Please knock this jealousy out of me!

Parent Cafe
81

I think my youngest has been feeling inferior when it comes to academics amongst a few of her long time friends. There is no doubt that at least one of the parents has judged her for not being as top notch as his daughter is …and she has heard his remarks about her.
She has sort of drifted apart from those friends this ( her senior ) year. He once commented to me that my daughter is " lucky to have his E*** as a friend " …but the truth is, she was more of a taker in their friendship and never really gave much in return.
I won’t be sad when they all go off in their separate directions , that’s for sure.

And this same father was insistent that his daughter study far more than any other student I have ever seen, even during the summer . Refused to allow her to get a summer job or even volunteer anywhere. The parents seemed very hellbent on her getting into an Ivy or otherwise very prestigious school , but she didn’t get into any of them.

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@lje62 Parents pushing the student generally only goes so far. The student has to want it too, from what I’ve seen.

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@lje62 What an obnoxious man! Your daughter is lucky to have his as a friend? What an incredibly rude thing to say.

Good riddance!

84

conmama, I would unfriend that person. I recently unfriend a person at work(just like Facebook), no hurting, but I felt that this person is a taker and rather not be part of that friendship. I never return email, text, nor phone call. Not mad, just don’t want to be friend with that person anymore.

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@lje62 - please send that “nice” man over to CC and we will explain a few things to him about being a decent human being, and how college admissions work. I’m sorry you and your daughter have had that experience.

86

This dad is a very strange man , there’s no denying it. We have known him for years and he has put his foot in his mouth more than once. Socially awkward and rude. He seems like he wasn’t satisfied with his own stature , so he wanted to have bragging rights about his bright daughter. I really don’t value his opinion on any topic, especially my daughter’s lack of perfect SAT scores and straight A 's. What matters is that we are proud of her and who she is as a whole and we wouldn’t trade her for any other :slight_smile:

Oh , and as a side note, he told me this right after I paid for his daughter’s flight and concert pass for a multi-day concert to Boston as a 16th birthday present for our daughter. They flew to Boston to spend the weekend with my oldest who took them to the concert…never a thank you , never an offer to pay for the airline ticket…I thought she was lucky to have our daughter as a friend

87

Sometimes it works in your favor when adults are jerks. My daughter had a boyfriend I was growing very tired of. His family asked DD on a trip, and the first stop was at some friends of the parents. Very wealthy. When she said where she was going to college, the friends made fun of the school and said some very insulting things. BF and family laughed, and they’d never been very supportive anyway. Although this wasn’t the sole reason for the break up, it sort of shook my DD awake, that these people didn’t respect her. I was very happy about the break up. Still am.

Facebook was my friend again when my DD posted a picture of her kissing a new BF. Old BF went a little nuts, wrote to me saying I never supported him and doomed the relationship. Okay. I’m still happy.

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I’ve found that during both kids’ senior years being an anti-social bridge troll who has never even been on Facebook seems to have been a net advantage for me.

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@twoinanddone That’s funny, and good.

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From the other side of the fence…

Sometimes, it gets annoying to be attacked for “bragging” when you share good news about your kid.

I have friends I never share good news about my offspring with because I know they will resent it. On the rare occassions I have shared good news, a couple of them have attacked me for “bragging.” Yet, these same friends share every single good thing their kids do with me. It gets stale.

Parenting should not be a competitive sport. Yes, that definitely means I should think I’m a better parent because my kid got into a more highly ranked college, law school, med school, graduate program than yours did or was offered a great job straight out of college while your kid is still unemployed. It should also mean though that if you called me to tell me your kid was elected student body president at his high school, got the lead in the school play, scored the touch down that won the high school state championship, etc., it’s a bit much to say I’m bragging when I tell you my kid got into his dream college.

My D’s first year roommate was a varsity athlete and a very pretty young woman. She was named in a campus publication’s list of “most beautiful people at [College.]” Her name was in the paper for her athletic feats at least a dozen times a year.

At graduation, the dean said that only academic accomplishments were being honored that day but, of course, other students had contributed to the life of the college in other ways, like sports and other extracurriculars. So, when they read off names, they did say things like “Susan Smith, English with honors,recipient of English department award for best senior thesis, summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, recipient of a Rhodes Scholarship,” Thomas Smythe, history," “Ann Thompson, dual majors in chemistry and economics with honors in both, cum laude.” First year roommate’s degree was plain vanilla–i.e., no academic honors.

Guess whose father went up and complained to the dean that it was “immoral” to make these distinctions. Graduating was an accomplishment and nobody should be made to “feel bad about themselves” because they hadn’t won as many academic accolades as some of their classmates?

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@jonri I guess you say it shouldn’t be competitive because everyone should just agree that you are a perfect parent while many of them fall so short of your flawless standards. You’d think that kids have no choice regarding their success from what you say.

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I’m envious when I read ANYTHING a “normal” kid is accomplishing. Community college sounds pretty good at this point.

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@albert69 That’s a complete distortion of what I said.I am not claiming to be a perfect parent. I am not claiming I have flawless standards. I am certainly not saying I am responsible for my offspring’s accomplishments. Nor am I saying I should put up a billboard in Times Square announcing them.

I do get annoyed though when FRIENDS who always tell you every single good thing their kids have ever done get angry when you share good news with them. That’s all.

And, yeah, I admit I found it funny when the father of the captain of a varsity sports team complained that academic awards were mentioned at a graduation ceremony because he thought it made 21 year olds who hadn’t gotten any “feel bad about themselves.”

YMMV

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@jonri You did say

Sounds to me like you are saying you are responsible for your kids accomplishments and that other parents are responsible for their kids’ lack thereof.

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@albert69 OOPS!! You’re right. There’s a typo. Mea culpa.

It should be " that definitely means I shouldN’T think …"

or should not.

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I joined Facebook but reluctant to add any friend for a reason. I just use it to look at my schools alumni pictures.

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@jonri Oh, I get it. Sorry…

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I knew a mom whose two kids worked for us. They were great kids and also great workers. The youngest was friends with my oldest. She loved to share and brag about their accomplishments but never wanted to hear about any of my daughter’s successes. She was more of an acquaintance than a friend , so I just stopped telling her anything and kept the conversations short if I did run into her

99

This thread has been interesting and has had me on both sides of the fence at times.

I chuckle a bit at a couple of things. Today is my D’s senior prom - can I post a pic or two of her? Or will I make other parents “jealous” that their daughter is not going to prom??? The answer to me is that that is silly, I won’t post a hundred pictures, I won’t say that she is the prettiest girl alive, etc. - it will just be a “look! D has prom tonight and this is how she looks!” - with the main goal for people who know and love her to share in the moment of HER night.

I do think that many parents equate their success with the success of their child. Greater success = greater parenting? I personally don’t buy that theory. Success is measured in MANY ways!

100

I just thought I should add as a student and not a parent: my parents have always been incredibly laissez-faire with me and my accomplishments. They have loved me and supported me fully, but seeing as neither of them are exceptionally educated (mom has a trade school degree and dad got education through the military) where I go to college has never been a big deal to them. The most they ever helped me with my applications was getting together our financial aid forms. When I applied as a sixth grader for a scholarship to the elite private middle school/upper school I ended up attending, I filled out nearly all the forms all by myself, and then just got my parent’s signatures. When I was little I called and signed up myself for all of my own dance classes, piano lessons, doctor’s appointments etc.

My parents were never neglectful, but they acknowledged that I was my own person and independence would help me more than any babying they could give me. Through all this I have done just fine, if not better than my friends whose parents have stressed about their futures 24/7 and helped them with every single thing. Maybe colleges don’t see that, but your kids will.

Your kids are not you. My parents always tell me that while they rejoice in my success, it’s not theirs to claim. I think if I had my parents’ stress on top of my own ambitions forcing me to do well, I would have been miserable. I just think you should keep that in mind as you watch acceptances and rejections roll in.