Redditors Support Mother For Forcing Her Manipulative Teenage Daughter To Remove DND Mode From Her Phone

"We’d have to call her more than once to get a hold of her but she is completely unreachable."

Filip

• Published in Interesting
• March 29, 2023

The worst parent's nightmare is being unable to reach out to their child whenever they are worried. Unfortunately, that problem teenagers can't recognize as significant, so they often put their parents in this situation due to their carelessness.

Recently, a mother on Reddit shared her worry caused by her daughter's reckless behavior. OP's 16-year-old daughter has constantly been keeping her phone in do not disturb mode.

It wasn't an issue earlier, as she would still answer her parents' calls and texts. However, in the past few weeks, the daughter has stopped responding to any texts or calls, claiming that she is not receiving them.

OP's other kids have also tried to contact her but to no avail. Recently, OP's daughter had to attend an event at school, and OP was supposed to pick her up after.

But her daughter did not respond to any of her calls or texts, which frustrated her. When the daughter finally got in the car, the OP got mad and yelled at her for ignoring their calls and texts.

Then she gave her the ultimatum, either to remove the do not disturb mode or her phone would be taken away for a week. The daughter refused, which resulted in a back-and-forth argument before she finally removed the mode in front of her mother and went to her room in tears.

The OP thinks she may have been too harsh but was frustrated by her daughter's constant unavailability despite being allowed to have the phone in do not disturb mode as long as her family is set up as priority contacts.

OP asks:

Her daughter always keeps her phone on DND mode:

It didn't bother them before, but then she stopped answering texts and calls from the entire family.

Even though her mother already told her she's worried when she cannot reach her, she still does it:

And the last time she did the same thing, her mother snapped:

OP gave his daughter two choices, but she didn't seem to take them seriously:

So they ended up arguing, but her daughter removed the DND function:

"I think I was too harsh but I was at my wits end," explained OP.

"A teenager has the phone to be contacted."

OP responded:

Although this may sound like controlling, it's for her safety.

Another Redditor agreed that it's a bit aggressive but also believes it's the right thing to do.

"NTA. As a parent, this is infuriating."

Another Reddit user also agreed that it's not pleasant at all.

"Her habits of sneaking out/sneaking around are more concerning."

"Clearly she's being sneaky and manipulative."

Apparently, there are a lot of people who disagree.

One Redditor pointed out that she has more serious problems with her daughter than she realizes,

and they explained their point of view.

OP added some additional information regarding her concern:

OP also revealed that her daughter lies about where she goes:

Someone suggested to the OP to take her away car keys, but they have already tried that:

OP said she and her husband would have a serious talk with their daughter:

OP addressed to Reddit community for taking away her daughter's phone, but it turned out that they have far more issues with her. Either way, her teenage daughter's behavior is not suitable at all.

She must have been hiding something. Hopefully, they would manage to get her to talk with them so they could work through her issues together.

Filip