Ds’s girlfriend coming for tea all the time

[LostFrog]

Ds1 is 15. His gf is also 15, but only just. They have been seeing each other for a few months. Since July she has been coming round for tea probably 4 times a week, except for when we were on holiday. She is from a v large (7 siblings, 5 of them younger) family who live rurally, about a 20 min drive away. No public transport so relies on parent to give her lifts. When she is not with us she seems to be staying at her friend’s house - she went on holiday with them for a week, and to a music festival with them. Quite often she will sleep round there after she has been at ours. I know her mum vaguely, but she hasn’t once been in touch to say thank you or to return the invitation. One time I texted her and phoned her because my son was late home and I was worried and wondered if they were together - I didn’t get a reply. When they have picked her up from ours they haven’t come to the door, they have texted her and she has gone out to them. I told the gf the other day I would take her home instead, and when she messaged her mum to let her know, half an hour later the dad turned up (parked down the road) and off she went!

AIBU to think they are being cheeky in expecting us, and her friend’s family, to basically feed and care for her? There has been no acknowledgement and no return invitation.

They are back to school next week so I have said to ds no more during the week, but I don’t want that to be taken to mean that we will feed her every weekend either, since it seems unlikely to be reciprocated. I don’t want ds to feel gf is unwelcome, but nor do I really want to have another mouth to feed so regularly when times are so tough. That said, I would probably feel a bit more accommodating if I didn’t feel they were taking the piss. AIBU, and what do I do?

Identical situation here. Like others have said, I do ‘cheap’ dinners 3 nights a week - pesto pasta, salad, bread / chilli / sausage and mash….I was the teenager once too

4 evenings a week is way too intense a relationship for a 15 year old. It doesn’t leave much time for homework, hobbies, sports, friendships and family time. It’s totally fine to have a limit on the amount of days you have house guests per week for everyone’s sake.

If you tell your son you don't want his gf round so much, what do you think the consequence of that will be? That you'll get to see your son MORE? Haha.

I echo a pp that my ex bf's mum was the same, when we were age 17. She didnt like that he spent so much time with me, his first gf, and she had less time with him as a result. Basically blamed me for him growing up and not sharing everything with her any more. The result was, no surprise, that he moved in with me and my mum for months even though we had a much smaller place.

If you push the gf away, you'll push your son away.

She's not pushing her away, she just doesn't want to have to cook dinner for her four nights a week. And fair enough.

Poor girl.

I do feel for her but I wouldn't be accommodating this relationship they're very young to be so involved.

I think it’s perfectly reasonable to not want another mouth to feed for half the week when prices as sky rocketing. I would have that honest conversation with your son.

@M08my They're 15.
How are they going to move out.
Most likely she'll dump him once free dinner is off the table.

My son is 16 and has been with his girlfriend for over a year now. She is always welcome here. As it is, he often goes to hers as well but even if he didn’t, for the sake of my relationship with him, I’d always feed her as well no matter what.

Next time she's round make up a small emergency that means you have to drive her home immediately, take DS with you.
DONT ASK HER, TELL HER. Get them both in the car and act normal/ chatty, get her to direct you or Google maps the address. Turn up and knock on the door and apologise that you had an minor emergency and had to drop her off, have a quick chat with parents to gauge what there like. If you feel bold enough/ you want to say 'sorry your DD couldn't stay longer, if it's convenient for you I could pick DS back up in an hour or so, after I've sorted X out.

To be honest I wouldn't be as bothers about the reciprocation as being a bit nosy as to what the parents are like.

Once there back at school try and get them to only hang out UP to dinner time so she can't stay for dinner. Weekends I'm not sure 🤔

Or make him cook and she helps, obviously still an extra mouth there but he might learn some VERY important life skills and takes a job away from you?

Might take him a while to get going but I'd definitely feel like it was worth it if he cooked for the two of them and the two younger kids plus washing up.

Maybe you and your partner could eat later?

This is good and compassionate advice

how much extra work/ money can 4 extra portions of beans on toast/ tomato pasta be really?

how much extra work/ money can 4 extra portions of beans on toast/ tomato pasta be really?
Why should the rest of the family compromise on their meals 4 nights per week.
Tea could mean dinner in the OP's home you're suggestions don't make for a decent dinner.

In saying that given her home life I'd make the effort to squeeze her in or let them have cereal every 2nd day for tea if money is a problem.

DS is a couple of years older, 17, but we had a very similar situation. GF was here a lot, often staying over. We had many talks about that, he had to get used to condoms being mentioned!

But feeding her was a problem: she had a food intolerance which I could easily work around, but also had an extremely limited palate. No spicy, few veggies, mainly beige. We eat mainly vegetarian food and love chilli, curry, stir-fries. DS would cook but got a bit fed up of chicken, chips, waffles etc.

However, I realised that she is one of 6 children (one of the oldest) and DS is an only child. Here she has access to a lot more peace, space and time. Often DS would work in one room, she would ask to use the spare room where we have a desk left over from WFH. I think she sometimes just wanted a break! In view of that, I kept my opinions on food, staying here and never meeting her family to myself.

She and DS are not together now- for lots of reasons. I’m worried about how she’s doing and if she’s going to find peace and space to study. They are at different colleges so DS won’t see her and I don’t think we’ll see her again as a friend.

Send a message to her mum saying that if her DD is staying at yours for meals this often, you expect a contribution of £x per week to cover food, heating, wifi, etc

I really hope you're not serious.

fucking hell. Would anyone really be shameless enough to do this?!

what the fuck?

Well you have already told your DS he can't invite her around week nights. Now I suppose he will want to go out to meet her week nights. I would invite her Wednesday and weekends. Better she is at your house, especially if she is quiet, than they are both off out somewhere every evening. I let my foster son invite as many friends as he likes over and feed them. I would hate the thought his friends did not feel welcome and would not feel comfortable if he was out wondering the streets in a gang of friends. I let them use dining room or conservatory and drop snacks and drinks in every few hours.

If you don’t want her there then you don’t want here there, it’s your home it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. But if the reason you don’t want her there is to stop them hanging out every night then you’ll quickly find it won’t work and instead they’ll just go somewhere else. Even if he says he’s just meeting his friends there’s a 50/50 chance he’ll just be meeting her. You also realise you don’t have to feed her right? If I’m cooking and there’s friends here I will occasionally offer them some too but I’ve often said dinner will be ready at this time sorry there won’t be enough for friend but they’re welcome to come sit with us or wait up here. Its never caused any problems.

Yes it seems intense that they’re together this much but it is very normal for his age and hard to stop and any attempt to stop it pushes them closer to them and further from our family. It’s was the same across all my DC and SDC and my sister and friends with similar age children say the same. I wasn’t to impressed at first but quickly realised I can’t stop it and there isn’t much reason it should bother me so why would I risk pushing my DC away over something quite inconsequential? I once asked half joking half serious do they not ever want to see their friends anymore instead and quickly learnt all the friends were the same “he’s always with his girlfriend now” “na she’s just with her boyfriend all the time aswell”.
Some of them broke up, dd is still with her boyfriend from school, DSS recently got back with his girlfriend from when he was 14-17 after 5 years. 15 year old DSD has recently started dating someone and we haven’t had a break from him all summer.

Do you really tell friends of your children they’re allowed to sit and watch you all eat but they’re not allowed to have any?!

Of course not 😂 I didn’t go into detail on that part as didn’t think it was that relevant. I offer to make them a sandwich/beans on toast/pasta etc, occasionally one of the DC will say actually they want pasta instead and give their portion to the extra friend, but if I didn’t know they’d be there for dinner then sometimes I just don’t have enough to feed them the same dinner. A lot of the time they decline the food I offer and just want to sit with us for the conversation anyway, very rarely they chose to stay upstairs or just go home.

@Lasagnainmyhair
Are you Serious about not offering food to your kids friends??

My daughter is 12 and whenever her school friends are here they don’t even have to ask for drinks and snacks as i leave small bottles of mineral water on the table and a big bowl of fruit and cheese sticks etc and I have ordered Pizza and Chinese food many times and I leave it up to my daughter and her friends to decide what they want then they just bring the iPad to me to check the order and press Confirm.