subadive we can agree to disagree. I feel strongly that the undergrad years can be focused on something a student loves, and that career concerns can wait, especially since something like a music degree is “practical” in terms of access to jobs and grad/professional schools. If it is not possible to pay, of course that is an issue, but a BA in music appears to be available at the school where this young woman already has a scholarship. And if she is talented, merit money will be available at conservatories as well.
That may be but the student in question at the start of this thread wanted to transfer universities and study medical imaging. At a certain point you have to make a decision. Indecision can lead to nowhere. When funds are limited you don’t have the luxury to change your mind countless times.
If my kid refused to see me and only communicated with me through campus security then admitted she was lying to me when she did see me, I’d shut off the money tap. She wouldn’t be going to any college next semester on my dime. If your daughter’s not ill, and she’s insisting to you that she’s not, then how she’s treating you is a choice. I wouldn’t reward that sort of behavior with residential college and spending money.
There’s no law saying she has to go to college now, or that any degree she gets has to be a 4-year degree. She can get a job and enroll in a cc. She can work and pay for a training program through one of the adult education programs. Or she can just work and save money for whatever college she feels she deserves.
Plenty of people return to college in their 30’s or later. It’s more difficult, but it’s not impossible. Your daughter is an adult, and she needs to understand that’s one of the choices too. Kids have a tendency to see binary choices – mom and dad can pay for school A or they can pay for school B – but really there’s a 3rd choice. The student can pay out-of-pocket for school C.
However, it sounds like your daughter has a history of depression. If she saw a counselor in high school long enough to learn the signs of depression, then you may have a real problem compounded by the fact that you can’t force an adult to get treatment. If that’s the case, my response wouldn’t change much. I’d still firmly explain to her that I wouldn’t be funding any more college until her attitude changed, but I’d add the caveat that she has to be cleared by a counselor too. If she decided to self fund one of her other options, I wouldn’t object. She’s an adult so she can do what she wants. But that doesn’t mean you have to pay for it.
That is the most “glass half empty” post I’ve ever read. Sigh. I’m sorry. Your suggestions are good, but she does not want to see it. I guess I’d lay out what you will and won’t do financially, what your expectations are for ongoing communications with her, and let her know she has the option of a gap semester (if she can keep her scholarship).
Lots of people keep music as a hobby. They play in community bands or orchestras, play in the pit for local musical theater groups, etc. It is an option, at least.
I would provide her some stats on the financial benefits of a four year degree. Can you get her to spend some time in the career services office? She can tell them she is having trouble picking a major – they may be able to help, and they aren’t “mom & dad”.
It seems that three things make her unhappy.
Pining after the “better schools”, but being at a a higher ranked or more expensive school doesn’t mean she wouldn’t have the same indecision issue.
Feeling like the orchestra at her current school is not up to her level.
But if she transfers to a better music school, how much is that going to cost and how much longer would it take for her to get a degree?
The boyfriend being away in Africa.
I agree with others, maybe she can take a leave of absence for one semester (or year), if she can keep her scholarship, to keep that option, and let her work and figure out what she truly wants in that time.
@redeye41 Could she be suffering from anxiety? Sometimes teenagers don’t like being asked if they are depressed, but feel less stigma about seeking help for anxiety.
Encourage her to study music. If that means transferring, then maybe she can find an affordable program. If not, then she can try majoring in it where she is. It sounds to me like permission to study what she really wants to study, needs to come from parents so she can move forward.
I strongly agree with @austinmshauri . If there was a refusal to discuss this issue like an adult, there would be no more funding. Families have limited resources. She does not seem mature enough right now for such a large investment. Some time off to regroup night be the best.
OP, you will not and should not be able to dictate what she chooses to do and whether it is a good idea or not.
I think you and your Husband need to decide on a budget that you will use to fund her education. It could be zero it could be $200,000. Decide what you think is reasonable. This is totally separate from any other discussion. You never answered my question on what would have happened had she not won the scholarship.
I would just say “Listen honey, your father and I have X$ to spend on your education. We’re not going to tell you what to do, you are an adult and we trust your judgement. I understand that the scholarship puts a lot of pressure on you, and that’s understandable. Nonetheless, we can only afford X$ and you need to figure out how to get to a place in life that you want to be using those resources. Use your best judgement and let us know what you decide”
Basically, you are going to let her make her own decisions and own mistakes and your financial obligations are limited by whatever you let them be. You won’t be using money as a means of control, but as a means of support.
@ClassicRockerDad If my DH and I had treated our parents like that, we would be disowned. Shockingly disrespectful and lying. There would be a funding all stop.
The daughter explained why she lied. Right or wrong, she feels like she’s being smothered and that her parents judge rather than listen. The extent to which the OP went through to see her daughter, while from the anxiety built up in the OPs mind was necessary, from the daughter’s point of view it exemplifies her excessive hovering.
The OP loves her daughter. This is not about demanding respect. The OP needs to listen to her daughter and hear her crying out for independence and judgement-free support. If financial support is not available, judgement free emotional support should always be available. The daughter needs the freedom to live her life and make her own mistakes. How else will she grow? You cannot and should not punish an adult if you want that person to continue a relationship with you. Cutting off funding because you are angry doubles down on the problem.
@ClassicRockerDad Perhaps the parents are making a judgement based on the daughter’s erratic behavior. The continually changing majors to the current one based on??? No research or job shadowing. And excessive hovering? If my kid was about to cost me 50k to 60k based on the latest whim major, there would be a respectful and well thought out conversation. OP’s “excessive hovering” was based on the daughter’s LYING and thus concern that there was a serious mental breakdown.
And I’m not kidding about a serious reaction to such a shockingly disrespectful behavior. Both DH’s older brother and sister were kicked out of the house. The brother was physically violent to the dad and asked to leave. The sister was wildly disrespectful because she thought she could get away with it because she thought he’d never kick a girl out. The brother reformed, apologized and now has a very good life. The daughter did not. Remained stubborn and continued to do things her way. She’s in an unhappy situation now.
Going to college is a privilege. No way we would pull that kind of crap with our parents. As someone said the biggest gift you can give your kids is saving for your own retirement. This kid is in crisis. This is not the time to be throwing money away by funding a kid who is flailing and demonstrating a serious lack of character with the lying. No excuses for that.
Perhaps in their own eyes but not in the daughters.
The desire to study something that will lead to gainful employment
Respectful to your kid? If so then great.
Which the daughter explained as an attempt to escape the constant scrutiny. OP had a respectful conversation with her and the daughter seems to have stopped. Time to let it go.
This is certainly not the result that the OP desires nor I suspect was it the result that your DH’s parents desired, nor would it be the situation that you were desired if you were to kick your own children out of the house.
Understand the sentiment, but doesn’t get us closer to a relationship of mutual respect. The parents don’t have all of the cards in obtaining a desired outcome. They can only control their own behavior.
“Respectful to your kid? If so then great .” Are you kidding me? We simply do not allow out kids to be rude and disrespectful. The parent drove all the way there because they are concerned with her safety. The kid refuses to speak with her parent? Forced the parent to go through public safety and then gets mad that her bratty behaviour has forced the parent to contact the authorities. Does kid ever expect to be let home or is it common for this kid to dump all over the parents?
The kid choose her school and all three or four major changes, no? Did OP block any one of these? No major has be good enough. The school is not good enough. She spends her down time pining over the top 25 schools. The orchestra is not good enough. (Didn’t even have the decency to properly invite her parents) The sorority, which must cost a pretty penny, is not good enough. A few kids ruin it for her.
Let her fail and have to figure out how to rebuild her life. It doesn’t sound like the daughter had college savings. If she had a funded 529, I don’t think we would be having this conversation. I certainly would not take a Parent loan or mortgage my house. She’ll figure out the value of things and the work it takes to get what you want.
This part I agree with, the rest not so much. The girl needs the judgement-free unconditional emotional support to be able to risk failure and bear the consequences without I told you so’s
The financial support needs to be a separate conversation so that withholding, if that’s what the OP chooses, does not appear to be a punishment for misdeeds, but a hard cold unemotional financial fact of life.
I think it’s time to say “hey, we don’t have the money to waste. You have a good deal with this school. If you can find another school with this type of financial aid, go for it.”
My daughter’s financial aid turned out better than we thought and she’s not going to give it up because she wants to go to a different school.
If parents are worried about the safety of a child, contact the public safety department. If not, then don’t. They aren’t there to be mediate social problems.
@ClassicRockerDad We’ll agree to disagree. The daughter committed to a university. Then at the last minute changed her mind and switched to this school. The daughter committed to a job at summer camp. Then at the last minute, left them high and dry and decided she is going to take classes. But then just takes one class and has no job for spending money. This with three or four major changes. The only thing that seems certain is change. How much money would you put on the line?
I would not have been happy with the Ds decisions but they were her decisions and I wouldn’t have been involved.
The money is separate from the D’s behavior and OP’s desire to control. I don’t use money to control.
If I thought my kids needed skin in the game to have ownership of the responsibility of managing their own education, I’d make them take out the federal loans, but I’d pay the rest. If resources were limited, I would set a dollar limit.
I would certainly let them fail if that’s what was necessary.
You say that, @ClassicRockerDad , but when the decision has to be made and it is real money on the line, it is hard to do that. Many of our kids need a lot more help in the decision making process. I have one that needs a lot of help even at 21.
I gave my kids a budget but they still needed help to stay inside that budget. The still ask my opinion on which classes to take, whether to switch majors, if study abroad fits into the budget or schedule of credits needed. They’d ask my opinion on buying a car or house, so why not on education?
There are lots of happy and fulfilled adults in the world who aren’t all that jazzed by the work they do (for money- to keep a roof over their head and food on the tables) but find fulfillment in other ways. There are lots of happy adults in the world who are so passionate about what they do that they’d do it for free (if they could afford to) and their professional gratification is part of what makes them tick. And there are lots of people (my guess is the vast majority of non-subsistence earners in the industrial world… so not people eking out a living on $3 a day and trying to find clean water) who most days are ok with their jobs- somewhere between tolerable and fine. And of course- people who hate what they do for a living.
I don’t fault the D for trying to become one of the people who love what they do for a living. I just think that for most teenagers and not yet college graduates, it is just too early to conclude that a certain path or field or profession is boring or horrible or non-engaging or whatever. They don’t have enough life experience to assess- and they don’t know enough about who they are to figure out whether the path is a practical one or not.
Regardless of how the parents feel about a particular field- I think it’s important to remind your kids that yes- they need to be able to support themselves, but if they can do it with a job they adore, that’s a wonderful thing which the parents endorse fully as a goal.
I know parents who hate their jobs and I do observe that they often are resentful of their kids efforts NOT to repeat that cycle. Not saying this is the OP at all- but a phenomenon in real life. If you are a CPA and really hate your work, it wouldn’t surprise me if you end up with a kid who cycles in and out of the arts, “something involving animals”, culinary school, etc. This is just a kid trying to establish "I’m not my mom. I don’t have to become an accountant just because grandpa told my mother that he’d only pay for college if she ended up in something “practical”.
Yes, the money. Tuition is expensive. But maybe figuring out what is really going on with a kid who is having trouble sticking with a major, let alone a job/path/life plan???