“I hate you,” she said to me.

Well, she actually texted it to me. My oldest. About five years ago. It was around early spring and time to figure out what my girls were going to do over the summer. I had one rule: that it had to be something more than sitting at home. It was really easy. It could be anything my girls wanted to do. Take up a new sport, learn sign language, advance in their swimming skills, dust off the acoustic guitar and take a lesson. But my oldest was probably 15. The age where they don’t want to do anything their parent suggests, no matter how good an idea it is.

(Summer camp really offers a host of new activities.)

In the past, my girls readily went anywhere I took them. To Vacation Bible School, to the local summer enrichment program at the Monr0e-Woodbury schools where they took arts and crafts classes, or drawing, or a learned to swim program. (In fact, it’s where they DID learn to swim.) So, this summer, I had a battle ahead of me. “You’re not going to sit around and let your brain go to mush,” was my cry. And her response was, “Mom, you can’t make me.” And I really felt like a bad mother. Here I was, forcing my daughter to “have fun.” She just wanted to sleep late and be on the computer. But I was not having any of that.

Finally, after suggesting topic after topic, which she flatly refused, I said, putting my foot down, “Then you are going to go to the local summer camp, run by the town.” It was called YAC (Youth Athletic Camp, I think.) She stamped her foot and stormed away. Later that day, while I was out with my youngest and she was at a friend’s, she texted me that phrase. It stopped me cold. “They’re just words,” a mom friend told me. “She feels she can say that because she’s not in your face.” So, I tried to shake it off. I texted back something like, “I didn’t get you a cell phone so you could text me messages like that.” And that was all. The initial shock passed, but the words remained in my head. She’d never, ever said that before. My friend added, “And don’t forget, she’s a teenager.”

Fast forward to July 5th or 6th. The day camp started. I dropped my youngest daughter at the arts and crafts class, and then dropped my oldest at YAC. She got out without a word. My attempt at a friendly goodbye was interrupted by the car door slam. In guilt, I drove away. I took a deep breath, and felt my heart beat faster. These are the hard days of parenting, when your child can fight back against the decision of the parent. She knew my rules, she had plenty of opportunity to choose a summer activity, but she decided to, as I call it, “play me,” and see if I would give up. She should know me by now.

I held my breath all day, waiting for more emotional texts about how I was the cruelest mother on the planet and how come so-and-so didn’t have to go to camp. And so on. But, you know, around 2 pm or so, my cell phone buzzed. A new text arrived. Seeing it was from “camp-girl,” I sighed and read these words, “MOM! ur rite, I like it”

I felt my throat tighten, and the biggest relief ever came over me. How hard it must’ve been for her to admit it, yet type it. And how hard it was for me not to text, “I told you so.” Instead, I typed the words, “Im glad. “

P.S. My oldest made a ton of friends that summer, and has since become a counselor at the camp, and even now — at 19 — she plans on returning each summer until she gets going in her career.

For a rundown of the best camps in the Hudson Valley and some great stories on choosing a camp, click here.