Is it a High Crime?? Please tell me

Parent Cafe
1

<p>Hi Everyone, I need your opinion please. My 20 yr old daughter is a full time college student about 2 hours away from home. She also works part-time, however we pay 100% of her college tuition, rent, and food. She's had the same boyfriend off and on for over 3 years and it's no secret that my husband and I (and many others) don't approve of him or their relationship (he's a deadbeat, been a cheater, liar, etc). The boyfriend still lives here in the same town as we do, with his father.</p>

<p>My problem is: I have found out on 2 prior occasions that she has "snuck" into town and stayed at his house - never telling us she was even here! I've confronted her about this and let her know that it's disrespectful to us, besides "after everything we do for her" and to PLEASE never do so again! etc. etc.</p>

<p>I've told her that what she does in her college town is her business (if he wants to come see her), but when she comes home, she needs to do just that - come HOME. See him, stay out until 2am, but come HOME here. She assured me that she would.</p>

<p>Well, I had a sneaking suspicion that she was here (unbeknownst to us). So, I drove by his father's house and there was her car! Why did I do this to myself? Because I like to know what I'm dealing with. A lying, disrespectful, unappreciative daughter. </p>

<p>I can't believe how she has such little regard for her parents! I'm sick and tired of footing her bill just to be disrespected and lied to. It hurts! Last time she said "What am I supposed to do, let you know I'm coming to town and staying at his house"? Clueless. I told her no, that we didn't raise her that way. When she comes home, see him but stay here for the night.</p>

<p>I have not let on that I know she's here right now. I don't plan to. Just feel like cutting her off financially. </p>

<p>Am I over-reacting?? Is coming to town overnight, without telling your parents (AGAIN) and staying at your boyfriends home a HIGH crime or not? PS. Her grades aren't very good this semester (a couple of D's).</p>

<p>Thanks for any advice!</p>

2

<p>For me, the bigger issue would be your PS–a couple of D’s? That would be where I would focus. We’re not sending you to college to play around and get D’s. If those grades don’t improve, she can come home, get a job, then eventually pay for her own schooling. The boyfriend seems to be distracting her from her studies at school.</p>

3

<p>You may wish to read the following recent thread on the Parent Forum about a similar situation. Many parents weighed in with their perspective:</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1003806-i-feel-like-i-dont-know-who-she-anymore.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1003806-i-feel-like-i-dont-know-who-she-anymore.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

4

<p>Your daughter is 20 years old and at this point in her life you no longer have control. Young people make mistakes about relationships for a variety of reasons but the more you protest the closer you drive them. If you can find it in yourself to back off and remain mum and pay no attention whether she comes visits him or not I’d wager the relationships will whither.<br>
If she is not paying attention to her studies you do not have to fund them. Perhaps it’s time for her to take a semester or year off and try to support herself. When she comes back she’ll be ready to control herself and not be fighting you every step of the way.</p>

<p>Please look at the words you use to describe your daughter. I’m sure deep down you don’t mean it. Do you wonder why she isn’t up front with you? I do not think coming home to see a boyfriend without telling you is a high crime. She is trying to let you know that it is time to let go (albeit in an immature way).</p>

5

<p>Her father has made it clear that - she will not be coming back home to live (here) because of the boyfriend. She’s got us.</p>

6

<p>Who owns the car? Who pays for the insurance, gas and maintenance?</p>

7

<p>Wow! Long thread! I’ll read with it interest, thanks! My choice of words. Well, I hate being lied too. I never would have disrepected my parents like she has us - over and over, especially when they paid my way. </p>

<p>She does wear her “big girl pants” now. I just don’t wanna sit back and feel used and abused. Watching and waiting for the “train wreck”. It’s like a bad TV show, except I can’t change the channel.</p>

8

<p>We own the her car - which she put on 50,000 miles in over 2 years on. We pay for insurance, upkeep. She lives off campus now, plus her p/t job so taking the car is not quite feasible. I don’t want to help her “fail”.</p>

9

<p>Well, if you want to get back some control -get her back on campus. Living off campus (parents paying) is a bene she hasn’t earned. Take the car away. If she can’t keep the part-time job….maybe that is for the best – more time to concentrate on her classes and she will need to stay on good terms with you for spending money.</p>

10

<p>50,000 miles in two years for a college student is a lot of miles.</p>

11

<p>It’s the grades that would concern me most. Clearly she’s not “balancing” living on her own, school, work and boyfriend…but if I was a parent supporting her to the financial degree you are; I would be much more upset about the grades. Try also, to figure out for yourself what is bothering you. You say you don’t mind if the boyfriend goes to the campus, but you mind when the D stays with him in your town. Forget that he is in “your town” he could be in any town. It seems to me what is bothering you is that she comes to your town and doesn’t stop and see you. Three years is a long time to be dating someone, is she still getting an “earful” about him when she does come to your house? Or is it that she is driving around and not “safe” in her college town? Why is it OK for her to sleep with him in “her” town but not “your” town? Why do you feel “used and abused”…would you feel less “used and abused” if her grades were good or is it really that she has this long standing relationship with someone you don’t like and it’s happening "under your nose – yet the out of sight out of mind is ok.</p>

12

<p>I would agree that conditioning your continued support upon her living on campus and not having a car seems the most reasonable thing to do.</p>

13

<p>Wow. I’m a student, so you can take what I have to say seriously, or not.</p>

<p>I certainly empathize and think you have a right to be upset about several things - concern about a boyfriend that is not treating her well/is not going anywhere with his life, concern that her grades are disappointing. </p>

<p>However, I think you may be confounding certain issues that shouldn’t be mixed.</p>

<p>For one, your concern about her sleeping with her boyfriend would be valid if she was asking to have him spend the night under your roof. I think the general opinion of parents/parents on this board is that when son or daughter is living under parent’s roof, parent’s word is law (curfew, bf/gf laws, etc.). However, you unfortunately do not own the entire TOWN you live in. She should be given the same freedom in her hometown as she is given in her college town. To make arbitrary distictions - when she’s within X radius of our house she must act in X way - is unfair and illogical, and, in my opinion, the fact that she doesn’t tell you when she’s in town isn’t indicative of the fact that she’s a lying, dishonest person. It’s indicative of the fact that you are attempting to exert unusual control over her that she should not logically be subject to (she’s given certain freedoms at college and she’s not a guest in your house…therefore…same freedoms should apply). </p>

<p>That said, if there are certain restrictions on car use - i.e. she is only to use it to get to class and to work - then you do have a right to be angry about her visiting her boyfriend. But otherwise, an arbitrary distinction like “you can use your car for anything besides visiting your bf and then staying with him in our hometown specifically” starts to get weird.</p>

<p>So, and this will work in your favor, stop attacking the boyfriend. She’s been with him for a long time so she clearly has strong feelings for him. Centering your dissatisfaction with other areas of her life - poor schoolwork, etc. - on the boyfriend, whether he is to blame or not, will simply turn her against you. I think you have a right to tell her to shape up and get better grades. That may mean taking away the car (to get rid of distractions like part-time work, 2 hr weekend trips home, living off campus, etc.), that may mean threatening to revoke paying for tuition if she doesn’t do better. But “you can’t spend the night at your boyfriends house while you’re in our hometown” isn’t really attacking the root of the issue her - Ds in college.</p>

<p>Quite frankly, you may do everything in your power to set her straight, and she may never shape up. She fails. You revoke tuition money. You take away car. You say you don’t have our monetary support/support of shelter if you don’t listen to us. Bf could pick her up, plop her down in his house, and they could live blissfully unambitious and “unsuccessful” lives totally independent of your control yet two feet from your doorstep. At some point, you have to let people make mistakes. Tell her you think she is beautiful, smart, that she could do better than someone who habitually cheats on her. Tell her she must get better grades (and enforce this). But at some point it’s up to her to set her life straight. Having an aneurysm over her visiting town and then staying with her bf instead of you isn’t going to help things I don’t think.</p>

14

<p>PS. Her grades aren’t very good this semester (a couple of D’s).</p>

<p>That is the big issue. That is the issue that should be your concern. That is the area where your money can speak up. You don’t have to pay for a poor effort in college.</p>

<p>I’ve told her that what she does in her college town is her business (if he wants to come see her), but when she comes home, she needs to do just that - come HOME. See him, stay out until 2am, but come HOME here. She assured me that she would.</p>

<p>Sorry, but that expectation is just silly and unreasonable. If the BF lived in a city that was 20 miles away from your city, would then it be ok? </p>

<p>Well, I hate being lied too.</p>

<p>When you make unreasonable demands to ADULTS, then they will lie to you. You created your own liar. Man up and accept that.</p>

<p>*Her father has made it clear that - she will not be coming back home to live (here) because of the boyfriend. She’s got us. *</p>

<p>OK…that’s just stupid…sorry. </p>

<p>Stop trying to control her. You may win a battle or two, but you are going to lose this war…big time.</p>

<p>Before you think that I’m some permissive mom, I’m not. I’ve been a rather strict mom. But once the kids are adults, you have to be reasonable.</p>

15

<p>I would not even go into the boyfriend issue right now, because it’s the academic issues that need immediate attention. </p>

<p>The real focus needs to be on her grades. You and your husband need to sit down with her and have a serious discussion to let her know that Ds are just unacceptable. Ask her why she thinks her grades are so low, and what she plans to do to turn the situation around. Does she need to take a leave of absence and get her act together? Does she need to dump the part-time job so she can concentrate on her studies? And then maybe she needs to move back on campus and garage the car to reduce costs, if she’s not earning money any more? Let her take the lead in this discussion (to see what she’s thinking and what her priorities are), but you and your husband can ask questions and suggest various alternatives to guide her. However, you will also tell her what you view as acceptable grades (and be specific – for example, no grade less than C or a semester GPA of 2.8) and what the consequences will be if she does not achieve that goal in some specified period of time. Let her know that you will pull all funding for college, or you will pay only for her to move back home and attend the local CC, etc. – whatever you and your husband are comfortable with. </p>

<p>After this discussion, you tell her that she needs to come up with an “action plan” – that clearly states what she will do to get her grades up and then present it to you. That way you’ve put her on notice that her present behavior cannot continue but you’ve given her “ownership” of finding a solution. And if she doesn’t follow through on what she promised, she’s been forewarned about what will happen.</p>

<p>I sympathize with you in this difficult situation and sincerely hope it will work out for you and your daughter.</p>

16

<p>Hm, and I didn’t make this clear in my post (despite its length!), but I think another problem with focusing so much on the boyfriend and not on her general success in life (good grades in college, good part time job, etc), is that if you start to take measures to try to help her in other areas of her life, she may interpret these actions simply as you trying to get between her and her boyfriend. The way your posts read, it really does sound like you are more concerned about him, than about how she is doing overall! I understand that you’re deflecting to a certain extent - you seem to think he has caused some bad things to happen to your daughter or will cause bad things to happen to her - but if I read your post as a tirade against the bf, then daughter will certainly see that as well.</p>

<p>I think it’s imptortant that you show her that you don’t just hate her boyfriend - you care about HER and her success in life. Whether or not you feel this on the inside you need to show it on the outside…that means stop fixating on bf…making unreasonable demands about bf visitation…etc. START focusing on her grades, internships/part time work she’s getting relevant to her field, and things like that.</p>

<p>worried_mom’s post was great. Focus around the grades and let her lead the convo. Lack of car may arise organically but starting the convo with a thought or worse, words, like “bf is bad, she got bad grades because of him, let’s take away car so she can’t visit bf” is not going to get anyone anywhere.</p>

17

<p>The academic issue is the primary concern and you footing all the bills while she is unappreciative is the second issue. If your daughter has a couple D’s this semester than you have every right to stop funding the education. Your daughter is obviously spending her weekends with the boyfriend either in your town or at her college town and either which way it is not being spent on any studying. That would be cause enough to step back and tell her that she needs to take a leave of absence until she is mature enough to want a college education.</p>

18

<p>This is a fundamental problem with the existing college system. It is so outrageously expensive, that young adults - 20 year olds - have to be beholden to their parents in order to afford college, yet they are old enough that they should be making their own lifestyle choices. </p>

<p>I can appreciate your frustration. I’d probably feel similar. At the same time it seems grossly inappropriate that parents hold the ‘bill’ over their young adults head to maintain control of them when, given their age, it is no longer appropriate to do so (even though, of course emotionally, it still drives you nuts, which is understandable and so it feels good to try to regain control using the only leverage point you have). </p>

<p>Methinks most parents should be footing the bill for college because they personally believe that paying for college education is important for their child’s wellbeing. They should not footing the bill on the basis of how much they like their children, or how much they give back, or how their children make them feel or how much their children are obedient.</p>

<p>You either value the price you are paying or you do not, but don’t use it to manipulate your kid.</p>

<p>What should be “normal” IMHO, is that 20 year olds make their own way in the world, make their own choices, make mistakes…they are too old to be controlled by their parents. It seems very unhealthy. We want them to grow up and be independent, and they get there by making their own decision and mistakes along the way. So while it feels good to have them under our thumb I think it is not helping anybody. It just stifles them growing up. I thought we wanted our kids to become independent, no? Its not really indepedent if they are just following your rules under threat. </p>

<p>Moreover, it’s not even respect if they are doing it just to make sure they get their tuition covered. It is just you manipulating your kid (saying do X or I’ll not pay tuition) and your kid manipulating you back (sure I’ll appear to be doing X just so I can keep going to college). What did you really accomplish then?</p>

19

<p>

</p>

<p>I strongly disagree with your viewpoint that any attempt to establish expectations in connection with “footing the bill” is a form of manipulation. Yes, I do pay for my children’s college educations because I feel strongly that such education “is important to their well-being.” However, that does not mean that I give them carte blanche to throw that education (and my money) away by not going to class, getting D’s or worse, etc. I want them to value the price I am paying as much as I do! </p>

<p>It has nothing to do with how much I like them or how appreciative they are or whether or not they are “obedient” to me. They want to be treated like adults and that’s how I treat them – as if they have entered into a contract with me: “My obligation is to pay your tuition/fees/R&B/books, etc. and in return, your obligation is to study and learn as much as you can.” I don’t require them to study any particular subjects, I don’t know or care who they hang out with, and what they do outside the classroom is not my concern – just as long as they are putting maximum effort into their studies and progressing towards their degree. That’s not "control. That’s not “manipulation.” It’s just a sensible way of ensuring that my children are getting what I pay for – a college education with a degree at the end of 4 years.</p>

20

<p>^I think starbright makes a valid point in the context of OP’s situation as described - I think there is a difference between revoking tuition or car priviledges to exert control (what starbright is talking about and what OP is most in danger of doing according to context) and revoking these privileges because they pay for them to achieve a certain end and that end is not being achieved (what you are suggesting should be the real focus of OP’s concern but what does not appear to be so at this time).</p>