Worst mother ever. Suggestions to help?

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My youngest daughters best friend, lets call her Betty, she's the one who lost her oldest brother about two years ago and a few months ago lost her other brother who in his 20's. Betty's mom is a bit on the trashy side but had always seemed somewhat nice when I've talked to her. Betty has always said that her mother never loved her, etc but I thought that was usual 16 year old crap. I was wrong.

Several years ago Betty's mom dated this guy and then left him because he tried to have sex with Betty. Yesterday she told Betty she's been seeing him again and that's it, she picks him over her daughter so Betty has to go. Out. At 16. Betty lives about 30 mins away and is at her 23 year old married friends house at the moment and is thinking of living there. I just got off the phone with her and told her that she needs a Mother and I'm more than happy to be her mother and that I love her. She cried. I suggested putting the b***h in jail but she doesn't want to because she's afraid of foster care. Again. She's been in it several times.

Anyway, tomorrow we are going to talk again and she will decide what she wants to do. My door is open, but I'm so f*****g furious right now with that no good piece of s**t excuse for an egg donor that is supposed to be her mother that I don't know what to do.

Suggestions? Any ideas of any way I can help her deal with this, or anything like that?

Even though Betty is 16 and basically an adult, this is still child abuse. It's not like slapping your toddler in the face type abuse, this is worse in a way, this is breaking your childs heart, on purpose, at an age where they will remember it and it will damage them.

Any words are welcome.

How is 16 an adult? They are still a child.

I think you are handling the situation the right way, so far. I can see where it would be better for her to go around the system so she can avoid foster care (which she already knows about first hand) rather than doing it through the system.

The system can be unpredictable, and she could easily end up in a worst situation in foster care and on top of it, be ordered to go back to live with her mother (who will at that point probably try to claim she ran away.) The court mandating she go back home would obviously be very bad for her--both from the fact that this guy is a predator and the fact that her mother will no doubt take the whole thing out on her if forced to take her back in.

It is cra**y that you can't count on the system getting it right, but that is how it is.

I do not have anything else to suggest beyond what you are doing--offering your home and your support.

Legally she's still underage, but depending on how kids are raised, 16 can pretty much be an adult. She can legally marry with her parents permission, she's basically been taking care of herself for years, she can take care of a house, kids, drive a car, manage money, make pretty decent decisions, etc. So, she's basically an adult. I know plenty of 18 and 20 year olds who were sheltered and overprotected to the point that they can't do anything for themselves and wouldn't be able to live on their own if their parents suddenly died and left them enough money to actually start out with - and these aren't people who have disabilities that would cause them to have trouble to do that. These are kids who were so sheltered that they wouldn't know how to grocery shop for a week.

My kids are basically adults at 17, 18, 20 and 24, although technically the 17yo is the only underage one. It all depends on how much the parent teaches them to do and allows them the freedom to do. While their brains may not be fully mature until their 20's that doesn't mean they are unable to live and function as adults. Up until recent history, 14yo's were adults and could live on their own etc. I'm not saying that's a good idea, but I am saying it's certainly possible. This girl is only a few months younger than my youngest daughter and I know for a fact that if DH and I and all her siblings and relatives and friends were to just disappear from the face of the earth and she had nothing at all and nowhere to go, my daughter could certainly find a job, a place to live, manage her money, make decisions, etc. She could keep house, she could take care of a baby if she had one, etc.

So, while 16 is not a legal adult, in many many ways, many, many 16yo's are adults. I wasn't, because I was so overprotected that I wasn't allowed to do anything at all but I learned really fast and by 18 I was just as able as any other 18yo to take care of myself. I wasn't overprotected because of AS either, nobody knew it existed back then and certainly not that I had it, I was just overprotected because my mother loved the attention she got from having a "sick, frail child" (upper respiratory infections from being constantly surrounded by chain smokers and also severe allergies that I outgrew) but when I was no longer little and sickly and frail, my mother basically threw my ass to the wolves and didn't care what I did anymore.

I've always taken care of my kids and done the housework and did things for them like their laundry, putting away their laundry, making sure they had everything they needed, etc and didn't really give them a lot of chores, but I did teach them how to do them so they would know how to in case they had to do them. I also taught them that they couldn't always get what they wanted (material or otherwise) and explained why so they would be able to see in the future why they couldn't have or do something and then by their early teens be able to usually make pretty good decisions about things like that. They were taken care of, but not sheltered. Betty was barely taken care of. She has had to fend for herself most of her life even though her "mother" was still there. Since she was about 10 years old she's cooked her own meals, washed her own clothes, changed and washed her own sheets, cleaned the house, washed the dishes, and when needed gone out and earned the money for food etc. Not because those were chores and responsibilities her mother was teaching her, but because her trashy ass mama wouldn't do them for her. When she was still going to school, she had to set her own clock, get herself up and dressed, and either get out there to take the bus or if her "mama" was passed out from the night before and she was about 14 or so she would just take the truck and let her mother fend for herself to get around during the day. It's not like her mother could call the cops on her for driving the truck to school, cause then Betty would tell them why and she would lose her to foster care - again. Her mother finally just took her out of school this past year to "homeschool" her, which down here usually means dropping out before you are old enough because this one homeschool place doesn't even check up on you. There are good homeschool places, which a neighbor of mine uses for her kids, and lots of people use, but there is one that's basically to just let you take your kid on out of school and forget about it. That's what she did. Unfortunately.

Maturity is somewhat of a spectrum as well. Some 16yo's can't do anything at all for themselves and wouldn't know how to if they were allowed to try. Their parents hover constantly, check up on them about everything even though the kids never done anything suspicious (he's never had a chance to!) and are constantly there to make sure their little baby doesn't get hurt feelings or fail at something or talk to someone in the wrong crowd. These kind of kids are not only having a disservice done to them by their parents but they are made fun of by the other kids because it becomes obvious how overprotected and immature they are because of that and because it severely stunts their social skills. All of the kids I'm discussing here are 100% typical - physically, mentally, emotionally, neurologically, intellectually, etc. I'm NOT talking about kids with AS, or kids whose parents have an actual reason to be this way towards them. I was one of those kinds of kids, and my mother didn't know I had AS, so I know how hard it can be when you are that pampered, overprotected child. On the other end of the spectrum you have kids like Betty, or some of the boys that my boys have known over the years. Their parents don't do anything for them except what they absolutely have to do, and they don't even do that all the time. These kids come and go as they please and it's not uncommon for them to be gone for a day or two straight when they are 13 or so, and their parents have no idea where they went or when they left. Most of these kids end up in trouble, on serious drugs, in juvie or later on in jail, pregnant or they are a baby daddy before they turn 18. They have plenty of responsibilities - all of them are for themselves because their parents take no responsibility for them - but they were never taught nor did they figure out how to make responsible decisions. Luckily Betty learned to make pretty good decisions for herself, I guess she learned from her friends parents - she never said too much about her homelife to anyone because she hated foster care the times she was in it because she was taken away from her trashy ass mother. Then you have the kids in the middle. Kids who know how to take care of themselves at an age appropriate level and sometimes at a higher level because their parents taught them that to prepare them for life and just in case emergencies. They have an appropriate level of freedom that's based on their actions and the decisions they have made in the past. They may stay out all night at 16 but they call and let their parents know whose house they are at, and if the parent says to come home, they do - or if their ride home has been drinking of is high they call their parents for a ride home rather than get in the car with somebody f****d up. They don't make big important decisions that will effect them for years (or even months) without consulting others, and at least one person who is older than them, and usually they consult their parents especially if it's a really big decision. These are kids with age appropriate responsibility, maturity, and skills. My kids fall into that category except I've taught them to do more things and given them a little more freedom, depending on the situation. Betty is a 36 year old in a 16 year old's body.

So, that's how a 16yo can be an adult. It all depends on where they come from (as in who their people are) and how they are raised. If you had been taking care of yourself and your home (and sometimes your mom) completely, from the time you were about 12 years old, lying to teachers and cops and the authorities to keep from being taken away because foster care sucks worse than home, if you had been the one person in the house to try and scrape up rent or the light bill money, if you had been the person who fed and cleaned up after your older siblings as well, then you would be an adult at 16 too. She's not just a pretty mature and competent teenager, like my 17yo is, she's pretty much an adult. She just can't get into a bar or vote. That's the only difference.

And it's a damn shame too. That girl's never had a childhood.

I would call CFS or CPS and report this mother for child abandonment.

As it turns out, the mother left. Actually got her stuff and left with the guy and told Betty she was on her own. So she went to stay with a friend but she's coming here Monday. She's got to find a place for her dog though, I'm not having another dog.

As for CPS and such, no. First off they would have to find the mother to prosecute her for it and since Betty is 16 that wouldn't really be a priority. However, they would put her in foster care and that's not something she's willing to do. We couldn't be her foster family or have her live with us with permission of the court because of that crazy s**t my mother pulled right before we moved down here when she made up all this stuff about me and got temporary custody of my kids and went to court for it etc, and did it all for attention. She actually admitted that to me once before surgery when she was afraid she was gonna die. Her friend had just actually had to get her grandchild from a trashy daughter in law because her own trashy son wouldn't take care of the baby either, so the friend of my mothers went to court for it. My mother (borderline personality disorder - diagnosed) enjoyed the drama of it so much that she turned around and created some for herself. She also moved in with us when we moved down here and was financially supported by us etc, until the kids just got too loud for her and she threatened to give them up for adoption. That's when we told her we were going back to court and everything about her (my mother) was gonna come out, so she talked to her lawyer, we went back to court and she told them that we were "ok now" and we got our kids back and she moved out.

Yes, I still hold it against her, very much so. That's neither here nor there though. We couldn't legally be Betty's guardians because of that crap.

The best solution is to just have her stay here with us. Just go about our business and let her share a room with my daughter. That'll work. She's already got Medicaid. I can add her to the food stamps without having custody of her or being her guardian.

Although I am going to give my neighbor, the cop, all the information about her and let him get her found and dealt with. I'd bet you cash money that it won't be running off and leaving Betty she goes away for, that b**** is on dope. She's been on it a while it seems. She's 45 and looks 20 years older than me and I'll be 50 in the spring! I thought she was Betty's grandmother when I first met her. I'm sure they will make it a point to watch her and pull her over right after she scores. Meth is nothing to play with. She will go right to Tutweiller where she belongs.

So, looks like I'm gonna be having another kid for a while. She's good and doesn't get on my nerves. She's been over here a lot, and practically stayed over here most all summer long this year. When she gets on my nerves or doesn't do what I tell her, I just yell at her like I do my own and then she minds, like mine do. She's comfortable here and fits in just fine and dandy.

You know, I used to think she was just sucking up when she would call me "Mom" and my daughter told me that her mother doesn't like her or take care of her, but I didn't really believe it. Now I do.

Poor girls never had a real Mom it seems.

Her mother also was absolutely horrible (actually worse than usual to her) because of Betty's boyfriend. Now, this is the old b**** that ran off with the guy who tried to rape her daughter and she's talking trash about her daughters boyfriend who is an honor student, polite, on the basketball team, never been in trouble, etc. Know why? Cause he's black. WTF!?!?!?!?!?!?! It doesn't bother the bf, but it bothered Betty a whole lot that her mom was like that. So, because humor is how I deal with things sometimes, we would joke around with both of them that it was because he was freakishly tall - which he is, he's 6-7 and not fully grown yet - but at least now she won't have to get flack because she's dating a decent guy and not some meth head child molester like her mother. The "tall" joke caught on and all the kids did it. There is this one joking thing that the kids say sometimes when you tell them no, or something like that, where they go "It's cause I'm black isn't it?" like they are implying that you are being racist to them. Now, black and white kids both do that. But now, in their group, they go "It's cause I'm tall isn't it?" So, that's sort of how her friends are showing her to just laugh off her mother's stupidity. Well, her egg donor's stupidity, cause that's not a mother.

So, for right now we are planning on her moving in here Monday. Right now she's with a 23yo friend of hers whose married and has a baby. But here would probably be better for all concerned. My daughter is going to clean out some drawers and closet space this weekend, and she has a queen size bed, so they will probably sleep together since there is no room for another bed, and plus Betty hasn't liked to sleep alone since this last brother died, she has terrible nightmares and usually cuddles up tight to her friends - one night when it was just me and the girls here and my daughter was staying up online and Betty wanted to go to sleep she asked if she could come in there and sleep with me since DH was gone to the lake. I told her that was fine, and she got right up next to me. Right up under me so it was hard to turn over even, but she would cry in her sleep and wake up yelling and all from nightmares, so I didn't complain about it.

I am just so furious with that meth head birth giver of hers that I don't know what to do. I swear if I were to see her, I would hand her ass to her so fast it wouldn't be funny. I also doubt I'd even get arrested for whooping up on her once the cops found out what she did to her daughter. They just "didn't see anything" would be how that would go.

So, I will keep ya'll updated.

I would definitely avoid foster care with a 16 year old if it was possible. It is a huge mess, no one wants a teenager, especially an older one, and they usually get shuffled around from shelter to shelter to bad placement, often then to residential mental hospital back to shelters. And generally treated like they are the ones that did something wrong even in cases of total abandonment like that. The only thing I'd suggest is trying to get her to go back to school, a diploma is looked on way more favorably than a GED by most employers.

I've seen that with my mom my whole life. She quit school in 11th grade because she needed 1/2 a credit and the school people were being a bunch of dicks (them conveniently "losing" her registration paper work every fall and then refusing to put her in the classes she wanted was the only reason she was short a 1/2 credit in the first place) and refused to allow her anything other than going the full day the full year to get the 1/2 credit, and she told them that she had a two year old and didn't have time to deal with their crap, so went and took the GED and passed it with an amazingly high score, but her whole life she has had employers and others make a big negative deal about it--more of a big deal than having had me when she was 15. Anyway, that's why I'm saying get the diploma if possible. Maybe people would be better about it now, but I really doubt people have really changed that much personality wise since the early 80's.

see if there is free legal advice in your area. Sometimes student lawyers (etc) make themselves available. post an ad saying you need help with child custody issues in your area, and see if anyone bites.

i dont know your area laws, but here are some ideas to investigate:

see if a 16 year old can get "divorced" - is the word "emancipated"? - from her parent. see if she needs to go to court to do this, or if she can just bring "legal document form number 65abcd" to her mother and have the crackpot sign it, to release her from mother's guardianship.

At the same time, look up adoption laws, especially with regards to 'emancipated teenagers" (or whatever it's really called).

See if the child is able to a. get a job b. get welfare/social assistance.

The point is, around here, a 16 year old who can prove they have the brights to survive on their own, and that the home is a hostile environment, can usually go before a judge and say "i want to be considered an adult now, with all the blessings and curses that this entails" and give the finger to their parents. And if the mother is THAT bad, chances are the judge will back you up... NOTE: you should deffinitely go with the girl to the court if this is your chosen path - and present, in cooperation with the girl, a plan for income, a RENT cost for staying at your place, with "food and board" on the tenant lease agreement, etc. (this is if adoption is not an option - things like a rent agreement demonstrates a step into the adult world and shows they are ready to be so declared).


You might even be able to get information from child protection people in regards to this process. Who knows. Some times those people ARE more interested in the child's welfare than they are a paycheque.

By the way - BLESS YOU for existing. For caring. I wish the world had more people like you saving the lives of those in such nasty gawdawful situations. You have already saved this child's life once by showing her you care to listen to her. Saved her soul (and i'm not talking her god soul, though you may have done that too - I'm talking about that crushed spirit that needs to hear, feel, know, over and over again, that there are beautiful decent people in the world).

Yeah so maybe I have a few issues too. Thank heaven I never had it as bad as she has.

I agree with emancipation, if it's available in your state. Poor girl.

The best thing you can do is what you already have: offer to take her in. Let her feel wanted, loved, and like someone is willing to be a mom to her.

After that, I like the emancipation idea. Consult with a lawyer to see all that may be involved, and how it make affect benefits for her or for you, but that is probably a road that needs to be traveled, to leave her in control of her life. And to allow this living arrangement to work without any further interference from the court or CPS.

And do get her re-enrolled in school

Bless you and enjoy having one more member of your family. Think of this in your mind as an adoption. Truly make her part of your family. Your gain, the egg donor's loss.

What does the law say around adoption and age someone is considered an adult etc? (I assume you're in the US). I know here in Britain you would be leaving yourself open to accusations of abduction if you adopted a child without going through the correct channels.
I think it's very admirable that you are stepping in to help the child but I would make sure that you are not risking any repercussions yourself by doing it informally.

I would check the laws where you live to see if she can be emancipated.

Update. She's decided to stay with her friend right now. She's 23 and married and has a baby. They have known each other for a long time and she's comfortable there, so she wants to stay. Also, she has a puppy and she cannot bring it here. I don't know if she decided because of the dog or because of other circumstances.

Karma did bite her mother in the butt, pretty quickly. The day after this happened, her mother was taken to the ER in an ambulance. She had emergency surgery for a perforated ulcer.