Mother refuses to stay with daughter in hospital during Christmas, sparking debate

Parenting is not an easy task by any means. It makes people experience varied emotions, from extreme delight to humbling irritation. Children can become the apple of someone's eye, but at the same time, make individuals go through tears of pain. u/Hospitalthrowaway532 was experiencing the latter part of the spectrum to the fullest with her daughter. Her daughter suffered from stomach issues and eating unhealthy foods always caused a visit to the ER. Despite this, she refused to limit herself and indulged in those foods whenever she got the opportunity. It disrupted not only her life but also her mother, who had to spend hours in the ER. The mother put her foot down on Christmas and refused to partake in the consequences of her daughter's actions. 

The post started with the mother giving a little background about her daughter's condition. Since she was little certain foods bothered her stomach to the extent that she would have to throw up. The mother added, "We've seen countless doctors, but so far, nobody's been able to give us a clear answer. The only advice we keep getting is to identify all trigger foods and cut them from her diet." It was not hard for parents as they had a pretty good idea regarding her trigger food items, which include "soda and other carbonated drinks, chips, Cheetos, and other similar processed snacks, anything oily or fried and most sweets."

Unfortunately, as any typical teenager, these are the food items the daughter loves to eat. When she was younger, her mother had a certain control over her diet, but as she grew older, that authority faded. The mother explained, "She eats the greasy pizza at her school's cafeteria. She trades her lunch with her classmates. She goes out with her friends and stops to eat at KFC, and so on." This unruly behavior always ends in the ER with her "crying and shaking because she can't stop throwing up."

During Christmas Eve, the dinner was filled with home-cooked food that did not upset her stomach. Still, her interest was piqued by "her main trigger foods, like chips, soda, chocolate and sweets." The mother warned her that eating these items might cause her to visit the hospital on a holiday, but the daughter did not listen to the warnings. Her excuse was, "Christmas is only once a year and she just wants to live a little." Lo and behold, she had to go to the ER and even get hospitalized for a few days.

This time, the mother chose her comfort in the situation and refused to spend her holiday in the hospital. She kept in touch through the phone and made it known to the daughter that this would be the arrangement. The daughter did not take it lightly. "She cried every time we talked on the phone, begged me to come over, told me how horrible I was for 'abandoning' her there all alone, and so on," the mother wrote. The family is all on the daughter's side, believing this is a step too far. It has made the mother rethink whether she was harsh in her call. She came on the internet for a third-party suggestion.

The comment section was mostly on the mother's side. u/journeyintopressure commented that the daughter needed to learn about the importance of consequences, "NTA. While I understand why she was sad, she chose to make herself sick. She needs to learn the consequences. This is one of them."

u/bamf1701 believed this was a good lesson for the daughter and wrote, "I'm coming down on NTA on this one. Your daughter is old enough to know what the effects of her actions are and old enough to take responsibility for them. By your description, it isn't like this is a one-off happening either, with her doing this after outings with friends. If this were the only time in the year, I think my answer might have been different, but she hasn't exactly been the model of restraint or discipline during the year. And her actions have a cost for the whole family."