To expect DCs to come with us to friends sometimes?

[Oneeyedbloke]

Just been to a little get-together at an old friend's house, she invited a few families we all know, specifically so that the children - all teenagers and 20somethings - could meet up. No big deal, and the purpose of the event certainly wasn't advertised as such. But our 3 boys all refused to go, citing their embarrassment at going to our friends' houses with us. Apparently, we don't treat them as grown-ups in front of other people. They're 21, 19 & 13.

So we went alone - our friends live about 10 doors away ffs! - and spent, admittedly, an enjoyable evening with the nice children of various of our friends, who are all turning out to be very sociable, chatty, capable young people. And I just wanted my DSs, who are just as chatty & witty & capable when they want to be, to be there. Believe me, DW & I are not into showing our kids off like trophies, we totally get being embarrassed by your parents, having suffered in our youth.

Which is why, when accused of embarrassing them, my response is, we SO don't. I have, once or twice, accidentally called DS1 'baby' in front of friends (mine not his), they just laughed it off, and he seemed to do the same. You know: Dad! But not a big deal. I apologised, didn't think anything more of it. But now it's brought up as evidence of how we're generally embarrassing. And I just think it's an excuse, for not wanting to get off their lazy arses and come and make the effort to talk to some people, who they actually have known for years, even if they're not best friends.

And today, we're invited to another friend's for their DD's birthday, very relaxed 'do', she's 14 and doesn't want a big fuss, but elder DSs are once again adamant they're not going anywhere with their embarrassing parents. DS3 (13) is coming, somewhat reluctantly.

This is, I know, the first-world problem of all first-world problems but it is pissing me off so much. We have not, I assure you, tried to 'show them off' on such occasions previously, we basically ignore 'em! Precisely because we know they want us to. Is it really too much to ask?

It's very odd to be arranging playdates for a thirteen year old, let alone two adults!!!! I wouldn't have been caught dead with my parents in public from the age of twelve and would have had no interest in hanging out with the type of people who hang out with their parents. I would be concerned if your 19 and 21 year old did want to go to a fourteen year olds birthday. That's strange.

Your adult children need to leave home to gain independence. They're never going to grow into men if they stay at home allowing their overbearing parents to dominate them and organising their social life. How infantilising.

Leave the thirteen year old to organise his own social life too, he's old enough to decide who to be friends with. Playdates are for toddlers and young children. Sometimes it may be necessary to organise introductions if an older child has issues making friends. By the sounds of it your kids are normal despite the helicopter parenting style.

It doesn't really sound like playmates to me - more catching up with family friends.
I wouldn't have agreed to go to a 14yos birthday when I was in my 20s, but I certainly still went to gatherings with family friends who had similarly aged "children". Seems like a normal family activity to me? Obviously if I had something else planned or didn't like the other family then I'd be under no obligation to go, but I'm surprised by how many people say they had no social interaction with their parents from their teens on!?

Marylou62 Yes, we've had the talk, and the general response was that they weren't keen on coming, not so much because of who else would be there - i.e. our friends and their DCs - more because we'd be there! And that hurts because I genuinely don't think we are embarrassing to be with, but I suppose we could review that, maybe promise not to talk about them in front of them, iyswim, not that I think we do. After all, that's the point of them coming along: so that they can speak for themselves. I just didn't see the others' DCs having any problem at all with spending an hour or so saying hello and chatting about what they're up to at uni, etc. No-one's asking for deep details of problems, bf/gfs or anything, it's just good to see friends' children growing up into decent young people.

lem73 You put it so much more succintly than I could. 'Invited as a family' - that's exactly it. It's never going to be top of their list of fun things to do but we do know some other families really well. They're not expected to stick around the whole time, and even when they're there we know they'd much rather not be talking to the 'oldies', as they see us, the whole time. It's just 'show your face and be pleasant'.

Maybe they don't much like the other DCs. I can't help feeling that all this 'you embarrass us' stuff is a bit of a red herring. Sigh, I remember having to go to family get-togethers as a teenager, they were always hosted at my auntie's house miles away and I didn't like it because I seriously didn't get on with my cousins and the evening would just drag on for ages. So I told my mum & dad and they were pretty good about not always making me come. If my DCs simply said, 'we can't stand X', I'd do the same. As it is, all our friends live really local so they can leave early and walk home - as DS1 and DS3 did yesterday after they'd agreed to come after all - which pleased me!

Surfsup1 exactly!

Oneeyedbloke I can see why this would be hurtful, but I imagine your sons completely get that you don't approve of all the time they spend 'doing nothing' on their computers. Particularly if you're making comments about how that means they're ignoring their friendships. I'm only a few years' older than your eldest, and if they're anything like me and my mates they are with their mates online playing games together. That's how a lot of young people socialize now, especially when friends are long distance as they often are when people have gone to uni or work. If this is what they're doing, they probably don't appreciate the (very very thinly) veiled criticism you've said you indulge in and might actually be looking forward to a few hours of being able to chat and have fun with their mates online without you there to have a go.

And they might find you embarrassing even in the absence of specific embarrassing behaviour: when you're a teenager it's not exactly a rational emotion, although I would have hoped your 21 yo would have grown out of it by now. I know for my db the mere fact of my parents' existence was hugely embarrassing from the ages of 12-20. They might not have specific reasons for this, and your questioning them about specific won't help: it may not be your behaviour that's the problem. It might even be the fact that you try so hard to get them to join in when they're perfectly happy doing something else.

The older boys are adults and don't want to go: if you object to how they behave in your house then they are old enough to find somewhere to live outside of it. You can ask them to do that. But you can't dictate their social engagements and they might be more happy to accept family invitations if there wasn't so much pressure on them to do so. Your youngest boy is still of an age where you can force him to do pretty much whatever you want, and he should occasionally be dragged out to see your friends. But you need to give a bit too and acknowledge that what they spend their time doing has value to them too.

lurkingbear Fair points re what they prefer to do with their time, socializing on the web etc. I'm well aware I can't force them & would never want to, not even the 13yo. There really isn't 'so much pressure'. When they object to my suggestion that they come along - with, let's not forget, the pretty hurtful assertion that I'm embarrassing - I don't rant at them, I accept their decision. But I'm not happy about it, hence coming on MN to moan about it.

You seem to make the assumption that, if they have different feelings about a proposed event, it follows that I must always respect that. I think x, they disagree, therefore I lose. I'm aware that trying to insist they came would be counterproductive as well as unfair. I wouldn't want them sitting there full of resentment. I accept a hundred and one things about my sons that range from odd to objectionable, and I accept this 102nd thing too. But I don't actually agree with them in their belief that they shouldn't come; I think they should, it does them good to talk to people outside their immediate family & close friends.

MN posters are so much more accepting of kids anti-social behaviour than anyone I know in real life. I can't imagine any of my friends who were still living at home not being expected to participate as a family member when family events came up.

But you need to give a bit too and acknowledge that what they spend their time doing has value to them too.
True - but this needs to be a give and take thing, not just a one-way street.

If my kids told me they found me embarrassing I would remind them that they have often embarrassed me too and tell them to suck it up and act like the adult they claim to be. Sitting in front of a computer all day is not something I would accept from any member of my family who wasn't being paid to do so.

Not often I sound like the authoritarian type on MN! I'm normally telling people that they are too controlling of their children and not giving them enough freedom or independence!

I like the sound of you Surfsup1 !

I stopped attending anything with my parents when I was about 16, including holidays abroad. If my parents had friends over I would lock myself in my room (which my mum dubbed "the batcave") and you couldn't have paid me to go along to something like you've described. I used to long for my parents to bugger off and leave me alone for a few hours.

Same Cherry

"it's an excuse, for not wanting to get off their lazy arses and come and make the effort to talk to some people, who they actually have known for years, even if they're not best friends."

Well of course it's an excuse because what you've described sounds effing awful.
Them not wanting to go because they wouldn't enjoy it is a perfectly reasonable reason not to go.

You only want them to go to enhance your enjoyment.

At the age of 19 and 21 your sons' overwhelming focus will be their own friends, jobs/courses and interests... it must be practically the worst age for wholesome events with family friends and banal chitchat about their college courses. Just because Derek next door has known them since they were toddlers doesn't mean they have to enjoy him asking them how their exams went and what bands they're into.

Let them be, in 10 years you'll probably be surprised by how socially skilled they are!

I think I stopped going with my parents to their gatherings around the age of 12, the only exception being visiting people whose children I was good friends with, grown up together and such.

Wow, Irene & MQv2, I never realised what an odd, unreasonable parent I am. I dictate my children's social lives to them, even though they're adults. I drag them along to effing awful, wholesome evenings of banal chitchat with my friends. What a bastard. This goes way deeper than embarrassment, it's a form of abuse, of slavery. And, worst of all, I fail to realise that, as a parent, when any sort of gap opens up between myself and my children, any difference of opinion on what is reasonable, I'm in the wrong because they are the oppressed and I the oppressor. How can they ever forgive me?

Never again. I'm gonna let them kill goblins.

It is absolutely an excuse and if you allow them to spend endless hours in front of a screen, getting no sunlight or exercise or real human interaction then their attitude will only get worse.

(I'm getting cranky at your kids now!)

However cool you think you are, you kids will think you are CRINGINGLY embarrassing by the time they are teenagers and will not want to be seen dead with you. Accept it.
A 13 you is a bit different, not yet adult so they have to do what you say - no arguing.

When they hit their mid 20s they will change again.

Yabu, sorry. It's not as if it was a big family do, such as a grandparent's birthday or something like that. 2 of your children are grown ups. I was living abroad and working when I was younger than that!

Not sure if I have got the worng end of the stick - but are your older boys still living at home? - If they are and they sit around doing bugger all and you feel they don't contribute fairly to the household (either in monetary terms or in terms of helping with chores etc. or both) then I think that is really where your grievance lies.

If they are contributing to the home, then I wouldn;t get too hung up over them socialising with family friends - I;ve got 2 kids - 24 and 30, at the late teens age they weren;t that keen on socialising with anyone other than thier own friends. Now they are more mature they don;t get hung up over the generational difference thing and happily socialise with people of all ages. I don't think at 21 my Ds would have wanted to go to a 14 yr old girl's birthday party.

I sense your angst is to do with a feeling of your DS's frittering their lives away doing nothing of value (I sympathise, I also see computer games as a waste of time, but I'm old fashioned) but at some point you have to try to chill out, relax and let them get on with their own lives even if you think they are making mistakes.

How does your DW feel about it all? In my expereince my exH used to get far more hung up over the kids and what they were doing when they were late teens that I did - I suspect there was an element of him losing control and not being able to tell them what to do any more, which he struggled with.

Its a transition period - they are still young enough for you to view them as'children' yet they are actually adults and view themselves as such and resent your interference in their lives., Once they get a bit older, and start behaving in more 'adult' fashion, I think it will get a bit easier for you all to see each other's point of view.