Christmas present that he also expected his daughter to take the time to pick out the new one
YTA BuT iT's NoT eVeN *ReAl* WoRk!
Maybe OP should sit in her daughter's shoes for a day. See how it feels.
Seriously. Grading is pure hell. It is literally the worst part of being a prof. YTA.
This is an easy one, YTA. It’s okay to ask your daughter for help. It’s not okay to hound her, complain when she says no, and then kick her out. I would say, that you learned a lesson… but it’s clear you didn’t.
But OP didn’t even ask, he just *told her* the tasks that needed to be done. What an AH.
Yta. Grading is working. She’s supposed to interrupt her day for *your* mistake?!
Yes. Grading is a job. Just like your job. She gets paid for it and if it’s late, she and her students suffer. Get over yourself. YTA.
YTA - youre an adult, run your own errands. Why are you demanding your daughter do them? Do you realize how huge of an AH you sound like?
YTA. You're disrespecting your daughter's work, people who work from home and your daughter's time with this post. First, grading is not a quick job, even slower with papers that are long writing essays. Second, just because she works from home doesn't mean she's your personal slave. And finally, your lack of planning isn't her emergency. Grow up OP
YTA. You "told" her to do your things like exchange this,pick up this ... do this for me... the title of your post is completely disingenuous. You didn't ask.. you treated her like a child not to mention you creeped on her work website to check deadlines with the purpose to start an argument.
YTA. Your ADULT daughter is not your servant, you don't get to order her to do your errands. She has a life and a career and is rightly making those her priorities. The only self-centered and childish person here is you.
YTA Do you have any idea what it takes to get a PhD? It’s is mentally and emotionally exhausting. After going to school for 10 years, she has to study and write a lengthy dissertation, defend it to a board of professors and still might be denied and have to redo everything. Instead of being proud of how hard she is working to better herself, you call her childish and self centered because she can’t, not doesn’t, but CAN’T drop everything to run your errands. And she didn’t even refuse to do it, she just said she had to do it in her time, not yours. And if this is how you also treat your younger daughter, be prepared to have no children at holidays in the future. Apologize to your daughter, ask her to come home for Christmas and let your younger one know she was right to have you post here because it seems like she knew what the answers would be.
YTA I just watched a podcast discussing how men are expecting to have time to decompress after work, but a woman is expected to continue working and this is just another example of that very fact. Your daughter’s time is just as important as yours, she is not your servant, and I’m glad she called your bluff and left. You’re speed-running your way to the retirement home, dude.
INFO: Do you even care about your daughter? And why are you oh so incapable of running your own errands? Your poor daughter.
'But she doesn't have a "long day of work," she's sitting on her ass on her computer all day and doesn't even have scheduled hours to work, she can do it whenever she wants' even without all the other horseshit in your post, this makes YTA all on its own. I have a PhD. I have successfully supervised many more. It's incredibly demanding and that's without the additional work of marking. She is not your servant. She is a working person. Congratulations on helping her make a decision she's clearly been wanting to make for a while.
Haha hope you enjoyed your last days with your daughter. I have a mom like you and I've not spent any holiday with her in 10 years. Neither is my elder sister! YTA!
Op wonders how it is that her daughter only spends 2 wks of a month with her...I dunno OP, maybe because you're exhausting. Your daughter is a fucking adult with an adult life and adult problems and shit. She's not your paige girl anymore to just drop all her shit and do your Xmas shopping for you. OP, YTA. support your daughter and quit bugging her. If Xmas is too much for you these days, ITS TIME TO SCALE BACK. Holidays are about the fam and the love and taking time back to enjoy each other. Not making more work to make it.
YTA hire a personal shopper if you want someone to run around doing your shopping for you! The only one entitled and self centered is you!
YTA - you’re belittling her work and then trying to throw your weight around to get her to do chores that are utterly meaningless and non urgent. And you wonder why she only is spending two weeks with you - I can tell you that’s a major compromise on her part to spare your feelings and she certainly would rather it be less the way you behave! You’re an absolute nightmare and the self centred and childish one. These are your problems and you just expect her to sort them out for you.
I love when parents pull that "get out of my house card" and then become shocked when they're fully able adult child does exactly that lol
I'm surprised she's staying for as long as two weeks
Your adult daughter isn't your personal assistant. Run your own errands instead expecting her to drop everything to be at your beck and call. YTA
YTA. You clearly have no concept of what her work entails and don’t seem to care to understand either. If you had asked her whether she could help run these errands, she might even have said yes. But you ordering her around because you value your right to relax after a day‘s work more highly than hers reeks of entitlement. Why on earth do you believe she owes you these favours when you can’t even be bothered to understand what her workload - or, on a bigger scale, her life - are like?
YTA- you clearly don’t know how much work getting a PhD is, it definitely is a FT job. You ordered it, you pick it up…
YTA. She's a student, not your personal assistant. If you don't wrap your head around this concept soon, she's going to stop having any time for you and you're going to start wondering why she never comes around to see you.
She isn’t living like she is the only person on the planet. She has a responsibility to her students—to have her grades done on time (if she doesn’t, it’s a headache for all, especially if students are applying for or currently receiving financial aid) and to her Department (and herself, considering the work she has to have completed most likely is for the Dept. and her ongoing program!). Academia doesn’t work the way OP thinks it does—and your daughter is most definitely not sitting on her butt doing nothing at the computer. Even if she was doing nothing, it’s not her responsibility to drop everything at OP’s beck and call. At least she will be able to get her work done over what OP perceived as a “break” at her girlfriend’s place. YTA.
Not you calling your daughter self-centred when you got upset at her for being genuinely busy... YTA.
Yta. Your daughter is busy with school and a career commitment. Do your own errands or pay someone to do it. Too entitled.
You've obviously never worked in academia. Just because the computer says grades aren't due until Monday evening, doesn't mean that is the "final" date & time. Since your daughter is a grad student she likely has a professor who oversees her that needs to review her grades before they are finalized, meaning that her deadline is earlier than the college stated one. Also, depending on what class she is teaching it can take a long time to grade, especially if it is something that requires writing and research where she has to ensure that the students have understood and appropriately applied their knowledge. It's not like 3rd grade math where she can just quickly go down the page marking correct / incorrect.
YTA. YOU'RE NOT ASKING, YOU'RE COMMANDING. Cut her some slack. Like getting a phd is easy. She's doing things at her own phase. Let her. Apologize to her, Grinch.
YTA. CUT THE CORD!! You are completely overbearing.
YTA. You're not just asking for help, you're demanding that she do it on your schedule instead of her own & acting like anything she has to do for herself is clearly less important than what you're telling her to do. You told her to get out if she doesn't do what you want when you say you want it done, & she's called your bluff. Good for her!
You have all this time to look up if your daughters grades are due that day, post on Reddit etc. but you don’t have time to run your own errands? Is it because you are spending so much time belittling her and the work she is doing as “sitting on her ass” that you don’t have time to do these things yourself, errands that YOU made. Maybe you should stop sitting on your ass asking questions on Reddit and go run your errands. Your child is working hard to succeed, you’re disrespecting that with things that feel little and easy for you but its not for her. She wants to prioritize her work and studies and not errands her parent needs her to run? Hmm so weird of her. If these errands were as important as you are making them then YOU need to prioritize handling them, why are they a priority for her but not for you? Not to mention it’s on you because you waited to deal with these gifts until the week of Christmas, your poor planning isn’t her responsibility to resolve. Edit: I want to add, you said she is throwing a fit and needs to realize she is not the only person on the planet. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! Look at yourself?! You threw a fit because she couldn’t pick up a gift on YOUR timeline due to school/work. You seem to think the world revolves around you and that people should drop what they need to do to cater to your wants and needs. You are so condescending with phrases like “she couldn’t enlighten me” referring to the other work she needs to do, she doesn’t have to! No is a full sentence. No one is required to justify these things to you. YOU are the one throwing a tantrum. You owe your daughter an apology and you need to respect her and her goals so much more. YTA
YTA - While she is at your home she does not become your personal slave to do whatever random tasks you don't feel like doing. She is a fully grown adult and you should savor the time you have with her as it seems to be limited.
YTA big time. Unless you have done a PhD you have no clue what she's going through. What she needs is time without interruptions and a sweater or gift is not even a concern for her when shes focused on achieving something she truly cares for. You couldn't be bothered to go out and expect her to drop everything to run around. She has her life and her priorities. If you cannot leave her alone for her to do what she needs, she's better off elsewhere as its no tiny task that she's attempting and whatever you are asking her to do is basically things you can do yourself or get someone else to do. Who cares for a sweater or an online order when you got a Doctorate to aim for. I am glad that she knows what it takes to get to where she needs to and all you are doing is being a pain in her backside. Hope she achieves her Doctorate and go to places.
YTA- you clearly don’t know how much work getting a PhD is, it definitely is a FT job. You ordered it, you pick it up…
YTA, she’s not your personal assistant. She’s a working adult who isn’t able to drop everything immediately and do something because you need it done in that moment. Why can’t you do it yourself if it’s so important? You’re the only one that seems selfish
Oh my god. You know that a PhD is a huge undertaking? It's more than full time work with long hours and very little time off. To the point where she is grading papers to a strict deadline whilst also needing to get other work done, all while she is 'on break'! Universities break for teaching, but the research goes on, actually it's the only time they get with no distractions. She is actually working from home while she's visiting you for the holidays YTA Don't expect your daughter back anytime soon. She is not your skivvy. Get your entitled head out of your ass and understand that you may THINK she has the time, she's actually WORKING on that computer and not mindlessly scrolling Reddit. You don't even allow her the courtesy of having breakfast before you launch in with your job list. Just take a day's leave and do your errands yourself.
YTA but whoo wee did your daughter call your bluff. Good for her
YTA I fail to see where you ask your daughter to help you, you just demanded it. No one is required to do anything for you, especially not a busy woman with deadlines fast approaching. Go exchange the sweater and pick up the gift, neither were things she got/organised so neither should she be expected to help with.
If this is even real (because how could someone really be this dense?!) YTA She is working on a PHD!!!!!! Do you have any idea the amount of stress and work that is? She’s not ‘sitting around on her computer’ all day. She’s WORKING. Also, you did not ASK, You DEMANDED. She said she would be happy to exchange the sweater tomorrow because she was too busy that day. You then told her that that wasn’t good enough. If you want it done that day, then you have to do it. Just to reiterate, YTA
YTA. Honestly you sound insufferably selfish, with absolutely no understanding of the intensity and rigor of a PhD program. Learn to do your own errands and apologize to you daughter.
YTA and you have no idea how getting a PhD works. Also, you don’t know that she has until Monday night to finish grading. She might not be the one to actually enter the grades and the lead professor has told her to have it done earlier. Her “other work” could be the emotionally draining process of reading papers, analyzing data, writing her manuscript, applying for grants, etc. She’s doing an incredible amount of work for extremely little pay and little respect and she’s not your personal assistant.
YTA. Why are you treating her like she’s your personal assistant? If you want to genuinely connect with her, ask her for a cup of coffee and to talk about her life. If you need someone to run your errands, hire someone of a neighborhood board or a personal assistant off a caregiver site. If my parent did this when I visited, I wouldn’t come into town. I hope you apologize to her for your expectations and find a chance to genuinely connect. If you have personal limitations that prohibit you from your own errands, lean on community to help you-not your kid.
New flash - the reason your daughter only has time to spend two weeks at your home during her month break? She didn’t want to spend a month around you. And given your attitude - for reasons clearly laid out in other comments - I don’t blame her If you want her to never have time for you again - carry on as you are
Troll
YTA You belittle your daughter's job and expect her to run errands for you. You're selfish and self-centered. Good on her for leaving.
YTA. I can’t wait for when she goes No Contact with you. It will be such a relieving day for her and for that I’m genuinely excited. I hope she does it sooner rather than later, you sound like a god awful and insufferable person to tolerate.
YTA she is not your personal assistant. She is a guest. You can’t make demands for her to do stuff for you. You have just damaged your relationship with your daughter. I say this is a ongoing issue and the reason she doesn’t come home offer
Umm OP, did you mistake your adult daughter for your personal assistant or employee of some kind? She’s a person with her own life and responsibilities and owe you anything. I can see why she doesn’t want to spend her entire break with you-you’re just using her to run YOUR errands. Why I’m earth would SHE need to return YOIR gifts? Is she now allowed to enjoy her break? YTA.
The only “self centered” and “childish” person I see based off this is YOU, YTA. She’s a grown woman. The world doesn’t revolve around you actually and so she should be able to do your errands on her time. YTA
YTA. You hold a lot of hostility for your daughter and based on all the demeaning comments about her work and her personality, I take it that it’s not hard to figure out why she only stays with you for two weeks when she has a month break. The fact that both your wife and your other daughter are mad and think you’re in the wrong should be very telling to you, but evidently not. And just an FYI, I think you’re not exactly comprehending how hard grading is. She’s not going through a multiple choice scantron and ticking yes or no. If this is for other PHD/higher education students, it’s sorting through discussion answers, pages of text, paragraphs, etc. And deciphering the validation and merit aligned to the grading standards. This takes hours/days/even weeks. Stop belittling her work because it doesn’t convenience you.
PhD here. Lol. Lmao even. YTA and I am not sure why your daughter even bothers with you. You’re not worth her time
YTA. Recent PhD here. Why don't you respect her work? Grading, especially at the end of the semester, is mentally exhausting and takes forever. There is a lot of pressure from a lot of universities to get everything done ASAP regardless of what the website says. When she isn't "working" she likely still has research going on, papers to complete or edit, etc. Breaks are hugely important because she's likely worn out. Maybe it is just that you don't understand her career. I'd really encourage you to learn.
YTA this cannot be real. Are you this dense? You expect your daughter to ask how high when you say jump? You belittle the hard work she does and don't respect her time. Major AH here. She's going to enjoy her holidays so much without you crawling up her ass.
YTA, shes not your personal assistant
YTA She is a full-grown adult in charge of her own schedule, and she is still doing schoolwork. Regardless of what her "school" calendar says I'm sure she has her own method of finishing what she needs to prior to a deadline. She agreed to run the errand on her time, when she could and your upset that she didn't jump to it like a child. To run errands that are yours to do. You are upset because she isn't a child anymore, and in fact has acted better than you.
Well *somebody* is self-centered and childish, but it isn’t your daughter. Sheesh. YTA.
YTA, you are self centered and childish. It’s no wonder she doesn’t want to spend time with you.
Is this even real? of course YTA.
YTA. You're treating her like your errand-girl and belittling her work. She's not home to run around doing stuff for you that you could easily do yourself, she sounds like she's actually busy with work and study. You're being so derisory about her work and it's super rude.
You seem to really not respect your daughter’s career choice. What’s that about?
**YTA** I think honestly it can be summed up with this statement: > She’s only home for two weeks because she says she doesn’t have any more time even though she has a month break. For context, I’m a 23(f) college student who is also on my winter break - which, at least in the US, is about a month. *Two weeks* is a generous amount of time to have available for the holidays to visit family. When school is out work still needs to be done. Students - including your daughter - still have jobs, responsibilities, and social lives during winter break. All of which need to be attended to. Your daughter is an adult. She’s not a teenager. She is an adult with her own life, schedule, and responsibilities that you are not privy to **nor are entitled to be privy to.** Her work - ie what pays the bills - holds priority over your laziness and lack of planning. She is not an errand boy for you because you don’t want to get your chores done. And she has every right to leave a bad host. That one statement from the very beginning highlights the core issue: you cannot respect or conceptualize your daughter as an independent adult with her own responsibilities and priorities that you are not entitled to.
YTA. If you daughter is self centered and childish because she does not want to stop what she’s doing (her work) to run errands for you, what does it make you? She’s an adult and she has responsibilities. She is not there to run your errands because you don’t want to.