@ProfessorMom1 Thank you for your input. Yes, we are happy to know he shares his college life with us (mainly through texts with occasional calls). And he does sometimes ask for advice. Sometimes he will just say “I’ll figure it out” which to me shows maturity and responsibility. During finals he “pulled an all-nighter”, staying up until 6am studying. I know that’s not good, but after he told me, I only asked “How was that?”. He said he was tired all the next day and that he saw the school’s weekly email saying how doing all-nighters cause more harm than good. So now he’s done it and hopefully learned that it wasn’t such a great idea.
I saw several people posted replies concerned about how I know about so many things. He tells me. He tells me he reserved a library room to study, probably because he knows I will think that was a good idea. He tells me he was up until late because his roommate snores or it was someone’s birthday or he just couldn’t sleep. He shares his grades because he’s proud of them. He also told me when one class wasn’t going well and asked if he should drop it. When he asked for advice on that, I reminded him of the support services at his school… tutoring, study sessions, professor office hours. He did all three.
Being his first college year, I realize there is a lot of adjustment going on right now. However, I am concerned with his rudeness at times and often what comes across as entitlement. It makes us feel as though he doesn’t appreciate our part in this and that he thinks it’s automatic and expected that we pay for his education (and being a private school, a very expensive one). I agree with the poster who suggested he “have some skin in the game” and so we all agreed beforehand that he pays for his books and entertainment. The college also gave him work-study as part of his package. He chose not to do it fall semester, which we were fine with. But now spring semester is approaching and he balks about having to do work-study, even though the hours will be minimal (2-8/hrs a week). He asked if we could “just pay that, too.” We said no.
There are also a lot of highs and lows… one day he’ll text he finished a long research paper (with lots of exclamation points) and the next day (or even later that day!) he’ll text he has too much work and he’s “not cut out for college”. I’ve heard the second semester is much smoother since they’ve gone through one and now know what to expect. I sure hope so.
I realize the readers here don’t know my son or us. I hadn’t posted on this site before and was hoping for some tips or maybe someone had gone through a similar experience. I was surprised at some of the negative judgments, but most of the replies were helpful and I thank you all for your suggestions and viewpoints. I’ll try to post an update at some point. (@NorthernMom61 I’m not sure how to reply directly to you…)