Niece chucked her life away - anyone experienced this pain?

[Corianm]

So my half sister has the most wonderful daughter who just turned 19. She is one of the loveliest girls to have ever walked the planet - she’s so kind, sweet, caring and hilarious in the most charming/endearing way. She has a lot of very young half siblings on her dad’s side and gosh the way she interacts with them is just incredible. She is adored by them.

I was always excited to see where her life would take her. My niece always expressed a desire to experience the world e.g. she hoped to live in Italy for a year and learn the language. The world was truly to be her oyster. I’m know I’m very effusive just out of a desire to convey her loveliness. Trust me my family have not been blowing smoke up her behind for the past 19 years. She very much is has her feet on the ground. Never placed on a pedestal or anything like that.

Anyway, niece recently told me she is expecting. Of course I congratulated her and expressed enthusiasm when she told me. But truth be told I am gutted. The father is a nice enough guy but is quite happy living quite an ignorant life. We once had a conversation which involved the bf arguing how boring art galleries are. I’m just heartbroken for my niece, she’s actually interested in the world and wanted to experience it. But she has completely changed her life plans (no uni now) for this boy.

I’ll always be there for her but my heart aches. It’s obviously her life to live. I’m very aware of not being inappropriate re boundaries.

Has anyone else experienced a similar situation?

Maybe he won't, maybe he will. People do change. Especially when their partner is more ambitious or different to them. My husband is from a background like that. That isn't my life. It was very clear from the get go that it wouldn't be.

Also you know, she doesn't have to stay with him if he doesn't change. But she's chosen to do this so op slagging him off for being some loser will do fuck all but push the niece away.

@Veritysays897 to be honest I wouldn't have wanted a life living somewhere where I couldn't communicate properly.
It would have made me miserable and quite scared.
But everyone is different 🤔

And maybe she can go onto university and do her year of travelling, but she has made it a lot harder to do that, and will require a lot of support from others on the way

If niece had said she always wanted to a mum that would be one thing. But she had actually stated a desire not to have children young like her mum in order for her to travel, live abroad

I always wanted to be Chief Constable of Devon and Cornwall police.
Yet here I am, working in a pub - and happy.
I met my husband, we had a baby, and my priorities changed.
It happens.
If your niece is happy, be happy for her. Stop dwelling on what might have been, that says more about you than her.

Let’s be honest, by the time a 19 year old hits retirement age, it’ll be about 85! If there is a state pension at all, likely won’t exist then anyway!

People of all ages go back to education to study for a better careers. Even if she went to retrain at 40 she’d still have 35+ years of working so worthwhile. That’s assuming she waits until she’s 40, she could retrain etc at 30.

Also if you have grown up kids by 40 you’re still young and can do all of your travelling then.

I was mid twenties when I had my first DC and they are mid teens now. My cousin had her first at 22 and thought what a waste but actually by the time she’s 44 she’ll have two adult kids so can get on with her own life.

What's the matter with you, just support her, she's not dead or dying.

OP I am a 100 per cent with you. If this is my daughter I would feel the same.
He is not the person for her, and you can see this clearly. I don't understand people being so harsh on you.
It could be worse but still that's not the life you want for a bright young daughter or niece.

They all married impossible men. I don't know any men who expect their partners to run round after them. And what is independence? Having to be careful to hide GC views at work because you might get sacked? Being reliant on an employer wanting to keep you in post? Having to work all hours to make a living and not actually bring up your own children? That's depressing.
I was married to a man who thought that my staying at home was a waste of space, gave no value to the input I made to the marriage unless it was actually money, but not as much as he earned because that was 'wrong'. I left him and met a man who valued the contribution I made, was happy I earned more than him when I did, valued my ideas and my work. But he did not think a job was the be-all and end-all of life, nor that working for someone else = independence (he was self-employed).

How can you possibly know he's not the person for her?

Let people get on with their lives. Presumably you have chosen your life let her choose hers without the threat of your permanent disapproval hanging over it. YABU

Having been a teenage mother, yes, having children young does alter the course your life is going to take but you're being overly dramatic. She hasn't thrown her life away, perhaps try supporting her so that she can parent and live her life to its fullest instead of judging her. Also, I would consider myself reasonably cultured. I still find art galleries boring and pretentious. Get over yourself.

I understand you completely OP. Had the same in our family.she had some wonderful, easily achievable, for her, plans. Got pregnant by some layabout. Relationship didn't last and there have since been a series of similar lads. Move in after about two dates, never work and sponge off her. She is thoroughly miserable. Oh what could have been. My heart breaks for her.

Yes, we all support her, offer advice when asked, and never, ever criticise.

Yanbu op. Everything changes when you have children and settle down. She is far too young. If this was my daughter I would be gutted. At her age I was at uni. I had kids in my thirties and had had a career, education, travel, owned our own house. Things may not last with the dad as they are so young getting together. The silver lining is that she is having the baby really young so she can totally get back on track with her ambitions while still young enough to do so and start again. There is no reason she can’t have all the opportunities she wants to travel study and work in her chosen field. It may even end up being easier for her if she has children really young. You despair because you love her and because you know what that mothering role involves. She is lucky to have you in her life. I hope she achieves everything she wants in life.

I thought you were being unreasonable from your first post, OP, but after reading your subsequent posts I see where you're coming from.

This is a huge change from the life she had planned.

You are grieving what you'd imagined her life might be like. It will be utterly different, but it may still surprise you - and her - in how it turns out.

I think you’re getting skewed responses OP because of the over dramatic language in your title. And because there are a lot of women here who think having babies is an unalloyed joy.

In reality, yes of course having a baby now will change the course of your niece’s life, for at least the next 18 years, and more if she goes on to have more. Of course it will make it much more difficult to do certain things. And it doesn’t sound like she’s chosen the most forward thinking partner (although perhaps he will be different from his family).

All this “it can still be done just on a different timeline” is guff IMO. Is she really going to be able go live in different cities and learn new languages at age 40 when her child is finally an adult? She may not be eligible for certain student visas etc at that age, plus will probably be thinking about supporting her child and paying for housing/pension by that point. Even if it’s possible, it will be a totally different experience at that age and may not appeal any more.

However, what’s done is done, she’s having the baby. As pp have said I would focus on how you can support her to keep her options open and her ambitions high. Can she look for part time university courses? Perhaps if her boyfriend is not ambitious that might be a good thing - he can be around to do childcare while she studies in the evenings…?

I had my DD at that age and at the time everyone told me I was wasting my life and that I wouldn't amount to anything. I'm now much older, married to a wonderful man (not DD's biological dad) and in a high flying job. My DD is the single best thing that ever happened to me. She hasn't stopped me experiencing the World she's just changed how I've done it and given me the best companion for the ride.

I'd be disappointed for her too. Has she given up on the idea of uni completely or looked at childcare options within the college she chose? Could she defer for a year and then start?

What has happened to your own life that you react this strong about your niece? There's lot of 40+yo childeless women who might feel jealous of her being able to start a family. Careers and travels can be done later in life. Children cant.

OP, I can assure you it is possible to take a baby in a papoose to an art gallery - I did it all the time. And to take children abroad to see Rome, Venice, Paris, Istanbul. Did that too (and on the cheap - we were broke when DC were small.

I know what you mean, though. Her plans will go on hold. But I know a lot of women who had children young, and by the time they were in their mid thirties they were burning to get out and achieve in life, so they did. Successful, young, energetic women who got degrees, set up companies, thrived in highly competitive jobs.

In a way, I envied them. I faffed about in my twenties, had DC late and then was knackered and mid-fifties before I was free again to try and pick up my life where I left off. Having children while you are young and energetic enough to cope better with sleep deprivation and charging around after them is not a bad idea, and you mature while you are tied down to motherhood, but come out the other side wise and still young.

Share lots of instagram reels about people travelling with families on a budget (maybe ones where they leave dad behind sometimes). Take her out for a meal and discuss logistics of university. A friend of mine did her degree with a very little one and found it easier than trying to work (though obviously harder than just looking after a child). Getting childcare for a nursery aged child may be easier than fitting lectures around school. Go informed with info about university nurseries, bursaries etc.

BUT let her take the lead. See what her dreams are. Things can change, people can change. Make sure she knows you will be supportive no matter what because you love her and will love your new great niece/nephew. And remember. When that child is older she will still be young. My husband had never left the country before I met him. With kids we have travelled to 20. He changed careers aged 40. Another schoolfriend was pregnant early, had 4 in quick sucession. By the time I was on maternity leave they were all in school and she had qualified in her dream profession. The order things happen in isn't the same for everyone.

Right… I’ll tell my kids I threw my life away to have them being that I had them young when I could have had any life option available to me. Doesn’t matter they’re the best thing that I could ever have done with my life, and won’t matter for your neixe either. Hopefully she gets you the fuck out of her life now.

OP I think you have had a hard time on here because you are being melodramatic about it and there’s a touch of snobbery in your comments.

But fundamentally I agree with you. I would be extremely disappointed if my DD was pregnant at 19 to a bloke like this. It’s a dead end.

If it’s any consolation I would put money on her getting very bored and frustrated and leaving him.

My BIL had a one night stand that resulted in triplets. His mom and dad both said how he's ruined his life etc, that she should abort them. They're now 3 healthy, wonderful kids and he loves his life, though he has to share custody with the women. A life isn't ruined just because someone falls pregnant early. She can still go live in Italy. She can still do those things.

I find art galleries boring too

No. Someone put the cat among the pigeons. And got the predictable reaction. The idea that worth and success are tied up with being economically active, or having a job (most of us do not have careers) is deeply regressive and misogynistic. It devalues the work most women do and makes them more dependent, not less. If you are in a bad marriage, certainly qualifications will get you out of a mess because you can work outside the home. But working outside the home if that is not what you want (looks like it's not what DN wants here) is just as imprisoning as not being able to go out to work. Choice is what feminism is about. What we have ended up with is women forced to work because a dual income is now needed to keep a family going - i.e. real wages have gone down, because the labour force was doubled virtually overnight without any provision for women's biology and life-arc being very different from men's. Not what was intended at all. (Men need to be rescued from wage slavery as much as women, btw.)
I think having a baby at nineteen is a bad career move - as did my late DH who considered early marriage was liable to end in not reaching one's potential (he had married at 21 and had a child by 22 and was divorced by 24). So to that extent, DN has 'ruined' her life (not that she will see it that way yet) but this is because our career and education structure do not match women's reproductive roles. In a society that valued women then we would have our children and then get qualified, or get qualified and then have time out to have children with no diminishing of seniority (i.e. child rearing counted as part of our work-life) whilst that input was counted as part of GDP. Not likely under neo-liberalism where if you are not an active economic unit you are worthless. I think nothing is more obscene than to count a women with children under five as 'economically inactive' aka 'unemployed'. Something deeply wrong with a society that thinks this.