AIBU to expect my daughter to accept my much younger boyfriend?

[Nephilim1964]

Hi to everyone reading this. It's a long story, but I'll try to condense it as I wouldn't want my first ever Mumsnet post to result in a spate of people lapsing into comatose states or just basically losing the will to live.

I'm a mum of 3 (grown) DDs and at the age of almost 50, I left my life in London to move to another part of the country to help my eldest daughter
after her divorce. I gave up everything, including my (then) 14 year old daughter to come here. I found a job and somewhere to live. I took a huge
pay cut and apart from my DD and my 2 lovely GC, knew nobody at all.

The man that I had been seeing for 9 years visited at first, but his long working hours and the travelling took their toll on our relationship and we
parted ways. We're still in touch and he's still my best friend.

However, eventually all the stress took its toll on me and I have now developed a heart condition brought on by stress. I've been made redundant twice in the 2 years since I've been here and my savings have all gone on living expenses. I'm generally a glass half full kind of person, but have been at a really low ebb. Anyway, last November, I was invited to a 50th birthday party and was asked to dance by a friend of the hostesses son. He was really sweet and respectful, and we got along really well. He asked me out several times over the course of a few weeks, but I kept turning him down due to his age - he was 24. Eventually I relented, but took it extremely slowly. I had no idea how badly my daughter would take it, but nothing prepared me for the anger and the vitriol that was to come - including saying awful things about me on Facebook. That was bad enough, but the thing that really broke my heart, was being unable to see my adored GC. I wasn't even allowed to spend Christmas with them and
Would've spent it alone if it weren't for my boyfriend's family taking me in.

Does anyone think that my daughter's justified in her behaviour or am I in the wrong for embarrassing her by taking a younger partner?

it doesn't give my DD carte blanche to dictate to me who I can and can't see.

She has carte blanche to dictate who her own children can and can’t see because that is part of her responsibility as a mother. Your GC are young and your DGD has mental health problems. She’s vulnerable. If your DD believes your behaviour around this man is crazy or irrational or selfish then whether she is right or wrong about that she may quite reasonably not want you around her children.

So if you really do want to spend time with your grandchildren then you might try doing more to convince her that you are a good person to be around her children - calm, stable, diplomatic, loving - and less to argue that you are right about this relationship and she is all wrong. Accept that she has concerns and prove that you are a good person by action not arguing. No matter whether she is unreasonable or not, if you really want to see your grandchildren you need to understand and respect her point of view about what's good for them.

Lol, Sam and Aaron Taylor Wood ARE HORRIBLY CREEPY. She met him when he was 17 and she was his DIRECTOR. They claim nothing happened til 18 but everyone on set disagrees. He comes from a really damaged home and stated that he felt he had no real family until he met her. They married when he was 18 and he adopted her two daughters. She then helped build his career.

It is the absolute definition of a power imbalanced relationship. She groomed him and I hope to god he gets away from her eventually.

Actually just to correct - they married when he was 21 but she got pregnant when he was 18/19.

If the genders were reversed, he'd be tarred and feathered.

Bloody hell A11

No, you're right Chip, few parents choose their children's partners, but most of us hope that they pick people that they have a lot in common with, are at the same stage in life, where the power balance is equal and where children are at least a possibility. I.e. - not Sam and Aaron.

Little - I agree, absolutely.

A11 you've mixed up Aaron with someone else. He has a good family background that he talks about in interviews (civil engineer dad, sis and sahm who took him to auditions) he's been an actor since age 6. He says he didn't like growing up in high Wycombe (boo hoo) www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/esmagazine/aaron-taylor-johnson-i-was-raised-by-women-now-i-m-raising-women-and-sam-s-the-best-woman-i-know-9323936.html

Nope, not mistaken. he came from money but interviewed multiple times about his depression and about how difficult his childhood was. I'll find and post the interview.

So he's been through a very bad time of it in life lately and now he is in a relationship with a woman who has dumped him twice.

That will do wonders for him.

OP his rough patch isnt over and you haven't helped.

You are the next bump in the rocky patch...a woman who keeps dumping him.

At twenty four, this man is not a child, he has free will and can choose to do what he wants to make himself happy. So if he wants to date an older woman, why are people fretting about him having children or what "older people" look like or what stages of life they are both at.

The only thing I'm finding creepy is how much people think they have a right to tell the OP things like it's disgusting, creepy, taking advantage of a kid etc.

I do understand if you feel a relationship isn't for you, because we all have a right to our own preferences and to voice them - I'm pansexual and have non-monogamous relationships and I don't expect everyone else to feel the same way I do about those types of relationship, but I do expect my being this way to be respected. I do understand being concerned for vulnerable people, because I was "groomed" by an abusive man when I was emotionally vulnerable who was closer to my age than many relationships I've had, so it does happen and it's relevant perhaps to look at motivations.

But I don't understand trying to say that this particular relationship is somehow wrong and creepy and disgusting and he's in it for a mother figure and she's taking advantage of a vulnerable or young adult.

I don't understand why the OPs situation regarding her younger daughter is relevant, sometimes parents make decisions we wouldn't, but that doesn't make them bad or wrong either, and certainly has no bearing on their adult relationship. I don't think the previous situation and support from mum towards daughter is all that relevant either, although I can understand feeling hurt about it.

I do think we can't dictate that our children accept our relationships, no matter how much we've given up to support them through things in their lives, but I do think that we could expect our children to treat us respectfully despite not agreeing with it (when I came out, so to speak, I expected people to make their own decisions about acceptance, but to also be respectful), so yes I do think it's a bit unfair for her elder daughter to be so vehement about this choice her mother made and in such public forums as Facebook. You can be unhappy about something without being disrespectful, my mum's dated plenty of blokes I didn't like and who I felt weren't great for her, but I also respected her right to choose who she sees.

Which is why - as I've said - I suspect that there is more to this than the picture the OP is painting, as she and her DD have obviously had a good relationship until this young man came onto the scene. She obviously feels so strongly about something that she has cut off all ties and the OP doesn't see her DSC any more. That's a pretty drastic step for any daughter to take - just hope the OP thinks a short relationship is worth it all.

When i started dating DH 24 years ago i was 19 and he was 42. But i wouldnt be comfortable dating a younger man. I just wouldnt Its just the way i feel.

Correction, you're not 50, you're 52, which makes you 28 years older than your boyfriend.

And, for the record, Sam Taylor Johnson and Aaron Johnson is extremely creepy. And Halle Berry, Kylie Minogue, Madonna and anyone else who dates men 20 or 30 years younger than them is also creepy.

Why is okay if the older partner is a woman, rather than a man? I'd be horrified if my 24-year-old DS hooked up with a woman almost 30 years older than him.

Op has implied her DD has mental health problems. Yes the story from her DD may be very different. However, the story my mother would tell of me is very different because according to her I am the enemy who hates her (this is total total narcissistic projection on my mother's part). Op doesn't seem to be covering anything up and maybe I'm naive but I tend to believe what she's saying.

The DD is fine - it's the GD who had mental health problems. I'm still going for the OP not giving us quite the full story.

Sam and Aaron is creepy as fuck. He was a teenager and she was his 40 something director. The power and age imbalance is huge. Bill Wyman and Mandy Smyth were another lovely healthy couple.

YY Bam And he wasnt tarred and feathered like a pp suggested at the TIME back in the 80s. Instead the press were referring to Mandy and her friend Emma Ridley as "wild child" There were regular photos in the NOTW every Sunday of a 15 year old Emma dancing on tabletops in nightclubs. And Mandy was only 13.

Yes, I know op has discussed her GD has mental health problems. But I'm thinking her DD does too from what op has said.

I can't see any reference to her DD having MH issues

Haven't read all the thread but have gotten the gist. Regarding you leaving your 14dd with her Dad for the right reasons - I actually don't get what the fuss is about with some of the replies. He is her Dad and once you maintain a good relationship with her that is the important thing.

As for your eldest daughter she sounds like a right spoilt brat. You had her young so I'd say you over compensated her with a lot of things. You have been there for when she needed you and you do not deserve the hard life she is giving you.

There is quite an age difference between you and your partner - however once you are both happy and harming no one sure get on with it. Your daughter has no right to carry on the way she is. She needs to get over herself and hopefully she will. It is very sad that you don't see your grandkids and very wrong for your daughter to use them as a way to get at you. I really hope things work out for you and you mend those bridges with your daughter.

Just to say that actually mothers do not have carte blanche to decide who their children see - grandparents have rights which will be protected by the courts if necessary...

I doubt that the courts will be particularly bothered by this one - and if the OP wants to further drive a wedge between the 2 of them then the courts are really going to do it.

Grandparents have no automatic right to see their grandchildren, oblada.

Here's more info (presuming you're in England or Wales) www.thefamilylawco.co.uk/information/what-are-grandparents-rights/

Dailymail hijack www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3638847/Mother-three-s-dating-younger-man-ripped-shreds-Mumsnet.html

^ Lazy fuckers.

Daily Mail dickheads. And they can quote me on that.