DD and boyfriend are wasting their lives

Reminds me of AbFab! Eddie and Saffy 😉

I think it’s good that your DD and her BF know who they are and are not pressured into doing things they don’t want to do. They sound happy.

I don’t really look back at my 20s with any fondness, I partied too much and I didn’t really enjoy it that much. It was just expected at that time and where I grew up.

No, we don't know. I don't think they sound isolated to me. Their lives involve interactions.
They sound happy.
I'd just let them be.

I have some questions...
What was she doing between the ages of 18 and 27? Did she do different things then?
And I can't remember if I actually asked this before or just in my head but do they have ambitions, hopes, dreams? Are they working towards these goals?

It’s very easy to remain isolated at work. And they are going to the Peak District together to do their usual activity - just in a different place. Probably totally fine. Maybe a bit codependent and avoidant. We simply don’t know but there is value in discussing it.

i have a son who may look wholesome but I know is avoidant. And it doesn’t make him happy. If he found a partner to be avoidant with he would never take any risks again - personally or professionally. He is Nd so I am hugely supportive but I do challenge him to try new things - on the occasions he does I can see he is proud and enriched (and sometimes it’s too much and that’s also ok - at least he knows).

my parents are at an age where partners (usually the men) are dying and there are so many lonely women of that generation who are now cut adrift. My dad has rampant adhd and is always super busy with his own projects - my mum has had to develop her own interests - some wholesome like this, some a bit more challenging but she’s done them on her own and I am super proud of her and know she will be ok if and when he dies.

They're both going out to work. Their planned holiday is walking in the Peak District. They're not isolated.

I see your point. I think this is what is so interesting about this thread because I believe that you can potentially isolated in quite a wholesome way as well as the smoking spliffs in the bedroom way.

I actually love crafting and nature myself but I also know it is a way to avoid real life/people/challenging myself. And challenging myself is when I’ve found the biggest rewards and personal growth. That’s not to say it has to involve being a white saviour in Africa or climbing 30 Munros - but actually volunteering in the community/ taking a risk with a work project etc brings so many more rewards and challenges ultimately than endlessly sewing cushions (which is my displacement activity when I’m stressed 😆).

My son is more like this than me and will always take the easy, non threatening option rather than push himself - socially/academically/new interests he has expressed curiosity about that pass him by because he’s deeply in his comfort zone.

On a more basic level - getting drunk and sharing with friends on a vulnerable level massively enriched my life and relationships - I know that’s not for everyone but I do think this generation of so many surrendered wives (endless ones on instagram) homesteading and making chutney to the exclusion of everything else has created this environment.

I know plenty of people will disagree with me but I’m just putting a different perspective out there. I do think the op has not done herself any favours in the way she has presented this. I guess I’m just musing on the value of a bit of balance.

It sounds totally idyllic to me. I wish I could go back and live a life like that in my 20s instead of the awful choices I made and the shallow values I had. The world is a pretty awful place and to be able to live with such calm among the chaos seems a pretty genius move to me.

OP, you seem to have a very fixed idea of when people should do things in life. The best travelling I have ever done was with my teen DC when we finally had enough money and they were old enough to appreciate long haul holidays. We were still on tight budgets but we took them to USA and Japan and they loved it. Maybe your DD will travel later in life. Airlines allow people over the age of thirty onto planes you know!

I partied in my 20s, rolled home drunk far too many times and spent so much money. I’m quite jealous of your DD that she has found someone who she is comfortable with doing such simple lovely things. We were always looking for something. Sounds like she has found it.

What DD and her BF do sounds so so nice

....much as I hate the countryside and hobbies and walking, I think I'd rather have their twenties than yours.

God knows. It’s such a weird thing for a mother to be dissing her own daughter and partner’s lifestyle choices because the mother thinks they’re just too darn wholesome for her liking.

What's the point of this thread?

This was more in response to @CancelTheTableAlan than the OP, but point taken.

I don't think they're "isolated". They're working, going out, having holidays.
I was expecting a tale of woe about someone never leaving their bedroom, vaping and smoking spliffs.

Yabu. There's more to life than partying even in your youth. I'm 30 and I haven't enjoyed clubbing or getting up to all sorts since I was 20. I'd much rather be living the life your daughters leading than the one you did. You remind me of my mum tbh so perhaps this is a generational thing as my mum's generation seems to be more into that thing whilst my generation seem to be more inclined to be home bodies.

I sort of agree with this but I’m not sure that’s what these people are doing? They seem quite isolated - and as I said in my earlier comment - I would want to differentiate between a kind of co-dependent sense of safety and genuinely loving the simple pleasures.

I have no idea which end of the spectrum they are on but I feel like the op is trying to articulate something (albeit not particularly well) here about the former.

Those are excellent points, @ObelixtheGaul .
👏

That's true, but there are more different people on our own doorstep than we know, I think.

There are some people who know a lot about the plight of famine victims overseas, but nothing about the little old lady 3 doors down who has dementia, no family to visit and can't always remember if she turned the oven off.

I think in our urge to get out and 'experience', we've lost community understanding. I'd far rather see young people spend a summer volunteering or working in their local communities than charging up Scafell or VSOing.

Because the truth is, there are different bubbles people can live in, and one of the most persistent ones seems to be the bubble which those with time and money surround themselves in their own bit of the world.

OP said she wanted her daughter to see the 'real' world. The real world is the neighbour battling with severe depression, the person begging in a dirty sleeping bag, the family caring for a loved one with severe disabilities.

I think if we want to push ourselves, we need to stop thinking that the 'real world' only exists in far flung places. Time and time again I have seen on here laments about the loss of the 'village' juxtaposed with remarks about not leaving your home town being a bad thing.

Right now, in these troubled times, I think it's just about the best thing we can do. We need to learn to work as communities again, to see what needs doing in our neighbourhoods and do it, rather than run away from it.

There are plenty of people with very different lives right here. Those people we could be helping who have travelled a long way in dangerous conditions, instead of complaining about their existence. Those people who also never left their home time town, but maybe are living with difficulties you or I have not experienced.

It's amazing what you'll find if you just walk up the road. And if you aren't the sort of person willing to do that, it doesn't matter how far you travel in miles.

Few people learn much about themselves or others by looking through the lens of a visitor who knows they can go home any time they like. Some rare individuals, like Bruce Parry, who live and work with threatened communities really do experience a different world, but your average British traveller, even if working, really doesn't, and seldom carry it with them when they return.

Those that stay and quietly support their community learn far more. But that's just my opinion.

Thank you @Coffeeishot@Fetchthevet

Be happy they are safe in their beds every night.

this sounds like a you issue. Maybe you need more adventure in your life rather than try and live vicariously through them. Go and book that backpacking adventure if that’s what you want to do. Before you are too old to do it

I’d say you’ve got the wrong end of the stick…if they were clubbing and getting up to all sorts, I’d say they were wasting their lives away! They’re happy doing wholesome things, leading an stress-free simple life…applaud them! Not everyone who gets drunk at bars and clubs, doing recreational drugs, hungover etc is making the most of their lives 😆 what an odd perspective you have of what constitutes wasting their lives away!

Yes definitely the Waterboys.

I think it was The Waterboys

Anyone now singing the bluebells “whole of the moon”?