Brat or typical tween behavior?

[Anonymous]

My DD has one girl in her friend group who acted this way - always asked for Starbucks when we were out, always ordered the most expensive items on any menu, expected to be bought a souvenir and so on. I finally realized it was because she was never taught any better because while her mom was now UMC her mom and dad had grow up lower income and the never had 90% of these type of experiences growing up and didn’t grow up with the social rules of being invited out places by others.

The mom told me that growing up she was never invited to even McDonalds by friends families because no one could afford to pay for someone extra. And in fact going out to eat in a restaurant with another family or going to an activity place was also something that she had never been invited too.

My DD and all her friends besides this one girl were all taught at home from a very young age that when you are the guest you don’t ask to go to places to eat rather you wait to be invited and then you order whatever the mom/dad says is ok to get and you don’t complain and so on. But also keep in mind that for my kid and yours, Starbucks is something that can always happen. My kid knew if they couldn’t get what they wanted when with a friend it was no big deal bc there would always be another trip another day with me and they could get their favorite. Your nieces may not have that luxury and so they want to go as many times as they can bc this is their chance. I would take them everyday and personally I would
Load up a gift card for each and give them a chance to order on their own and let them take the card home.

I will also guess that hosting them is actually more of an expense than you can comfortably afford and for a while you have let them believe that you were “rich” that became your persona but in fact your are budget constrained more so than you want to admit when it comes to hosting 3 extra people.

I would suggest that you take a step back and consider your own behavior and motivations in this situation and think about how and why your want or need to be perceived by your brother and family in a certain way might be part of your own struggles with this visit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My DD has one girl in her friend group who acted this way - always asked for Starbucks when we were out, always ordered the most expensive items on any menu, expected to be bought a souvenir and so on. I finally realized it was because she was never taught any better because while her mom was now UMC her mom and dad had grow up lower income and the never had 90% of these type of experiences growing up and didn’t grow up with the social rules of being invited out places by others.

The mom told me that growing up she was never invited to even McDonalds by friends families because no one could afford to pay for someone extra. And in fact going out to eat in a restaurant with another family or going to an activity place was also something that she had never been invited too.

My DD and all her friends besides this one girl were all taught at home from a very young age that when you are the guest you don’t ask to go to places to eat rather you wait to be invited and then you order whatever the mom/dad says is ok to get and you don’t complain and so on. But also keep in mind that for my kid and yours, Starbucks is something that can always happen. My kid knew if they couldn’t get what they wanted when with a friend it was no big deal bc there would always be another trip another day with me and they could get their favorite. Your nieces may not have that luxury and so they want to go as many times as they can bc this is their chance. I would take them everyday and personally I would
Load up a gift card for each and give them a chance to order on their own and let them take the card home.

I will also guess that hosting them is actually more of an expense than you can comfortably afford and for a while you have let them believe that you were “rich” that became your persona but in fact your are budget constrained more so than you want to admit when it comes to hosting 3 extra people.

I would suggest that you take a step back and consider your own behavior and motivations in this situation and think about how and why your want or need to be perceived by your brother and family in a certain way might be part of your own struggles with this visit.

Please stop stereotyping. Most of the UMC kids I know are literal brats.