DD (15) just told me her BF is her GF and I didn’t handle it very well.

[sendwineandastraw]

DD 15 last night in amongst a a mad 5 minutes (3 DD’s having a tickle fight, trying to watching a movie, youngest DD spelling out, hang man style who her celeb crush was) said to me do you want to see who my crush and who I’m dating is…

Thinking she was joining in with the hilarity I didn’t take too much notice until her DS, she was sitting beside her said “OMG it’s ….” (DD’s best friend)

I still thought they were all joking about so did the whole yeah right thing, you can’t kid me they are just friends.

DD at that point started crying and walked out the room. I did try to speak to her after, told her I was always here if she wanted a chat but it wasn’t really the right time to drop something like that into the conversation, and it needs some serious discussion but she wasn’t having any of it.

Of course we have no issue with DD being gay/Bi/straight as long as she’s happy and she has actually said in the past that she isn’t sure if she likes boys & girls or both, and my DH and I handled that very gently, gave her a hug and told her it made no difference to us but it’s the fact that this has obviously been going on a while, sleepovers every weekend, speaking to each other on the phone (if we didn’t intervene) from afternoon to bedtime, not hanging out with anyone else but each other makes me question how we handle it moving forward, I just feel we have gone from a typical teenage girly friendship which involves, shopping , copious amounts of popcorn, and never running out of things to say to a fairly intense relationship that feels quite heavy.

I do believe she hinted they may be sexually active as made an odd comment last week about how she needs to pick all her underwear up from DF’s house as she keeps forgetting it!! I thought it was quite odd at the time but now wondering if that was the start of her wanting to tell me something was happening..

Am in no doubt there are lots of of sexually active teenagers who are very sensible at 15 but I can’t but help feel if this was a boy we would be putting the breaks on it as now feels very all consuming and not really what I want for her when she should be concentrating on having fun and her GCSE’s next year.

Sorry for the ramble I’ve just just woke up with it on my mind, to summarise.

We knew DD might not be straight and have no worries about it.

She told me in such a way that I didn’t take her seriously which upset her and made me question if I’d handled it correctly.

We have no issue with who DD dates but I always thought it would be a “I’ve met someone” or “such and such asked me out” I almost feel like we have been blinded into encouraging a much too serious and intense relationship under the guise that we thought they were just best friends.

DD doesn’t do anything else but talk about friend, to friend, hang out with friend and stay over with friend, we have had lots of discussions about how it would be good to do things with other people and it’s not healthy to spend all your time with 1 and that was when we thought it was just a friendship.

Help me sort this out please.

Just for the record I didn’t punish her, push her away, tell her she was wrong…

I just played it down because initially I thought she was joking and then when it got a bit serious didn’t think it was the right time when little sis who is 10 was hang manning Harry Styles down my back…though I get now that she might have picked that moment because it felt less serious and therefore confrontational, I guess she just really caught me off my guard.

I did try to talk to her afterwards but she wasn’t having any of it and reflecting thing possibly good that we have now all slept on it, I have spoken on here about how I felt and how to move forward and we are all less tired!

I remember being a really intense teenager with friendships, romances, causes, you name it. Everything at that age felt huge, all encompassing and all or nothing.
I was going to ask you why the intensity mattered more in a relationship than in a friendship and whether if you weren't aware of the shift in the dynamic, you'd be encouraging friendships beyond just this girl. But thinking about it, if my son (currently a toddler!) were in the same situation with a boy or girl, I'd probably want him to have more diversity in his social life too.
I think it's great she told you, even if it was clumsy. Teenagers don't tend to be tactful or graceful about these things, and I think maybe a nice way to take it forward is to have a non-confrontational chat about it while doing an activity together, and then to show you accept both her and her relationship, maybe offer to pay for a lovely dinner date at a nice restaurant for the two of them to celebrate their going public? Maybe I'm hopelessly out of touch, but I do remember at that age thinking going on nice dates to places adults went to on nice dates meant my relationships (with other scruffy goth teenagers!) were ever so sophisticated.

You've got 2 issues: (1) not responding to the news of the same-sex relationship "well" and (2) the intensity of the relationship. On issue 2, as the parent of teenagers myself I don't think there is a thing you can do about this. Any concerns you express about such an intense relationship in the GCSE year are likely to result in driving them even closer together. Young love IS very intense, the world doesn't understand them and they are the first people in the world ever to have felt that way. You remember, right?!

On issue 1, I sympathise with both you and your DD. She must have been trying to think of ways to tell you and worrying about it - and has just blurted it out when you were unprepared for a serious conversation. It's not your fault that you reacted as you did. From my experience with my own DD, I'd recommend not continuing to try to explain yourself to her, as that gives the notion that you "didn't react well" oxygen. Just carry on calmly as normal, and when the opportunity arises, repeat what you've said before: that you don't mind at all who she dates.

Then you can put some boundaries in place around things like how they spend time together at your house, just as you would if it were a boyfriend.

Good luck. You sound like a nice mum. I'm sure it'll all turn out ok.

how do you know that the relationship is 'too heavy' you were fine before you knew they were dating