To think that two 18 yr olds can walk for 5 minutes

[YeahRightWhatever]

DS has a new g/f who lives about 5 minutes walk away, on busy-ish roads, well-lit etc. Her parents are really over-protective IMO, she is driven everywhere and has never been on a bus or a train on her own or even with friends. Anyway,they are not happy with her walking home from here even if DS goes with her - especially in the dark but transpires they are not even happy with her walking in broad daylight. We live in a very average town in the shires with no particular crime issues. My DDs (now in 20s) were allowed much more freedom at the same age. So whenever she is here either we have to drive her home, which means we can never have a glass of wine, and frankly I resent starting the car for such a short trip or she has to get one of her parents to collect her, and depending on what they're doing there can be quite a delay, and a few times now this has impinged on our own arrangements. Overall this is starting to really annoy me - they are 18 FGS. Am reluctant to rock the boat as gf is lovely. AIBU to think they are being ridiculous? But even if IANBU I don't know what to do.

The more I think about this, the weirder it is. Her parents are not happy about her walking for 5 minutes, in a residential area, in daylight, accompanied by her 18 year old boyfriend? But surely she and your DS sometimes go out together, to bars, concerts, outdoor activities, other friends'houses etc. If not, how did they even manage to form a relationship in the first place? Can they really only ever have been at school and each other's houses and driven everywhere in between?

"I think you need to go and see the parents and discuss this. "
No! She is an adult. No one consults my mum if im going anywhere.
jessie, me too. By this logic this 'girl' must never go anywhere.

Exactly Stealth, you do not discuss adults with their parents!

I feel sorry for this girl - it really is a shame that she's not going to university as that could be a good way for her to realise that her parents are not being normal or helpful about this.

It may stem from "caring" or "worry" but they are not helping her to be a happy capable adult.

what happens when she asks to go to a nightclub with firends, or Kavos/ibiza/malia.....

YANBU, but your ds might want to get out of the relationship now. They won't be letting her out of the hosue till she's married I imagine.

Also I would not feel the same way about 14 year olds. But 18 is an adult (I was living in a foreign country, on my onw and working)

I mean seriously. Let your kid grow up

protecting your daughter is a key part of parenting. good on them.

Rabbit do you actively parent another adult?
Do you not see that a key b part of parenting is getting your children ready to be an adult in their own right? And here, her parents have failed.

rabbit she is 18

She could be married/in the army/ have a child of her own now.

But what she can't do is walk five minutes alone to her own house. She's basically been infantilised in to being incapable of looking after herself.

Do you ask your mother's permission to walk home at night?

I thought my parents were overprotective but have come to realise they were quite moderate and in some ways liberal. They panicked aboit me walking home at night but by tbe time I was 18, my having sex was none of their business and they wouldnt have dreamed of tryong to influence me in any way.

what would she do if her parents died tomorrow? She is hardly going to be put in to foster care is she? She'd be fucked, and probably move in with the first man willing to treat her like a child

rabbitlady are you the mother by any chance?

Rabbit is that a joke.

it is not like her parents are refusing to let her get the last subway home alone from the bronx.

Walking 5 minutes with another adult (her boyfriend) through what I suspect is a naice safe,mc area......

Sons are worthy of protection too.

Forbidding an 18 year old from taking a short local journey on foot in broad daylight is not 'protection' but quite the opposite (unless the gf has a mad stalker we haven't been told about).

This girls parents are bonkers.

When I started high school aged 11 I had a ten min walk to/from the bus stop along a busy A road with no footpath. And there are plenty of 10 year olds in my sons school who walk 5 min to /from school too, both boys and girls.

They're doing the girl (actually young adult) a disservice to not encourage more independence .

If she lets this continue at what point could she move out.

21, 25

30......

Bonkers! I host foreign students, all girls, mostly from Europe. From 15 they are allowed out in the evening until 10pm, to use the local buses etc as long as they stay together (we live in a pretty, "safe", tourist type city). There must be other reasons for this girls parents being this over protective, I would want to understand what those reasons were before pandering to it.

Teaching your daughter to protect herself is a key part of parenting, rabbitlady. Treating your adult daughter, who could be married with children of her own, or in Afganistan, is very poor parenting and I suspect that the daughter will cut the apron strings as soon as she gets chance to get away. (The sad alternative is that she may be scared to live away from home.)