<p>A. Absolutely nothing.
B. Convince him to dump her ASAP just because I said so.
C. Hand him money to dump her since what I said in B hasn’t worked so far.
D. Call her and tell her he hates he so she’ll break up with him. </p>
<p>I need advice. I want to go on the MTV show parental control wherein the parents get to pick two other dates for their son/daughter and at the end of the show the kid decides who he likes best. </p>
<p>My wife doesn’t care. She shrugs and figures it is his life. That is her form of parenting. Let him figure everything out on his own. That sort of parenting makes no sense to me. I prefer to guide him around the land mines before his arms and legs are blown off. Call me stupid if you must. </p>
<p>Why don’t I like her? </p>
<p>Nothing big. She has values. She’s nice. She isn’t incarcerated. But she just isn’t the right girl for him. He can do better if he’d only try. He only likes her because she’s easy. No work involved. No effort. He refuses to get shot down, which means he ain’t in the game. </p>
<p>But, seriously, should I stay out of this battle or is this part of what good parents do?</p>
<p>I have detested at least two of my daughter’s boyfriends. But we kept our opinions to ourselves and she eventually wised up. We both like the guy she is dating now. Are we envisioning wedding bells??? Hell no! We’ve got six more years of tuition bills for our two girls to take care of first before we contemplate anything like that.</p>
<p>You are leaving out one rather important piece of information, how old is your son?</p>
<p>When I was in high school and again in college I had two boyfriends, both of whom would have been disasters over the long haul. I’m sure my mother couldn’t stand either of them but she said nothing. The one in college ended up one of the best learning experiences I ever had. After him the boyfriend’s got better, I never again repeated those mistakes. I’m with your wife on this one, sometimes the school of hard knocks is the best way to learn something.</p>
<p>He is 16? Don’t worry. This is part of growing up. He needs to learn for himself that she is unsuitable, (assuming that is the case). If you intervene and somehow get them to break up then his next girlfriend will be just like her because he won’t have learned anything.</p>
<p>16 is a time to date inappropriate girls, because then he will see how much better the college girls are and dump her freshman year of college. I personally think that high school is a time to learn how to be in a relationship and to deal with rejection. Do nothing now - but make sure he knows how important it is to prevent teen pregnancy and diseases. You don’t want him to make a mistake that will stay with him forever.</p>
<p>Clearly, you befriend the girl and start spending so much time with her at the mall and doing your nails together that your son becomes jealous and breaks up with her.</p>
<p>Sounds like your wife has the better parenting skills. He is 16- do you really think this is worth making that big a deal over? It’s not like he is going to marry her. I am sure he will have a lot more girlfriends over the years and there will be many you may not like. Get over it. It’s his choice, not yours (unless she happens to be a serial killer or something like it). The more you say, the more he will rebel. Find something important to get upset over and take your mind off of this. There have been a number of BF/GF’s that my husband and I have not been thrilled with over the years, but we have never said a word. Our oldest daughter is now married to the sweetest guy around. Seriously, would you have listened to your parents at 16? Sounds like you might be too involved!</p>
<p>Definitely, the more you say you don’t like her, the more attractive she becomes to him. You might try acting like you really like her, then he will think something must be wrong with her and dump her.</p>
<p>I have not always liked my kids choices in boy/girl friends. The only time I said anything was when my daughter dated a very abusive controller. Couldn’t not say anything in that situation. Didn’t get me anywhere and caused a lot of resentment on her part (though she finally make the decision herself).</p>
<p>Thanks to all who replied one way or the other and MizzBee I couldn’t agree more. This girl will be the one he starts with and anyone who thinks 16 is too early to worry about pregnancies and diseases is probably going to be giving long speeches after the horse is well out of the barn. </p>
<p>I’ll try to be more mature with my posting from now on so smog and others will take me more seriously. I am sure she’s frowning even as I write this latest sentence.</p>