My [42M] daughter [17F] has been bullying a girl at her school, and the girl just tried to commit suicide because of it. I had no idea this was happening.

No no no no no. You're getting this all wrong.

First off, I was bullied for more than 4 years, middle school and high school. It ended in 10th grade only because I moved out of state. And honestly, I don't even remember when it started. I've blacked out my early childhood and I don't even want to remember it. Going on 40 now, and I'm still dealing with the trauma of being a punching bag for so many years. I was suicidal for 20 years because I had no sense of self worth. I have a lot of experience with being bullied. And I did my fair share of bullying. When you are beaten regularly, you start to think that beating people is how the world works. I was hurt, and I hurt people. I know what it's like to be bullied to suicidality, and I know a bit about what it takes to be a bully too.

I don't know you and I don't know your daughter. But I remember when I was 17 and my dad removed my bedroom door. After he did that, things changed for me. My trust in him had been wavering, and that was the end of it. My dad called the police on me once, had me spend the night in jail. After I graduated high school, he told me to get out. I was happy to leave because by then I hated him. I was homeless for years. The first time I was raped was when I was about 20. I just wanted to sleep under a roof for a change.

That's what my dad did to me. What he never did was listen to me. He never treated me like my own person. He wanted to mold me into his first born son. But I was never his son, I was his daughter, and he wasn't having any of that. When I tried to tell him my problems, he would vent his anger at me because I wasn't living up to his expectations.

I can see from your post, that's what your doing to your daughter. She isn't living up to your expectations, so you take everything from her? You treat her like she's not human? Like she doesn't deserve any dignity? Look, I've cut my wrists, I've had a noose around my neck. I even had a shotgun in my mouth with the safety off. Do you think that it would have been any easier for me if I had known that my bullies lives were ruined? That didn't matter because the damage was already done. What mattered to me, as a victim and as a bully, was getting into therapy and finding a way to find some self worth.

Getting your daughter into therapy is the best idea you have up there. Maybe punishing your daughter like this will work. But I doubt it. Instead of taking out your frustrations on her because she's not living up to your expectations, I would suggest a different strategy. Maybe she has some serious problems that she doesn't know how to deal with and she needs her father to love her despite the stupid, harmful things that she's doing.

She doesn't have empathy for her victims right? Well, why doesn't she have empathy? Why does she think that punishing others is how the world works? Look in the mirror when you ask yourself that. I think you should get therapy too.

/r/relationships Thread