45 year age gap - Filipino bride

[binkyblinky]

Argh help me.

My step dad (mum's Ex partner) is in his 60s. He split from my mum when I was 14 and we have remained very close. He has been like a dad to me and my sister.

He is a lovely, warm, kind man. We both love him to bits. He has been unlucky in love and has been desperately lonely.

Well anyway he's gone to the Philippines and met someone - turns out she is only 19. (He has told us she is 25) but I've had a nosey on Facebook and found her.

I know the age gap is huge but I've seen bigger. I don't understand the attraction and I don't have a clue about Filipino culture. Is this the norm? Is he in danger?

We are going to visit him and have a frank discussion with him. She has applied to come over here on a work visa (she's a student)

Just wanted advice / thoughts. Also I know it's a shocking age gap. I don't need to be told that and I don't want to hear abuse towards him. I'm not keen on the idea.

Thankyou

WeeNurse makes a good point. European doctors like to improve their statistics and that means keeping people alive as long as possible, even when the individuals concerned are ready to fade out. Long after their interest in life has gone. My very DMIL is a case in point; she lost the love of her life 13 years ago, can't move forward and is lonely for 18 hours a day with a tv for company when her carers are not there. I wouldn't wish that existence on my worst enemy, male or female. We are too far away to be useful.

He will end up supporting her whole extended family. It’s a cultural thing and it’s important he is aware of and ok with that.

Just to explain, I lived in the Philippines for many years and this is the norm (financially supporting the entire extended family... forever). Catniss captures this in her post above.

I take a pragmatic view of these ‘relationships’. They are both adults. Each party is getting what they want out of it. She gets financial support and the chance to make a life for herself in a developed country, while supporting her family back home. He gets companionship and the chance to enjoy the body of a much younger woman. Who am I to judge?

Good luck to them.

This makes me angry.they are not exploiting each other !!

The power imbalance here means sorry but he exploiting her . I know that's hard to face when you live him but she is extremely poor and 19 years old.

Exploitation arrives out of lack of choices and freedom. Your step dad is not lacking in these things and she is.

When I was 19 I had just got my alevel results. Please stop judging this desperate girl.

Op it must be hard. Take a step away from here and have some time to think clearly.

Many people make foolish decisions. Your step dad has got carried away. Maybe you can in time sit him down and talk calmly to him.

I am quite well informed about the Philippines and trafficking from there. It is an incredibly poor country and most women seeking jobs in domestic work in the middle east will basically end up as slaves. The women know this . So this girl has a better deal than most.

Well I just googled life expectancy in the Philippines and it’s 66 for a man. Is it possible she thinks he will be dead soon, and doesn’t realise that in the UK we’re very good at keeping people going for another 20 years?

At 60, life expectancy in the Philippines is 77 years.
What people usually look at is life expectancy at birth, which is lower. Low life expectancy is usually caused by high infant mortality, not much shorter life spans.
She'll be used to men well into their 70s and many in their 80s.

I don't criticise her. She may even be under huge pressure from her family, and when you struggle to make a decent leaving in a poor country, who can blame them?

Him, on the other hand, could easily have started a relationship with someone closer to his age instead. But men tend to ignore those women.

There’s some really nasty stereotyping on this thread. I’d be more concerned about the fact that your poor old SD is exploiting a teenager.

Not helpful to you but I hope he does get fleeced. He is grotesque, an old man with a teenager. He went to there with the express person of getting a young girl. It's not exactly a normal touristy country to take a trip to. I would not worry about the dirty old goat at all.

Reason, not person

Gross 🤢

I cannot believe people are worried that your Step Father could be exploited? A 19 girl/young in Europe would be living at home, possibly at college or embarking on first year at Univeristy not having to sell herself to 60 old year man. She would be barely out if school in the Philippines. He may be lonely but face facts OP he is also creepy and pervy and exploiting a vulnerable young woman because he can.

What are you all on?! This man is not some poor innocent lonely old dear being manipulated by a devious young woman. He's a sex tourist who knows exactly what he's doing and the prospect of a geriatric husband satisfying his fetish with her every night using his old body is a better prospect than living the life she currently lives. These girls don't target millionaires to get platinum diamonds and Ferraris , they want a normal life that's possibly not being involved in sex trafficking. How depressing is that - he ought to be ashamed and TBH if I were you I'd cease the relationship

My dad and my uncle and their friends all older men have filo women.

My dad I think she was 23 or something had children already. My dad spent 20k on her buying her a shop and sending her money
He no longer talks to her because she was just using him.

Filo women think British men are rich and they want to upgrade their lives and these foolish old Brit men like my dad and yours fall for it

Nothing natural there. Feel sorry for her and somewhat sorry for him (if he doesn't know what's going on).

And I think their relationship ended because she wanted to come over here and my dad lives with his ex girlfriend who would of never had it
I’m not sure but he doesn’t talk about her anymore

Tbh the fact all him and his friends go there for younger women I do find it weird tbh and was shocked but one thing she looked about 35

I agree with everything GunpowderGelatine said above.

If I was in your shoes OP, I'd be reconsidering my relationship with him and feeling extremely upset and confused that he's known you since you were a teen, and now you're in your 40s and he has a teen girlfriend.

There was a 50 year age gap between Dh great-grandfather and his great grandmother but that was in a different time. Bit distasteful these days.

Honestly if he’s thinking a 19 year old finds him sexually attractive then he’s a fool and not being a nice man either. How could you have sex with someone who’s that young and not think they probably feel a bit sick about it.

I’d be worried about her well being and I’d tell my step dad. I know it’s an economic thing, but it’s awful really, she will have had pressure to support her family. You cannot blame her.

Hi OP. I live in a country very similar to the Philippines. I too think she would struggle to get a visa to the UK based on work.

I've seen so much of this kind of relationships and I can only give you the typical worst case scenario of what I've seen time and time again.

My guess is they will then attempt a fiancé visa or go ahead and get married in the Philippines and then try for the UK marriage visa. It will be tough to succeed because of the age gap.

If this fails, she and her family will likely persuade him to sell up and move all the money to the Philippines - buy or build a house and open a small business. The honeymoon period will be great and he will think it's the best thing he's ever done.

Expectations will be on him to provide and pay for everything and many times cover her whole family's expenses.

There are so many men who are trapped in this situation with no way back as they cannot liquidate the property or business and they may have burned all the bridges back at home. The fear of humiliation keeps them here and it's a miserable existence.

I'm not sure how much you can do to protect him right now but stay close and listen and if his future plans start to shape up like my example then please try to discourage him from moving because he will be at her family's mercy. The family dynamics in Asian culture has a way of sucking you in whole. So long as he and his money remain in the UK he still has control of his future.

You sound caring and lovely so I really hope I'm wrong. Just thought I need to warn you about what could happen if he decides to move.

Honestly, and I say this as someone who had a long term relationship with somone 20 year older than me, that age gap is disgusting and abusive.

She’s a teenager from a very poor country.

I know someone who married a Russian bride as others have said you have to take care of the whole family. The financial burden got too much for him and he was trying to find some poor fool to marry her sister to ease the burden.

A 40 year age gap is disturbing.

Quite frankly, I don't feel sorry for these men if they are stripped of their money. They seek these young women. And I doubt they think they are truly interested in them.

So your potential stepmother will be more than 20 years your junior?

He may well be lonely. But...sleeping with someone a third of your age?

If the Filipino girl is applying for a student visa and, I'm assuming, can afford to study in the UK then she's not in "desperate poverty."

Unless the guy is the one paying for everything of course. In which case why isn't he marrying her straight instead, might be cheaper and safer (because she won't be meeting 19yo British guys in school) for him.