<p>As always, the route you take has to be in line with your priorities and willingness to live with the downside of the consequences of that action. If a top drawer school is an important thing in your family's life, and it is in many families' lives, you may just have to suck it down,. Curmud's soliloquey is a great one to memorize, if your truly would feel sick about about paying $200K for a school when he is bringing the relationship and girl with him. There are future consequences for each action, and you need to weigh their importance. To oppose the relationship is a rash and hostile reaction that would likely cause a lot of damage immediately and in the future and may result in an even more rash and hostile response from your son. These kids will bite of their noses to spite their faces at this age. If your philosphy, is to "suck it up", well, then, you let them. But most of us understand that many things including relationships are not so wise among the young and are more forgiving. As I said before, this girl may look pretty good if he does break up and find another girlfriend/wife/partner. Also, it is important that your spouse/child's mother works with you on the decision as there are consequences if their is not agreement on the action you want to take.</p>
<p>I really don't know what a game person is called. Game-r? Ga-me-le-on? But whatever they are called, if my child were a gameleon and spent countless hours alone, online, playing VR (is that still a term?) games to the exclusion of other school activities I'd be having this same talk. If she said she wanted to continue that behavior in college we'd be having that same talk. If the child wanted to continue their business venture that eats up every free waking moment and wouldn't allow other activities, we'd have the same talk. </p>
<p>If the parent makes it about the girl they will not be taken seriously. It has to be about the "outside the classroom" education and fit and money. IMO a expensive college is not a good fit if the kid isn't going to take advantage of what the college offers. And then they still won't take you seriously.;) (Don't let them blackmail you, either.) </p>
<p>Now if they are going to take full advantage of all the college has to offer, and it is just about the girl then....</p>
<p>I don't have any particular knowledge of these kids , that's why I let the OP's opinion of the deletrious effects of this relationship stand un-challenged by me. If they are right that their child would not be using several rooms of the house, I just can't see why they'd want to rent that particular house for $200K. Now if the parents are wrong and the child will take full advantage of everything but "sex with strangers", I'm changing horses on ya. ;)</p>
<p>I know if my kid said "Dad, I want to go to Blank Residential College but I'm going to come home to see my boyfriend every weekend. So I can't play BBall or be in a sorority or take part in Student government or research. " I certainly wouldn't be willing to pay extra for that type of college experience. We have well thought of local schools that can fill that bill just fine.</p>
<p>Where is JamesF? He has been getting advice about his son for several pages but has yet to post again.</p>
<p>He's dun runned away. Get the dogs. We'll drag him back.</p>
<p>Curmudgeon: Here Here. My son knows a girl whose parents are paying for her to go to a top school while her high school boyfriend dropped out of school, got his GED, and is moving to the same area to be with her....I say if you are living that kind of lifestyle i.e.pretending to be an adult in an adult relationship then pay your own way. Stop the madness...why are so many parents out there afraid to say NO?</p>
<p>I realized some time after I posted that JamesF was a "new" member with only 1 post to his name. I've learned in the past to ignore these, as a sure sign of a troll. I mean, what person in their right mind joins a forum where they have never posted before to ask advice of a personal nature on a question that is sure to stir controversy?</p>
<p>Anyway, my bad for having taking the bait.</p>
<p>Calmom, not necessarily. I found this forum and made my first post when I was at wit's end with an unhappy freshman. Since then I feel I have come to "know" many posters and have the addiction :).</p>
<p>Zoosermom, I've already said I don't believe the post, but I do want to respond to your comment. </p>
<p>There is no evidence that this girl is manipulative, emotionally-needy or self-centered except in the statement of the father, who has already announced his bias: he doesn't like the girl. He's not going to say nice things about her. </p>
<p>In fact, all evidence is to the contrary. The kids attend separate high schools, have weathered prolonged separations such as for summer internships, and "more than likely" will attend separate colleges. </p>
<p>The girl calls regularly and punctually at 10 pm -- an hour late enough that it is unlikely to interfere with other family activities. A manipulative or emotionally needy girl would call frequently at all hours, especially at inconvenient times or during times like the family dinner hour -- this girl waits her turn. So she is predictable, consistent, and reliable ... not needy.</p>
<p>The girl and her mom "flood" the son with "small gifts" of "no occasion". Self-centered? This is simply a matter of thoughtful gestures from a family that really likes the son. A manipulative person would be more likely to buy the kid an expensive gift, one that was difficult to reciprocate. </p>
<p>In other words, the facts presented simply don't support the conclusion. I realize that they touched a nerve because you have a manipulative, self-centered, and emotionally needy sister-in-law.... but I'll bet your sister-law also does a lot more to draw attention to herself and force your brother to be at her beck and call. The girl in this little fable seems quite willing to give the son the time and space needed to pursue his own, separate activities, and to relegate her relationship to its designated time slot.</p>
<p>Yeah, mkm56, but then you probably took the time to read the replies to your post and respond. JamesF has disappeared as quickly as he appeared. You, on the other hand, seem to be closing in on your 400th post. ;)</p>
<p>True calmom. Well, hopefully we will hear from him soon---I've made these people real in my mind! And I want the next chapter.</p>
<p>First and foremost, lots of great advice here. And to my esteemed pal, curmudgeon.... hear, hear or here, here. Whatever. Brilliant.</p>
<p>I hope the OP is not a troll; but in addition to posting this on Parent Forum and Parent Cafe (made some sense), he also cross-posted it on Harvard, UPenn and several other school forums. Seems odd, and not typical of what a parent would do. I took the bait as well, and I want the next chapter too. I guess one of us will have to ghost write it? :p</p>
<p>I'm new here, but I assure you that I am not a troll. Not exactly sure what goes into being one, but I am a real person and will not be posting fake issues. Enough real issues in my life.</p>
<p>The terms describing the girlfriend are the opinion of the poster. I have known parents who have intensely disliked a girl/boy friend, or any person and have a slanted opinion about them. There are no specifics about the girl to really evaluate her; she is not a criminal, a dropout, a drug user, a heavy drinker, poor student. Those would be facts (if the OP is telling the truth) not opinion. It is not at all unusual for parents to dislike their child's friends and seethe at a relationship. However, if the relationship is not causing any factual harm, I think the parent needs to bite the bullet on this one. I have known couples in college who participate actively in ECs , and kids who are uninvolved not take advantage of the resources, and do poorly. If the young man should break the relationship with the girl, there is a chance the next girlfriend is manipulative, emotionally need, self centered in every sense of those words. It does happen and can happen to any of our children. Heck, I'm sure most of us were involved with some toads in our lives, may have married one, may still be married to one. It happens and a parent can drive himself crazy trying to monitor relationships when the kid is away from home. Often can't do it when the kid is under 18 and is at home.</p>
<p>Because there are consequences to each action the parent can take, he should look at the choices and decide which is the harmful to him. Life is often full of no good alternatives, and it is a matter of picking the one that is the least bad.</p>
<p>Zoosermom, how can a young man still in high school possibly be viewed - by anyone - as a "gravy train"? Or for that matter, any possible future serious partner? </p>
<p>Specific to economic considerations, 100% of my peers view our daughters boy friends somewhere on a scale of "benign, harmless but need to watch carefully anyway" to "serious threat to current and future financial security". We do NOT tend to view any potentially serious relationship as an enhancement or benefit to financial security; we unconditionally expect our daughters to achieve this on their own power, in their own names, and on the merits of their own achievements; accordingly, we eye any serious relationship through the lens of "risk management" - could the young man in question screw things up?</p>
<p>I agree with Calmom on this one, and in addition I found the reference to "single parent home" used in concert with "only child, lonely" in the original post a bit off-putting.</p>
<p>*Zoosermom, how can a young man still in high school possibly be viewed - by anyone - as a "gravy train"? Or for that matter, any possible future serious partner? *</p>
<p>yea I wondered about that too
How could he be a gravy train, is he going to come into a lot of money or something?
I have dated young men who had parents who had built up substanslil assets particulary through real estate and (investments - diamond mines in South America, unfortunately) and those who were particulary ambitous and had built up their own consulting firm while they were still young, but that wasn't who they "were" or even a big part of what I thought about.
Unless you are particulary grasping, and want to be financially dependent on someone else, why would the "potential earning power" be a big part of why you are with someone ( unless you like sleeping with a checkbook)
Yes I didn't really date people who were living on unemployment for months, but even though my friend with his own company was a great guy, and it was a lotta fun to see the Sonics on what he usually used for his business clients, I ultimately rejected him for my husband who was working at the shipyards at the time</p>
<p>I also thought perhaps this young man is getting more emotional support from his girlfriend and her mom, than he is getting elsewhere.
It might be really nice to be welcomed by a family that is generous emotionally and perhaps is a little spontanteous even if impulsive.</p>
<p>( but I agree- the OP obviously didnt come back- but it has been a good discussion, because as our kids move into their adult lives, I am sure things like this would come up. I know that some parents have issues with their kids friends earlier on in school, not wanting them to associate with, luckily, that hasn't been an issue for us, at all, both my kids have been remarkably grounded at finding friends who are really sweet, relatively mature and just great kids. They have had a few friends who were maybe a little boy crazy, but I just chalked that up to energy and hormones)</p>
<p>I think the girl comes from a lower socio-economic situation than the OP's family. It is often difficult for a parent to accept that kind of relationship. Parents who let a highschool relationship go even if there are disparities in religion, race, money, neighborhood, etc, start getting strange when they realize that things are revving up. I think the OP is finally getting the message that the relationship is permanent. It was cute to be jr high sweethearts, fine to be dating in highschool, and time sneaks up on you, then you realize they may be serious about each other. Some us tend to be very protective of our children when it looks like marriage. Seen it so many times. Just speculating about OP, maybe not the case, but his descriptions of the girl, her mother give some indication.</p>
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<blockquote> <p>And to my esteemed pal, curmudgeon.... hear, hear or here, here. Whatever. Brilliant.>></p> </blockquote>
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<p>Off Topic: Correct usage is "hear, hear." It's short for "hear him ,hear him...."</p>
<p>That's a good hypothesis, cptofthehouse.</p>
<p>Here's another possibility -- something that could be happening instead of or in addition to the socioeconomic difference you suspect.</p>
<p>I think that the OP has an extravert personality, while the son and his girlfriend are introverts. </p>
<p>When the OP talked about the types of opportunities he would like his son to take advantage of at college, much of what he was talking about was the sort of social interaction that extraverts love, such as "going to parties, making new friends, dating new people, discovering yourself not only through academic interactions, but also through social, emotional relationships." </p>
<p>At one point, the OP criticized his son and the girlfriend by saying "these young people are a little shy and socially lazy." That's the way extraverts talk about introverts. </p>
<p>Extraverts love meeting new people and socializing in large groups. Introverts prefer smaller groups and familiar people. Only an extravert would say, as the OP did, that a person in a committed relationship is a person who has "a mind closed to personal discovery." Introverts don't look at it that way. They don't find their personal growth at large parties. They might find it through a job, a research project, a summer internship, community service, or a hobby, or perhaps through friendships with a few selected people or a deep, long-term relationship with a sexual partner, but they surely don't find it by standing in crowded, noisy rooms with a drink in their hand.</p>
<p>I suspect that in the early days of the relationship, the OP actually encouraged his son to get involved with this girl because he was thrilled that his introverted son was actually starting to date. He may have permitted questionable things like unsupervised visits at the girlfriend's home and travel with the girlfriend's family because he thought that encouraging his son to become more social was a higher priority than discouraging the kids from having sex. But this strategy backfired. Introverts don't date for the excitement and adventure of dating, the way extraverts do. They date only to find a partner with whom they feel comfortable -- at which point they drop out of the dating game with great relief.</p>
<p>If I'm right, the OP's son is NEVER going to experience college in the way that his father would like -- regardless of whether he has a girlfriend -- because he simply isn't inclined toward the extensive social activity that his father values.</p>
<p>cptofthehouse, I would agree with your point, in fact, I'm pretty sure there are credible statistics somewhere that point to correlation between long, happy marriages and persons very similar or fairly equal in socioeconomic status. I would agree too that the parental alarm goes off when someone very different comes too close in range. </p>
<p>I'm just a bit put off by the vision of a single mother being labelled as the sort who views a young man - or for that matter any man - as a "gravy train". </p>
<p>Marian, if we're still pretending the OP is real, your points are exactly right on target. My household has the opposite dynamic - I'm an introvert, D couldn't be more of an off the chart extravert. Nope, one dynamic will NEVER do or even attempt what the other things they should or could.</p>
<p>The introvert/extravert thing is a good point. I'm introverted and shy and while I didn't go to a school with anyone else that I knew, one of my closest childhood friends went to school right next door, and my parents incessantly whined that I was just going to hang out with her and not make 'friends of my own' and not take full advantage of the college situation and so on. In reality, I was far more likely to go to some sort of large social gathering if she was going to go with me (or in the OP's case, if I had had a boyfriend going with me) than to go by myself. Most of the big parties and whatnot I went to, I went because one of my friends sort of dragged me along, but I didn't really like going often. I'd honestly much rather do other things. My mother is pretty much the same, but I think she wanted me to somehow develop an opposite personality just because she was never like that.</p>
<p>Emeraldkity, I agree with you, besides, today it would be somewhat hard to tell even if adults are well off or not, unless one wishes to invade privacy. The guy in the huge new house with the late model car and seemingly great job could have a horrible credit rating, be terribly in debt, etc., and the blue collar worker with the second part time job and driving the older car could have managed investments very carefully, saved money, borrowed wisely, etc.</p>
<p>Besides, everyone I know accepts dates - and remains in relationships - based on issues like excellent character, kindness, positive attitude/outlook on life, personality compatibility, ability to laugh a lot, etc. Presence or absence of money doesn't really come into play, at least in the dating/serious dating stage. Maybe later, when discussing marriage.</p>