<p>My D started dating a young man in May of HS senior year knowing she was going away to college. He’s a nice kid from a nice family. But May of senior year, really? When she went off to school, I made one request. They don’t see each other for the first six weeks. That’s the time when everybody is new and making new friends. Having the boyfriend there on the weekends, IMO, would have prevented her from doing things with potential new friends. They honored that request. She still has a group of friends from those first few weeks, but My D broke up with him in spring of freshman year. She has a freshman roommate this year who spends every free minute alone with the BF. If or when they break up, she’ll have a harder time finding her niche.</p>
<p>Just be honest with her about your concerns that the BF selecting his community college just be close to her could change her college experience. She should encourage her BF to go to the school that is right for him, not just a school that is close to hers. Once you have said your peace, there isn’t a lot more to do. I hope you can find solace in knowing that you are not the first to face this situation.</p>
<p>Lets start this over to an extent.
My biggest Concern is her not finding friends and activities among other college students because she would be spending valuable spare time with BF, especially at the beginning of her freshmen year. And its not like she is supporting a pre med student while he is attending grad school? Yes, if down the road they find that they are right for each other and want to get married, then thats their choice. I just would like her to not go into College with closed eyes, or heart.
I do like the idea of them agreeing to not see each other for the first 6 weeks. (Sounds like if it comes down to it when it gets much closer to her starting date, I will ask her)</p>
<p>Thank you everyone</p>
<p>Parent</p>
<p>Asking her not to see him for 6 weeks just makes him the forbidden fruit. I understand your desire for her to be unfettered as she starts her college career, but I really think you need to accept that there is nothing you can do about it, beyond making sure that she HAS a dorm room. (Whether she uses it or not is out of your control.) Honestly, I think it quite likely that she will meet new friends and drift away from him.</p>
<p>The bottom line is that it’s not your business where anyone chooses to relocate, and once your DD is a 18, she can see whomever she pleases. You can threaten, you can withdraw support and make conditions, but that’s really upping the ante on something that can escalate a situation like this. All you can do is make sure you designate your payments so that they go to things like the meal plan, the dorm room and say that is a condition of her going there (at least for that first year) and you won’t be out of line in that demand for most colleges as they do want freshmen on campus and many even have those requirements for those boarding that first year. </p>
<p>Close friends of ours agonized for years, when their DD did move off campus with her boyfriend who had dropped out of college, and, yes, she and they were essentially supporting HIM as well as her for a few years. In that case, it took a long time before he left the scene and it was likely at times that he would be joining the family. Now, in retrospect, my friend tells me it saved them money, as they simply were not as generous with their DD as they did resent the presence of the ne’er do well that would benefit from every cent and thing that was given to DD. But they bit their tongues and let time take its course.</p>
<p>My brother’s DD, an honors grad of college, married her boyfriend who has not set foot in college. He seems to be doing all right; they seem to be doing all right. My brother and his wife are not thrilled with her choice of a SO, husband, but this is a song as old as time, and sometimes it does work out. After all, my brother’s wife did not go to college either, and things they are a-changing in many respects in gender roles. You go with the flow. </p>
<p>My MIL was not happy with me even though I met my DH while going to the same college. This is just one thing that one is going to not like about children’s choices of SO in their lives. This is early and there is a good chance it will sputter out. But warning… doesn’t mean the next choice will be a lot better. Sometimes subsequent SOs make the early ones look mighty good.</p>
<p>BTW, my usual advice for parents in this situation is to recommend that they watch Say Anything and relax. B-) </p>
<p>The “don’t see each other for six weeks” idea might work for young people going to college in different areas – especially if there’s a substantial drive between the communities. I think the young people could see that visiting each other would take them away from their respective campuses just at the time when people are making friends and getting involved in activities.</p>
<p>But I don’t think the same restriction would work for two people in the same town, and there’s no way you could enforce it. In general, it doesn’t seem like a great idea to set conditions you can’t enforce.</p>
<p>“Well, like I have said, he is a very nice boy, we like him very much, but just doesn’t have the drive and means of really being able to keep up with my daughters drive to be financially successful. In other words, she might end up supporting him once her career gets going.”</p>
<p>As a woman, it always bothers me when people say things like this. Why is there always the assumption that a Type A personality needs or would do best with another Type A. I am independently pretty successful - have a well-paying job, great education, and for the world of me I can’t imagine what’s so wrong with having a husband that makes less than me. I prefer more laid-back people (the opposite of me) and definitely wouldn’t want to be with someone who is extremely career-driven. I am not sure if I ever want kids, I may not, but if I do decide to have children, I would be thrilled if husband could be the primary caregiver.</p>
<p>I think barring actual problems (abuse, drugs, or serious character flaws), it’s pretty obnoxious for parents to tell their kids someone is not good enough for them or they need to move on from a relationship. Back in college, I would have never accepted that from my parents. And I obviously wouldn’t now that I am independent. But the older I get the more I actually care about people’s personality vs. their carrer prospects and ambition. I can make my own money - having a genuinely good person to share a life with is what I actually value.</p>
<p>And remember, if their relationship breaks up because of your interferance (I don’t think any significant other would be wrong to be upset about their boyfriend/girlfriend not seeing them for a month and a half because their PARENTS told them), she will have every right to be very angry with you. Don’t meddle in other people’s relationships.</p>
<p>^ I’m not necessarily Type A but I’m very ambitious and need to stay busy. I’d go CRAZY with someone as driven as me. Can you imagine how little time we’d have for each other? </p>
<p>You could also tell daughter that many many many high school couples break up in college. There are so many new people to meet! That you are spending time with! Also, all the people around you are new. They don’t have any preconceived notion of you…don’t remember you from 3rd grade. So how will he feel(or you feel) if one of you meets someone else and then he is stuck there? You might even not break up even though it is the right thing to do because you would feel bad for him. Or he may break up with you and then you will still need to meet new people. Tell her that she should not hold on to him because she is afraid she won’t meet anyone else. He needs to do what is best for him at this point, and she needs to do the best for her. If they are “meant to be” then they can visit during breaks and what not. Neither will feel resentful if things don’t work out.</p>
<p>The whole “she might have to support him” part of this is beyond me. I know a wonderful young man. He is kind, compassionate, handsome, and hard working, but he will NEVER earn as much as a career person in a professional field. Still, I hope some fine young woman realizes what a terrific guy he is…because he IS terrific. And I hope HER parents don’t think he is beneath her because of his salary. </p>
<p>“I do like the idea of them agreeing to not see each other for the first 6 weeks.”</p>
<p>I can’t think of any way that will drive her MORE into his arms (so to speak) than you telling her not to see him for the first 6 weeks.</p>
<p>I went to the same college that my hs boyfriend (who was a year older) went to. And my parents disliked him (and had some good reasons to). But they were smart enough to bite their tongues and our relationship died its natural death within the first 6 months. If they had tried to forbid us? My god, we might seriously be married today, which would be an unmitigated disaster (we reconnected on Facebook and both of us agree on that score, LOL).</p>
<p>If you are happy with your daughter’s choice – she’s the only person you can control. You can’t control where this young man goes to school. All you will do is make forbidden fruit all the sweeter. I recognize easier said than done.</p>
<p>Romani - I was not saying he is some sort of devious home wrecker.or mean to imply that he is going to get her pregnant intentionally . I was mentioning the birth control because I grew up in a small town in Michigan and I have a number of friends who either they or their daughters ended up pregnant when they were in college.Actually a few got pregnant in high school. Anyway the point was that kids take risks thinking “Oh it won’t happen to me. it will be ok… I won’t get pregnant” so it’s better to have had that talk. </p>
<p>OP, I understand your concern. Saw this play out with a friend’s son. He went to school about an hour away from home. Girlfriend did not go to school, went and visited him all the time. He really did not engage at the school and even he agrees that the frequent presence of the girlfriend was a “crutch” for him. I think the best you can do is to ask her things like whether she has considered what will happen if they break up, what will happen if he has nobody to hang out with but that she has something to do with friends, etc. Good luck.</p>
<p>I understand your concern, OP. Seen a lot of friends family go through the same. But do listen to Janna Levin’s story on The Moth. </p>
<p>Wow! What a great story! But . . . she was 25+ and had a PhD already when all of that transpired. Presumably by that point everyone here would agree to butt out of their kid’s life.</p>
<p>As I mention from time to time, I have a relative who is a famous, much honored academic in a somewhat esoteric field. She is frightfully smart and somewhat tenuously connected to reality. She has been married for 30+ years to a guy who repairs refrigeration systems, and whose post-high-school education was at a trade school. It has been a great marriage, with two great kids (whom the husband pretty much raised single-handed, with occasional drop-ins from his wife). I can’t imagine how anyone could have guessed that they would click so well together.</p>
<p>I have a friend who is so type A. She runs several businesses and is very much the bread winner of the family. Her DH has never been able to stick to a job at all. He always was her very Personal Assistant and would do every and anything needed in an untrained capacity for her, as he had zero skills in her businesses all very high skill. But he truly is indispensible in that he takes care of all of the things that did and do come up in what she does. Still it’s a bit awkward when people ask, really innocently, what he does, as he has no salaried job at all. He’s the House Husband (no kids) and personal go-to guy. He does what she asks him to do, what needs to be done, and they do just fine. The thing is, if the gender roles were just reversed, it wouldn’t make a bit of difference, and as I’ve often said, “the times, they are a-changin’”. It’s hard for a number of parents who have DDs who are the breadwinners by a long shot and who married SOs who have jobs that don’t make a fraction of their wives’ or are 100% homemakers. Even more so when there is an education/ training/ other socio econ disparity. We accept it more when the gender roles are reversed, though even then, it’s a tale as old as time of those who are in one social crowd or however you want to put it, have to consider that their children are going to be marrying those in another deemed several layers below. We want the best for our kids in everything and that includes in their life partners. I have no idea how this sort of disparity figures in divorce rates, by the way. I have brothers who married and divorced what any parent would consider “perfect matches” that weren’t, and it was pretty clear that they weren’t despite the packaging that was so similar some years before the breakups. They’ve now been married double digits, and happily so to mismatches in terms of education, academic and cultural interests and knowledge. </p>
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<p>It would not be surprising if the parents and kid had different ideas of the ideal marriage partner simply based on the parents’ ideas being based on when they (the parents) got married. The idea of the wife being the breadwinner with a homemaker husband may seem foreign to older generations accustomed to traditional gender roles. Other sources of disagreement can include social class (including both achieved aspects like education, profession, and income and ascribed aspects like family status and wealth) of the marriage partner, or such factors as race, ethnicity, or religion. Or if the kid is L/G/B and chooses to marry someone of the same gender.</p>
<p>This is not unique to the US, of course. Some immigrants have mentioned that their parents back in the origin country have strong preferences about whom they marry (social class/caste, race, ethnicity, religion, etc.) that they themselves do not consider to be desirable means of screening marriage partners.</p>
<p>"I have a friend who is so type A. She runs several businesses and is very much the bread winner of the family. Her DH has never been able to stick to a job at all. He always was her very Personal Assistant and would do every and anything needed in an untrained capacity for her, as he had zero skills in her businesses all very high skill. But he truly is indispensible in that he takes care of all of the things that did and do come up in what she does. Still it’s a bit awkward when people ask, really innocently, what he does, as he has no salaried job at all. He’s the House Husband (no kids) and personal go-to guy. He does what she asks him to do, what needs to be done, and they do just fine. The thing is, if the gender roles were just reversed, it wouldn’t make a bit of difference, "</p>
<p>I think that even if roles were reversed, if a wife were a “personal assistant” to a husband’s business, then the business should be considered almost a joint venture. </p>
<p>I gotta agree with acollegestdent and romanigypsyeyes…I’m a woman pursuing my PhD and my husband is currently pursuing his BS after a stint in the military. I am definitely more Type A, neurotic, and career-ambitious than he is, but we would drive each other nuts if we were both super career-driven. He does things like remembers to clean the bathrooms and help me to stop hyperventilating over small details in my work. He’s also really, really supportive in my own career ambitious and has expressed willingness to move with me, which is a relief for someone contemplating an academic career.</p>
<p>I also agree that if you tell your daughter to stay away from the boy that’s only going to make her want to see him more. My mom insisted that I need to break up with my boyfriend, who was attending college across the street from where I was going to begin attending college, before I began because otherwise I would be far too distracted with him. She gave all the lines parents have suggested so far - there are so many new people to meet, most high school couples don’t last, etc. My mom’s advice didn’t make me go “Hmmm, she may be right!” - it made me rebel and say “SHE JUST DOESN’T UNDERSTAND MY DEEP AND UNDYING TEENAGE LOVE.” Which is what teenagers do, lol.</p>
<p>She ended up being right, of course - I look back on my college career and although I did very well academically, I could’ve done more socially and personally for myself that I didn’t do because I was caught up with this boy. It worked out - I ended up marrying him - but I do regret not getting more involved in college the way I really wanted to because I was busy trying to navigate a too-serious relationship at 19.</p>
<p>Buuuuut she’s unfortunately going to have to figure that out herself, because I’m willing to bet money telling her this is only going to make her more stubborn.</p>