mom....Don't be so hard on yourself. Did you cause this estrangement or did your ED choose to walk away? Good enough? Maybe your ED is not a "good" daughter right now. Your parenting was not a waste, it is your ED that is choosing to waste your good parenting. Expectations? Can any of us live up to our kids expectations? I can't - but I don't have to. All I want is the truth to come out and apologies made. That is not asking too much for neither you nor I. That will "fix" it for me and I think that would fix it for you too. Right?

So true. We pray that one day, in God's timing, our EC (my ED) would be convicted by the Holy Spirit to become accountable for the past 2 years (lies, false allegations, walking away from all family and friends). Only God...

We are like many others on here...tried our very best...heck, when I was in the thick of raising my kids, I thought I was doing a bang up job...why?, because I put my heart and soul into it...it never occurred to me that we'd be considered sub-standard. I am not sorry about our parenting skills...did the very best we could...I feel sad that our ED thinks we deserve this and just how messed up that logic really is, it's a very unsettling thought.

Don't feel badly or blame yourself. My ED says her main gripe was our choice of religion; we made some really bad choices in pastors and church groups but sincerely believed we were doing the right thing. So then she replaces us with a family of alkies who help her steal things and I suspect run scams. She calls this woman mom, then accuses me of replacing her with my DIL. Contradictions are her specialty. I don't have the time or want to to play these sick games.

momindeep I have felt the way you feel many times. Why, just today I felt that way. I must have been a terrible mother for my son to oust me from his life so thoroughly and not want to even say, "Thanks, Mom." when I leave a big bag of Halloween goodies at his doorstep especially designed with gluten free candies for his girlfriend and strawberry short cake for him. That is a bad bad overbearing mom!

But under that criteria, God himself must have been a bad God for Adam and Eve to trust the evil words of Satan and turn their backs on Him. What they did, just as my son and his girlfriend are doing, was hide from God because they knew that they were doing wrong. And, yes, their love for God was not the same as His love for them. They were in it for themselves. God was in it for them. That's why He died on the cross for all of us because "He first loved us." 1 John 4:19

Anyone who reads this: if you can look back and see truly horrible sins that you committed against your children, then you need to repent of them. Did you try to murder your child? Repent! Did you molest your child? Repent! Did you steal your child's money? Repent! But I suspect that our sins were not quite so egregious. Did you yell at your child, as I did when he stole something or tried to start a fire in his bedroom? Repent! Did you call your son's girlfriend a piece of coal and not a diamond when she sent lewd photos to your son on the internet. That was unkind. Repent! Or maybe you kicked your son out of the house because he was 19 and had had a baby out of wedlock, and you had to get him to realize that there was responsibility that went along with bed time fun. He could not just play video games and have a part time job when he had just created a beautiful little image of himself.

If you have done something wrong to your children, then you should admit it and go before Jesus Christ and find forgiveness. BUT, if you were a parent who was trying to raise your child, and they were undermining you at every turn. If you expected that at the end of the parenting process you would actually have a son or daughter in your life. Then stop kicking yourself. You were a concerned parent who loved their son or daughter and probably because of your love for him or her, you raised a little tyrant like I did.

I saw a documentary about some African tribe where the boys go out into the desert to herd cattle across the Sahara when they are 16 years old, and then come home to marry their sweethearts who are 15, having proved that they can provide for a wife and children. I sensed from seeing these boys take up their responsibilities that they were not the type of people that would reject their parents. Perhaps our failure was that we did not send our sons out across the Sahara at 16 years old, or expect our daughters to cook the goat stew at home while they waited. Children who truly understand life don't do what our children are doing. THE BUCK STOPS WITH THEM!

Gees BINGO. I made some mistakes but you are dead on about the undermining. We came to realize we were not raising children, we were raising MEN and got frustrated when one was just refusing to take responsibility and do what he needed to do. Get a job. And we showed him, trained him how to interview, etc, and he gained a great skill. He applied and got every job he interviewed for...but not really wanting to work...SORRY gotta put your big boy pants on. and grow up its part of being a man.

We only had one choice.. tough love. It is HARD to do, and does backfire plenty of times, but it makes men and sometimes they come back thankful. Only the ones who are accountable and not playing blame games.

Have you ever thought it may have nothing to do with you and everything to do with your daughter?

I don't know if this fits your case or not, but be aware that Satin has a way of wanting us to feel like we are unworthy of love, he makes us constantly doubt ourselves. This leads to no good. If you can't honestly think of what you did to cause your daughter to leave, then maybe it is not your fault. I do believe that God loves us all and wants us to be happy. You cannot change your daughters choices or thoughts, but you can change yours.

I feel this way every day. It means you are a card carrying human being. :)

You know, its just the blameshift game....maybe you were great paretns, maybe you weren't there is no book that comes with these kids, we make mistakes, we say we are truly sorry and have to move on.. But you may have been good enough, but maybe some compatibility issues, or just she sees too much of you or your husband in herself, and needs to establish identity and grow up. Its hard to say. I just know that if you put too much peanut butter on her sandwich, or corrected her when she made a mistake or gave too much uncolicated advice, it is just a matter of time for her to come back. There are a million reasons. You know there may be none fault of your own. If you are able just gently reach out with unconditional love in little bites. And don't skip Christmas either. But saying...we did our best doesn't work. We need to try to get into their minds, and read a few books maybe to discover how to fix the rift because my dear, this CAN be fixed through prayer and through Gods work in either of you....

I think an awful lot of this estrangement is simply the immaturity of a person who wants things their way and is throwing a "tantrum." Remember, when your darlings would hang onto your hand with dead weight because they didn't want to go where you wanted them to go? I see this often in the store. Answer: let their chubby hand go and plop, their dead weight scheme looses it's power. Or when they used to drop things on the floor over and over again to see your reaction. Classic baby tactics. Stop picking it up!

My son knows how his silence is hurting me. He is not busy. He is throwing a tantrum to make me pay, because he wants what he wants now, and I don't agree with him. I guess he wants me to say, it's OK to live with your girlfriend; it's OK to make babies and then forget about them. It's OK to disregard the feelings of those who love you. A grown up man would not do this. He may be able to make a living and survive on his own, but that is not real maturity. Real maturity is caring about those around you and following the precepts of Christ. The problem is that immaturity can become a lifestyle choice. The deeper you get into a hole, the harder is to get out. That's why some kids are there for 10 or 20 years. They are in a hole of immaturity and it's going to take them some humbling to get out.

What we have to do is trust the Lord that He is on the side of that hole reaching out to them. He has not forgotten them. This is the hardest thing to do for a mother, because we can't stand feeling like we are dong nothing for our child. But we are not doing nothing if we are entrusting them to Jesus Christ. We are delivering them "unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus." 1 Corinthians 5:5 We must be "persuaded that he is able to keep that which" we "have committed unto him against that day." 2 Timothy 1:12

Thank-you for all the reflective thoughts and time to respond. I always told my children that I am not going to apologize for being a mom and not because I made all the right decisions,mind you, but because I made those decisions with love and or concern, for them...based on what I knew at the time...always their best interest at heart.

My parents did their absolute best with me....was I happy with them all the time?...heck NO...I knew they loved me, though, even when it certainly didn't seem like it at times.

Hope my ED doesn't have to drink from the same bitter cup as her dad and I are forced too...I wouldn't wish that on anyone.

Only Jesus God was perfect. We tried our best and most of the times succeeded. Our EC chose to only to remember the negative. They usually do so due to their own selfish agendas. Our ED took that road and added lies and false allegations to gain freedom from home and to gain a bf at age 20.