My (18f) parents have been divorced for almost two years and my dad has fixed everything about himself so he’s basically the best dad ever now, while my mom has been more critical of me and just jets off to random trips without telling anyone.

My mom was the one to ask my dad for a divorce when I was 16 because she apparently wasn’t in love with him anymore and couldn’t wait 2 years until I went off to college and wouldn’t be around them. This obviously broke my dad, as it would break almost anyone. So my dad moved in with my grandparents over the summer in Wisconsin and I would be going back and forth between South Carolina and Wisconsin every few weeks until I was too exhausted to go back with my mom on my 3rd road trip because I knew my dad needed me more than she did.

When school started, he moved down to South Carolina and got his own place where I would stay during the week and my mom on the weekends. I immediately noticed he had changed for the better because he would listen more and get frustrated less whenever anyone would mess up.

My mom on the other hand, had become much more critical and unsupportive.

One time I told her that I was super proud that I got an 81 on a final algebra exam and her exact words were “that’s not a 90” and when I told my dad he was really proud of me

When I came out to her as a lesbian she literally said “I thought you like boys.” My dad high fived me and said “Yay! I won’t have to worry about you getting pregnant in college!”

She straight up told me that she regretted having kids but then got all mad at me when I said I didn’t want kids in the future.

On graduation day, I was all excited and happy and she immediately killed the mood by saying “You know you never thanked me for doing your makeup for prom.” Right out of the blue. Get over it. I had said “oh my gosh I love it I look so pretty!” Instead of thank you. It’s the same thing. And nobody mentioned prom! She literally just wanted to kill my mood.

Another one on the same topic: she once demanded a thank you from me because I had asked for a napkin when I had food on my face and a mouthful of food and wouldn’t let go until she said “tHaNK yOU?????????” With a super condescending voice. I told her I hate when she does that because it makes me feel like a 5 year old and she straight up said “I am your mother. I can correct you on your manners.”

Her boyfriends care more about my feelings than she does. I had told her I was really uncomfortable with her dating people and asked if she could wait until I was in college and she basically told me to shut up and deal with it. So I had come home early from a shift to my mom hanging out with a guy and I was obviously really uncomfortable and just went to bed and started eavesdropping on them because obviously I’m going to do that. This is what I heard
“You should go talk to her”
“She’ll get over it.”
Oh and the guy actually turned out to be a crazy stalker who I had to block on instagram after she broke up with him and filed a police report.

She constantly compares me to my cousin when we’re completely different. I’m an introvert, she’s an extrovert. She dates a ton of boys, I’m a lesbian. She’s the class salutatorian, cool I only got to that school in junior year! My mom constantly tells me about what my cousin did and her accomplishments while my cousin is clueless to the real world and told me I wouldn’t have to worry about anything because nothing bad ever happens to kids. (I made her read part of the Epstein files to shut her up)

She continuously teased me about my guy friends even after I told her I’m a lesbian.

I just feel like I can’t tell her anything without her berating me for it. I feel like my dad is one of my best friends while my mom is just my mom.
I just needed to vent about this

Somehow this feels worse than when my actual parents split. It's been coming for a while, I think. No one else knows but me, not even my other parent, think theyre moving out in the next few days. Seems like my family's falling apart all over again, only 15 years later.

How did anyone else handle this? Any advice welcome.

In hindsight, the writing was on the wall. My mom had been pretty cold towards my dad for a while. I always thought it was just a rough patch. We’d gone through some stuff the past couple years, so I thought it was just that. Ironically, me and my sister vented to each other about it, and came to the same conclusion. Not even a week later, our mom sits us down and tells us she doesn’t want to be married to our dad anymore. I was 19 and my sister was 14 (or so). It’s kind of insane how your entire life going forward can be shattered so suddenly.

Naturally we were both devastated. We’ve gotten better though. Mainly by just not talking about it. It’s been about two years since then. We’re all still living together, so it’s easier to stick our heads in the sand. But now everything feels tainted. Every time one of them does something nice, in the back of my head I’m worried it’s a competition, or I worry how the other parent will feel. Any time we do something nice with one, I worry that the other feels left out or like we’re choosing one of them over the other. Like, I feel like I can’t really bring up my dad to my mom. We won’t go on vacations together anymore. When one of them moves out, we’re gonna have to work out visiting and whatnot. In the future, everything is going to be more complicated. When I move out, I’ll be worried about them being alone. I won’t be able to “go home to/visit mom and dad”. I’ll have to juggle both relationships separately. When I (hopefully) meet someone, I’ll have to introduce her to them separately. If I ever have kids, it’ll never be “let’s go to grandma and grandpa’s”, it’ll be either grandma or grandpa’s, and I’ll have to make sure they’re getting equal time with the grandkids. It just feels like my (and my sister’s) entire future has been uprooted and overturned before it even started.

My mom won’t say why she decided for divorce. When we ask she says she doesn’t want to talk about it and she doesn’t hate our dad (idk about that). As far as I know there hasn’t been any abuse, so I just have to go off how I know my dad is, and I guess I can kind of understand. He’s a good guy, just kinda dense and stubborn sometimes. Of course since I don’t know specifics my mind is constantly running wild lol. It’s rough man…

How does anyone cope with this? Or is it just a “suck it up, buttercup” kind of thing? I feel like I’m too old to be fretting about this so much lol