DD return from University

[user1465822474]

Only DD returned from Uni last week, skint. No sign of any summer job on the horizon (hinting will have the opposite effect to encouragement I fear), expecting free board and lodging for the summer (fine) and to be fed as well (not fine). AIBU to ask her to pay for her own food? She's got an extremely healthy appetite and certainly hasn't starved when at Uni- her diet has been way better than ours actually. Me and husband are both really hard up at the moment because both self employed and owed money so we really can't afford this- or any luxuries. My only one is a quarterly trip to the hygienist for a tooth polish but now I'm feeling guilty about that as DD says she's in real need of one too but can't afford it. Can feel resentment building up at same rate as bank account getting depleted (and we have until October of this, potentially). Don't want to upset her but not sure how best to approach the conversation we'll need to have pretty soon.

The problem is that the grant / loan / parents money is for 52 weeks and the student doesn't make it stretch and assumes that coming home for the summer is like visiting for a weekend, when you wouldn't be charged.

I see what you mean Schwabischeweihnachtskanne.

I suppose part of how I've brought my daughter (and stepchildren) up to be adults is to encourage them to look at choices.

So I'd want to say 'Well one option is to chill out at home. Only we're skint so it's going to be boring food and no treats. Another option might be to look around and see what temporary/casual work you can get. Then you can afford to do more becaues after a contribution towards the household kitty you'll have some spending money.'

Obviously if the bailiffs are at the door, that would affect how the discussion goes. But the above feels more like engaging with someone o on an adult level then saying. 'You have to get a job' Because to someone still in their teens it can sound very reminiscent of 'You have to brush your teeth.' 'You have to do your homework.' So there's a risk of triggering an adolescent reaction, rather than getting an adult response.

I think students should do something meaningful in the summer hols but might need help, or a push to do so.

If you make this holiday less nice, explain your financial situation, don't support her other than share a bit of food - no lifts etc next holiday she will be more receptive to your suggestion of a job.

I agree " you have to get a job" sounds bossy and makes people retreat.

It's not bossy. It's what adults need to do if they want to eat. If anything it's treating the other person like an adult to explain that money is tight and they need to contribute. Four months is a bloody long time to sit on your arse watching Homes under the Hammer.

Schwabischeweihnachtskanne, a lot of live in carers are in illegal and grey situations, but it suits the councils budgets, and the industry would collapse without it.
I’m not sure MN is quite ready for some of the harsher realities caused by hotbedding, don’t want to hijack the OP’s thread with it, and I have to 'vacate the premises at 10.00'.

TooLazyToWriteMyOwnFuckinPiece (love it! ) you'd be very likely to be treated as intentionally unemployed unless you file for bankruptcy.

HeadoftheHive and BusStop isn't the problem the fact that if the OP has got to the middle of June treating her adult child as if she is a 12 year old at boarding school and not mentioning that finances are tight at home then the OP has created a problem by infantilising her adult child for fear of upsetting her, then changing the rules when it is almost too late to find summer work.

Rather than saying nothing all year then in June saying "You have to get a job now, because I say so" the OP should have kept her DD abreast of the situation from much earlier. If the DD had been told at Christmas or in February, March or even at a stretch April that finances were desperately stretched to the point of not affording food, the need for her to work over the summer would have been out there and the Dd would have had ample time to realise for herself that she needed to find a job - and more chance to arrange to stay in her uni town or go elsewhere if employment would be easier to come by or more lucrative that way.

Expecting your adult child will contribute financially is fine if you treat them as an adult by discussing finances in a general sense with them in advance and allowing them to understand the situation in advance.

Sheltering and protecting and emotionally "coddling" then turning the tables when they turn up on your doorstep expecting the same treatment in June and saying you aren't going to feed her and she needs to get a job and pay up is a bit shitty unless this is an absolutely unexpected, unforeseeable, unprecedented financial emergency for the OP.

IT comes across as bossy - there are ways of getting people to do something without coming across in a confrontational way. Saying it in that way invites conflict, whereas explanation and action might not.

The other thing op might be able to do is have a live in house help. I,e. The DD. It's what I do with mine. ( and mum did with me) you work your passage. Board and lodgings for housework. All ironing, washing, cleaning etc. Op gets to be less tired, to chase those debts. Win win.

Absolutely schwab

I agree, it would have been better to have said something earlier, but surely students don't expect to spend four months having their every need met by mum and dad. Do they?

Exactly, the DD is equally to blame for not thinking to sort herself out with a summer job earlier in the year. She should have been doing this for both financial and personal development reasons.

As others have said 4 months doing not very much doesn't look good on a CV when she is up against people who have been working or volunteering.

BusStop who knows these days, sometimes reading MN there do seem to be some who seem to be treated like 12 year olds, with parents accompanying them everywhere and sending them Ocado internet grocery deliveries and phoning their personal tutors the same way they might have done in year 8 wanting to discuss progress or complain about the course or request essay deadline extensions on their behalf and expecting to supervise their revision and proof read their essays...

grumble grumble, grumpy old woman emotocon...

I'm sure in real life there aren't many like that.

Expectations of what summer at home will involve are largely down to parents though: going back to my uni days I always either worked or used saved money to travel or do other study not directly part of my uni course - however even though it would not have occurred to me to sit on my bottom and do nothing, it also would not have occurred to me to pay board to my parents, because I was under the impression they were financially comfortable and it just wasn't on my radar (which in my case was correct - OP seems to have created the same impression although it is not correct).

I'm not sure that we talked about expectations. My daughter and her university peers had obviously been talking for some months about plans for the summer. At Easter she announced she'd been interviewed for a job/placement abroad, and then told us a few days later that she'd been offered the post.

I do think friends have got a big part to play in all this. If they are enterprising and motivated and discuss plans together, then that will have its effect.

Elinor that's great - I guess the ones that go home with no plans to work are the ones who have no real initiative though... and if parents are struggling financially to the extent they cannot stretch to feed another person basic meals then the parents are doing their adult child no favours hiding the fact and leaving them thinking they can always come home and regress to childhood.

OP would have had the same problem or an even worse one if her DD, not knowing money was a huge problem at home, had lined herself up a full time voluntary position or internship in her home town - motivated, socially useful or good for the CV but even less chance of finding a paying job around the edges to pay for groceries...

if you can't lovingly kick her up the bum, who can? 2 weeks holiday, then job hunting. And fill her up on plenty of rice and lentil stews. Apples, bananas, but no strawberries and cream. Don't buy any fancy grub until she starts chipping in.

When DD3 came home for the summer after her first year at uni. She did have some money left from her student loan ( we had paid for halls as that's what we had done for her sisters). Anyway she did pay us some rent while she was home as she actually wanted to pay us something.
She didn't have a job but did do some voluntary work.

What's wrong with being bossy? Its the OP's house, her rules...she IS the boss!! The DD is clearly lazy and can't be arsed to find a job. Nothing wrong with the OP saying, "the condition of living here is that you pay x amount towards your food". Then getting a job becomes essential. If I decide not to bother working, my landlord is going to get "bossy" pretty quickly, welcome to the real world!!

Then getting a job becomes essential.

And if she can't get one - what then?

Starvation?

Food bank?

Dropping out of her university course in order to claim JSA/try her luck at getting a full time job?

Blimey. Hot bedding sounds unlikely to be legal for landlords (can it be?) and not very pleasant. .. but not as dodgy as I thought

It still sounds bleddy grim. I think I prefer the sound of whatever you thought hot bedding was.

What's wrong with being bossy?

It may not get her the result she wants - dd working and contributing financially to the household. It may result in dd behaving like a stroppy teen and 'rebelling' against authority. Having an adult conversation about the family's financial situation and how dd's contribution is more likely to motivate her.

The op is her mother, not her landlord. They have a personal relationship. Presumably, they love each other. It's an entirely different situation to the business relationship between landlord and tenant. I have never loved any of my landlords.

I can't get beyond the fact that on MN there are 19 and 20 year olds who would actually want to spend the summer with their mammy.
As others have said, in our day, no-one did it if they could help it. The ones who did go home were driven off in the family Ford Fiesta with their palms flat against the back window and their mouths forming a silent scream.

I spent most university holidays at home. I did work for a children's holiday company in the UK for 4 weeks in one summer and 2 in another but that still leaves almost 3 months at home. It's not that unusual.

Also what's wrong with people loving their families? Both my daughters came back to live after university (as they did 2 years at law school) and that was lovely. It was not a burden or nasty. (They both now don't live here and have bought flats but the fact they were here at that stage wasn't a problem - why would people not want to be with the people whom they love?)

I spent summers at home until a BF drew me away. Why would it be odd? I went to uni in a different UK country than the one I came from, it was nice to go home.
I find it stranger these days that so many go to the closest uni to their home town, though this may largely be financial.

Sorry "Then" but I happily went home every summer as did all my friends, and this was in the 80s. Very few stayed all summer, unless they had an absolutely wonderful summer job or internship or dreadful parents. Admittedly for me it was much easier to get a summer job at home (London area) than Uni (West Midlands).

Both my DDs came back home in the summer holidays while they were at Uni and both got jobs, usually one they had from the previous year or while they were doing A levels. At one point my elder daughter was doing 3 jobs - shop work at local Co Op, then a few hours in a local bakery then waitressing for the Little Chef in the evening. My younger DD did shop work in our local city. They just sent out cvs or wandered round our local shops looking for signs or just asking if any jobs available. No way would I have been happy if they spent all summer lying around expecting us to support them so they knew if they did not work they would get no money for clothes, going out or driving lessons etc which is what they were learning at the time. It does young people no favours to think they can be supported indefinitely and they need to learn the work ethic as we all did at some time or other.