Married Man/ex work colleague continually texting DD

[expat101]

Subject title pretty much sums it up. She is 24, doesn't have an established social circle, he would be early to mid 30's with a wife and children.

What's acceptable these days and what would be a red flag for you?

Him messaging her is a red flag - he's sniffing around, seeing if he can line her up for an affair. Doesn't matter what the content is of the convo - it will slowly build to become more sexual once he feels he's reeling her in.
Whether she's up for an affair is up to her as she's an adult, but no, it won't be a 'friendship' and to deny that is to be totally naive.
There's not much you can do other than tell her it's not a friendship he's offering, and keep lines of communication between yourself and her open on the topic in case he becomes a stalky pest and she wants your advice.

What's acceptable these days and what would be a red flag for you?

Cheating on people is not acceptable and has never been acceptable.

Having mates has always been acceptable to some and will always be unacceptable to others.

I don't get what is about this particular situation between your adult daughter and her ex colleague. They're either friends or they're setting up to have an affair, or are already having one. Your 24 year old adult daughter probably hasn't been duped.

This would be viewed the same in 1972 or 2022

Well, from the information given, nothing inappropriate is happening. A 24 year old woman is in frequent text contact with a former colleague whom she still sees socially with a work-associated social group. Two of my best friends are married male ex-colleagues who are older than I am, and I’ve never had the slightest indication of anything sexual from either in decades.

Your daughter is 24! She is a young woman .I would feel it is a line in the sand TBH. However all you can do is warn her that he may not be all he seems (just a friendly guy) and have a hidden agenda.After that its up to her .She may listen to your concerns ,she may not.You will have done all you can

It feels weird that people are saying its grooming, she's 24 not a child, if its romantic at all it would be flirting.

My group chats on whatsapp notify me with the group name first, which if its a longer name, hides the name of the actual sender.

I am a similar age to OPs daughter and I do have converstions with work friends. Sometimes in groups or individually. Everyone is of different ages from 22 to 59. Its quite normal to have friends who are men and friends that are older than you.

I was friends with a man who I knew from work who was in his mid 40s and we kept in touch when I left the company, we mosty talked about rugby and game of thrones. Not everything is creepy.

You say you're old fashioned but if so why did you not bring your daughter up with the same morals?

That's if it's untoward. Because at that age I was friends with people in work who were older, and was close with one man in my work, platonically, but he was single.

If she is platonically friends with this man that's her choice. If she is flirting with a married man, well, doesn't sound like she has the same traditional values as you do. You're going to have to accept this now she's an adult, your chance to instil values in her is over.

I dont think there's enough info to say if it's a red flag. All you can hear are the pings, there's no saying that all the pings are him and you also won't have any gauge of how often your DD is replying.

If he is messaging her unrequited then that's a red flag but currently you don't know if it is your daughter instigating the conversation. You don't even know if he is replying to her 1:1, or if he is just participating in a group chat with old friends and your Dd happens to be in the group chat.
Equally it might be that your dd and him are having a perfectly normal conversation about her car or even that your daughter is actively pursuing him.

What's acceptable these days and what would be a red flag for you?

What's 'acceptable' is whatever the people involved are comfortable with. If you were my mum, I'd find you really intrusive and over-bearing.

Your notion that he should have stopped messaging her when she was away for the weekend with you suggests that you don't really understand the way people communicate these days. She was reading and replying to his messages, so he had no reason to believe it was a problem. If she was constantly messaging instead of engaging with you during dinner or whatever, then she was the one being inconsiderate, not him.

FWIW, I have plenty of male friends, some married, some not, and would and do) happily have a long conversation with any of them via messaging. Some of them are ex-colleagues. There's never been any flirtation or attraction. DP is friends with a couple of female ex-colleagues too.

She's an adult
She didn't have to respond there and then but she chose to. That's up to her not him.
All of my group chats are muted so sometimes when I check a group chat there could be loads. I might respond to a few of them one after the other so it will therefore look like I'm sending loads.... I'm just catching up!
You really need to leave her to it. It's absolutely none of your business

She's 24.

I'm guessing she knows full well what he wants.

If it were my DD I'd be making sure she was aware of the motivations of men like him. Ensuring she understood he was not her friend, but a man engaging in inappropriate level of communication with a much younger woman, at best to flatter his ego, at worst because he hoped for an affair with her.
I'd be clear about the techniques used by such men to gain young women's confidence, the fake friendship, flattery, confiding, and encourage her to consider how another woman would feel if her husband was doing this.
I'd point out that older men chasing younger women usually represent many red flags, from immaturity to controlling behaviour. That behind the facade of sophistication they are often have serious issues.
I'd encourage her to build relationships with people her own age.
I do this without judgement as I know how common it is for men to prey on young women, and younger women often don't.
Then I'd consider my duty done, back off and hope for the best.

She is 24 and whilst I get that you found it rude for her to be on her phone a lot whilst you and her away it seems like you are over invested in her private life and there is a fine line of being a protective mother and an overbearing meddler.

Unless she is a vulnerable person, at 25 she should be more than capable of managing her own contact with other people and telling others what is or isn't appropriate messaging.

And your basis for your knowledge of his motivations is what?

im no longer surprised that so many Mumsnetters regularly say they’re desperately lonely and friendless, if they regularly rule out as potential friends people who are (1) male and (2) older. I’d have missed out on some longterm, valued friendships if I’d automatically assumed my older male colleagues were trying to seduce me if they initiated text conversations at weekends.

Being in the world for a long time and knowing countless men.
Being a woman, both young and not so young, and drawing on my lived experience.
Not being so naive I would think for a moment that an older married man sending an unusually frequent number of texts to a young woman has only the best of motives towards that woman and his wife.
I'm not in the least lonely and have many friends. From the position of strength and experience this gives me, I am able to recognise a situation that is highly unlikely to be a genuine friendship, and enough other options to avoid it.

I’ve not managed to get a full go of all the posts as the page keeps crashing but are you concerned she’s entertaining it too much, OP, and even if it’s innocent now it may not stay that way?

Depends what the content of the messages are really. A former colleague sends me funny meme type texts, particularly about football which we are both into. Nothing personal, offensive or intrusive, and he did ask first before starting to forward them. I send them to him also.

If she finds it unpleasant the best thing is to ask him to stop contacting her or block him.

Thanks all, particularly those that mentioned group chatting as I hadn't considered that at all. I played around with some of mine last night and found the same name/profile pic always remained at the front, regardless of who was replying, although the ''drop down profile pic'' would appear first who had read the message, which I was not able to see, but the original lineup would remain the same eventually.

So I have misjudged the situation completely. Lucky for me I bounced it off forum members of MN!

OTT somewhat, we don't live in the same country, so the weekend was very special to me. It also means I can't look at her messages or have the chance to be overbearing (probably most fortunate in this example). I presumed, obviously incorrectly, that her friends would know she was away, but then again they might have been chatting amongst themselves and thus the pinging...

At least it's sorted. Thankyou again.