To advise my dd that she should expect to be picked up in the car for a date?

[Hellandhighwaters]

I have just been informed by my lovely dd (age 19) that she is going on a third date tonight. I am lucky that she chats about her dating life and I genuinely never pry or ask her for too many details.

She is a university student (as is the lad she is seeing). She’s just messaged me to tell me he has made last minute plans and asked her to come to his tonight. It’s raining, so she is deciding whether to walk or get an uber. This is where we disagree - the lad she is seeing has a car and it will be a 15/20 minute walk for her, but would be less than a five minute drive for him to pick her up and take her back to his.

He sounds nice enough and they have had a pub date and also been out shopping together on their second date (when he did drive and they went back to hers). She’s taking things really slowly with this boy after having a really horrible dating experience in her first year at uni. However, aibu to think it is not very gentlemanly that he has not at least offered to pick her up (in view of the weather). She genuinely does not mind walking and goes everywhere on foot normally as a skint student, so she got annoyed when I suggested that it was a bit lazy of him to expect her to walk to his in the rain, without the offer of a lift. I said that back in the day, all my boyfriends who wanted to see me came to pick me up in their cars (before I passed my test) even to go on local short journeys. Am I just old fashioned and aibu? She has just said that if he isn’t drinking and doesn’t offer to run her home later then that will be a red flag!

They went back to her place on the second date, I'm not sure this is really moving slowly. And nothing wrong with that.

Thanks for all your replies. She’s rang me this morning to say she had lovely time. He walked her to her Uber home and held the door open for her. He’s nice and respectful and is talking about where to take her out for their next date. She did not stay the night as she had work this morning.

As a side note, she had travelled back uni after visiting me yesterday and he said that he would have come and picked her up from the train station if she’d asked (which she wouldn’t have dreamed of doing!) I am very lucky that she wants to share her dating stories with me. However, I have taken on board all your comments and just listened without prying for any further information or passing an opinion.

Hehe, maybe I'm lucky but DH opens doors, walks on the correct side of the street etc. Definitely don't behave like a lady,. Also, I'm the only driver in the house and handle our family finances.
But it was drilled into him by his parents and something he does automatically... so not to 'impress a lady' like some PUA.

You need instinct and life experience to form an overall impression of someone's character I think I went on many, many dates and while people did a mixture of the 'right' and 'wrong' things logically ticking them off as red or green flags just wouldn't work. I had to follow my instincts. Honed through experience.

A lot of things we know subconsciously, but 'rationally' someone seems good so we ignore it, only to regret it later. Of course instincts are not always right, but neither is being rational in character assessments so don't ignore either

You do have to be careful with how a lot of MNers insist on the most negative possible interpretation of a situation they don't really know about.

From some comments you'd think your daughter was simultaneously the victim of an overbearing mother and an entitled new boyfriend demanding sex.

In reality I'm very happy she seems to have had a lovely date with a nice man, and that she has a healthy, open relationship with her mum.

All of these things are down to personality. It’s like someone above saying chivalry is about control and yes at times it does look like that. Other times it’s manners but should work the other way eg if she was the one with a car, although the messed up thing about nowadays is if she had a car and he doesn’t everyone would call him all the names under the son. Is like when on first dates (programme), they talk about paying. When the guy says he will most women say oh no, but don’t mean it. When the guy agrees to split you sometimes see the woman trying not to look pissed off!! And there’s times I say ‘could he not have paid?’ I feel sorry for men sometimes😅😅😅

You can dislike the coarse terms but your abc points are amiss…

a and b - she said she wants to take it slow (she could change her mind, but for now it’s going slowly)

c - of course, but would it surprise you to know that some men don’t hear “no” very well?

Im really, really pleased to hear she had such a great time.

But let’s not pretend that it was inevitable that it would all be fine and that it couldn’t have been any different (and for too many of us, sadly is)

She told her mum she wants to take it slow. It's nice that she has a very open, healthy relationship with her mum but even given that, I don't think that many 19-year-old women will cheerfully tell their mother they're popping over for a booty call.

And yes, of course unfortunately going round to a man's house is a risk. But it's a risk we're all capable of assessing as individuals. She obviously likes and trusts this man, and it's her prerogative to make that decision - neither she nor he deserve lurid depictions of their actions and characters.

Also see women being offended when he offers to pay as not being treated 'independently'.
There's a lot of dross out there but really. The man can't win.,
Why can't people just say what they mean?

@gannett totally agree that women can have as much sex as they like with who they like, but OP stated that her DD had been hurt in the past and was taking it slowly with this man. She sounded like she was (literally) walking into another bad relationship.

You remind me of my dm op. She was constantly telling us to know our worth and saying that if a man is really interested he will go above and beyond. She once refused to let me go out to the car when a date beeped his horn rather than came to the door to knock. She said that no daughter of hers was being summoned by a bloody beep, and when he finally came to knock she made sure he knew what she thought of his lack of manners too!

It may be old fashioned and I often didn’t want to listen as a teenager but she was absolutely right. Her advice helped me to weed out a lot of bad apples. She always said that if a man isn’t giving his best in the early days when he’s trying to impress, imagine what he’d be like when you were married.

I recently lost my dm but she very much approved of my dh and grew to rely on him as much as me. We have been married over 20 years and while he drives me bonkers he still goes above and beyond for me in lots of ways. Op there is nothing wrong with wanting the best for your dc and encouraging them to expect more. I often think that if all mothers were like this we wouldn’t have so many fabulous women lumbered with lazy, useless men.

I'd find the lack of independence a complete turn off. She's an adult.

Thanks @SchoolQuestionnaire your story about your mum berating your date made me laugh. Sorry on your loss, I
miss my late dm every day.

I must admit it used to drive me mad when my dds first boyfriend used to come round and text that he was outside rather than knocking on the door. I didn’t say anything to him though!

I agree with you and my comment only came from wanting the best for her. One lad who she met on a night out got quite cross because she wouldn’t take a half an hour train journey to go and see him first He had no intention of meeting her half way or coming to see her first. I agree that good early impressions count, but will try and refrain from being as vocal in the future when she is in the new stages of a relationship.

And how would him offering to collect her in the car (you know, the thing that the thread was about) have changed any of this? Rapists also have cars.

He should offer to pick her up.

But more to the point, having a date at his house, at this early stage, is low effort and definitely not taking it slow. I’ll say cheap too and just not a date really. They have years to act like an old married couple.

When I was young, my mother told me that if a young man really likes you, they can't do enough for you. If they don't, they'll be the one leaving you to walk home in the rain alone. I thought she was really old fashioned and I was too cool to take that on board, but my experience was the same.

Maybe he doesn't need to give her a lift. She also doesn't need to trudge to his house in the ring to suit him either.

Times have changed, I think. I’ve seen young men getting a mouthful from women when they’ve offered them a seat on the tube, etc. Wouldn’t even occur to most young women not to be responsible for getting themselves around now.

Anyone saying that a visit to his house is low effort makes themselves sound high maintenance tbh

These are poor uni students. Snuggling up watching a film with a take away is fine. It's a good way to get to know each other better. Dates don't all have to be big trips to here, there and everywhere.

He’s not her dad, and she’s not 14.
A grown arsed woman can get herself fronA to B even if it is raining!

‘I’ve seen young men getting a mouthful from women when they’ve offered them a seat on the tube, etc. ‘
oh shut up have you! I’ve seen lots of people offered seats on the tube who’ve said ‘ oh I’m ok thanks, getting off next stop’ or ‘ thanks, but I’m okay’ and plenty more of ‘young men’ sitting and completely
ignorjng anyone else - which is the norm on the tube.
But have I ever, in 30 years of constant tube travel seen a woman going off at someone for offering them a seat? No.
And nor have you.

I'm with you OP, he should have offered.

However, we can't control other people and maybe previous has made him reluctant to do so.

So in the absence of him offering she should feel confident enough to ask him if she ever doesn't fancy walking.

So true!!

Unfair to criticise uni students for having to do anything cheaply.

Not just uni students either what with COL and all.

Completely disagree that a date at a man's house is substandard either. My first date with DP was at his house and it was an opportunity for me to be blown away by his cooking - he put a lot more effort in than other men who might have taken me out, but to places with no imagination or thought. I remember thinking, if this works out I'll be eating good for the rest of my life (and indeed I have been).

Play to your strengths is what I say. If you're a man who isn't rolling in money but can cook up a storm, focus on the latter.

Only a handful of posters have pointed out that the last minute change of plans to just go to his place on the 3rd date is entirely inconsistent with your daughter’s “taking it slowly”. I’d be way more worried about the situation she’s going to find herself in regardless of how she gets there!

What a sad way to view life.
We know nothing of why he might have invited her there, but there are loads of reasons why it might be a valid / sensible / nice thing to do.
Also, as pps have said, she may well have known this person for a long while as a fellow student, before they started dating.
There's a lot of projecting and presuming going on, on this thread.

Well it wouldn’t have changed it would it? Which is why I said in my earlier post that the way she got there was something of a non-issue. It might be helpful to trace back the quoting/responses to see the thread of conversation.

You could call it sad, or you could call it informed by experience 🤷🏻‍♀️

Yes maybe I am projecting. I wish someone had been honest with me about the subtext of “back to mine”, I used to assume it was just to hang out.

I think a lot of people are being disingenuous on this thread. I’m surprised at the backlash against those saying to watch out for his possible intentions.