Nina Shandler - Ophelias Mom: Loving and Letting Go of Your Adolescent Daughter

The pastel glow drained from Manjus face, leaving the dark pallor of mistrust. For the first time in her life, she screamed at us. You used to be my friends. She paused before delivering the next salvo. Youve turned into PARENTS. I had betrayed her without warning. For twelve years, I had reasoned with Manju. I discussed options. I gave advice. I listened. I didnt dictate rules. I never acted like a parent. Suddenly, I changed. That day she had walked through the door with a boy, a symbol of her new maturity. For the first time in her life, I didnt trust her judgment.

Now Jamies fourteen, nearly fifteen. She calls me her probation officer. All the little boys, theyre scared to death of me. Other little girls have fewer rules. I try to plant small moral messages in her head. I hope shell hear a little voice when she needs it.

At the end of the session, the counselor pulled me aside and said, You have two options. Either you let her go, or shell go. I had raised Shauna to be strong. Now she was using that strength to salvage her own life, something I was unable to do at her age. I knew I had to do it another way, but I didnt know how to let her go.

She needed a pair of shoes with a heel of sorts, so that, she said to me, her calf muscles would appear more defined. While your kid is working on showing off her legs, youll be bemoaning the force of gravity as you hope each morning that your breast doesnt get caught in your jeans zipper. This irony is not lost on me; the more beautiful your kid gets, the less young you look. And if age were really just a state of mind, youd look even older. Trust me.

Some days maybe I was better off being numb. At least then I didnt realize the magnitude of my problems or of my daughters pain. I was numb until the ton of bricks fell on my head. My child wanted to kill herself. She had decided today was the day.

She walks out of her room in a tight tank top with her midriff showing. I do a double take and rein her in: Where do you think youre going in that hoochy wear? She says, Mom. Theres nothing else in the stores. So I take her shopping. Shes right. Shes absolutely right. Theres nothing else. Why are we dressing our girls like whores?

I was obsessed with getting rid of my hot flashes. I was stirring all these estrogenic ingredients into my food processor, the magical medicinal mixer, when my fifteen-year-old bounced into the kitchen and announced, Ive made an appointment with Family Planning: Friday at four. Id like you to go with me. But if you wont, Josh will take me. Her long, streaked hair flowed down her back. I had an epiphany: The witch in Rapunzel is my hero. That fangtoothed captor is the good guy. Ill rush right up those stairs, push her into her room, lock the door, install a doggy door for food, sit on the balcony, and cast evil spells on any big scruffy male who wants inside.

Then I noticed the diary. Callie always left it wide open on her bed. But I never read it out of respect for her privacy. To hell with her privacy, I thought. I sat on the edge of the bed, picked up the notebook, and started reading.

My moms delusional. Having seven kids lobotomized her. We ask her about our adolescence. Her voice goes all high-pitched and dreamy. She says, You were all good all the time. Discipline? Forget it. I was a whoopee/Im outta here/later, baby kind of teenager. My sister got pregnant at nineteen. I got pregnant at twenty. But my mom keeps saying, No problems, you were good girls. Shelley, my daughter, asks me about my adolescence. I say, Lets ask Grandma.

The sight of the affection between me and Shirlene throws my husband into a paranoid state. He attacks, starts mocking me, pointing to his chest then to me, and obsessively repeats, Bad parent. Good parent. Later I bring up the fight. I confess, Im still so angry. Robert nods. Yeah, Shirlene was so outrageous. I tell him, No. Its not Shirlene. Its your behavior Im angry about. So Ive made three rules: No hostility. No insults. No generalizations. Trouble is, all three rules apply to both my husband and my daughter.

When both girls were still at home, I felt trapped in an I love you both equally, just differently quagmire.

Mya hitting adolescence was like the divorce. It hurt. I couldnt say anything right. Expressing affection was like loading her gun. She aimed it straight at my heart. The rejection. The losing her. It was like losing my husband all over again.

At fifteen, you are still quiet, especially for a teenager. Once you locked yourself up, you swallowed the key I forged for you. And I am ashamed. And you are still far too silent.

In your letter, the one you did not write to me, you told me you felt as though youd been abandoned when I moved. You said that phone calls, cards, and e-mails werent the same as hugging your mom good night. You said there were times like when you went to the prom last year that you werent sure what kind of bra to wear with the dress, and you couldnt ask your dad about it. In the letter you didnt write, you let me know that you miss me and love me just as I miss and love you.

I was the mom who was there for everything: swim practice, swim meets, lacrosse games, school dances, school functions, carpooling, birthday parties, making cookies, shopping for everything, knowing everything. I remember lying with her on her bedroom floor while she went through her yearbook, telling me every girls name. I loved it. I was living my teenage years again. Now Im back to being an adult overnight.

Also by Nina Shandler

Estrogen the Natural Way

When requested by contributors or their daughters, names and identifying details have been disguised.

Copyright 2001 by Nina Shandler
Foreword copyright 2001 by Sara Shandler

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Published by Three Rivers Press, New York, New York.
Member of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc.
www.randomhouse.com

THREE RIVERS PRESS and the Tugboat design are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Originally published in hardcover by Crown Publishers, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 2001.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Shandler, Nina.
Ophelias mom: loving and letting go of your adolescent daughter / by Nina Shandler; with a foreword by Sara Shandler.1st ed.
1. Parent and teenager. 2. Mothers and daughters. 3. MothersPsychology. 4. Teenage girlsFamily relationships. I. Title.
HQ799.15.S53 2001
306.8743dc21 2001028955

eISBN: 978-0-307-53937-3

v3.1

To my daughters:
MANJU,
who transforms everything she touches into a completely unique work of art, andSARA,
whose great talent is the intelligence of her emotions.

Love you so much.

acknowledgments

THE CREATIVE INFLUENCE of Betsy Rapoport, my editor at The Crown Publishing Group, is invisibly embossed on every page of