Husband says he is embarrassed by our adult kids

[TudorMary]

This is my first post and it’s long and has a few strands and don’t know where to start I keep rewriting.

I thought we were happy and husband was a good father. Kids no longer go on holiday with us etc and this upsets my husband.

Three kids. Elder 2 definitely took scenic route. Dropped out of uni, now happily working, 2 initially took science, failed 1st year exams, took year out now finishing 2nd year of Humanities degree at local university. Both live at home along with number 3 who last week came home to say she was convinced she had failed one of her papers, I think this is correct having done big of research which means she won’t get first choice and she now wants year off.

My husband has gone fucking ballistic and has gone from blaming me to blaming himself for not standing up to me. He has called all the kids losers but thankfully not to their faces but has said to daughter she will have to go to whatever uni will have her.

Now if you are with me! Husband close to brother and I actually like him and his wife but only when we meet them alone. When the kids were younger I used to have anxiety every time we saw them with kids. They had tons of them. It was chaotic. Litter on the floor. Debris everywhere. Rotting food the lot. Kids were sworn in front of, occasionally sworn at, if a risqué anecdote had to be told it was told no matter if the kids were around. and spoken at like they were 30. No concessions were ever made for their age.

First time we went out a four year old actually summoned a waiter to order another fizzy drink. Two year old given a knife to cut their birthday cake. I was on tenterhooks and no exaggeration sometimes took to my bed after seeing them.

Well every single one of their older children are either at medical school, are studying or graduated from an Oxbridge College.

My husband is now suggesting sister-in-law is parent of the year and he should have stood up to my prissy ways. A bone of contention is that they all still holiday together whereas our kids don’t want to know. He is embarrassed by our beautiful kids.

I am so sorry this is a novel. I am heartbroken thinking I must have done something wrong.

Hang on op, I totally understand that this is an emotive subject and one that is difficult to talk about in rl, but why are your so-called “prissy ways” aka keeping a functional and clean home, responsible for your children not succeeding in tertiary education? If anything, I would have thought that a lax chaotic upbringing leads to children who are not disciplined enough to study.

So what specifically have your in-laws done differently to you that have helped their dc to succeed academically? I doubt that it is anything to do with housekeeping!

And if your husband thinks that you as a couple have focused on the wrong things when bringing up your dc, why is it only you that is held responsible? Why is he not implicated equally as well?

I sympathise with your dh in one way because it is hard when you pour your love, time and money in to dc and they don’t seem to be on a happy purposeful path or fulfilling their potential. And it is difficult when you look around and every one else’s dc are seemingly doing better.

However, our adult dc are not an extension of ourselves. They are people in their own right with perhaps different view to us who are starting out in life. There is a lot that can happen yet which will affect the ultimate “success” of a person which is not the same for everyone! Starting out at Oxbridge is a great advantage of course but it doesn’t guarantee that life will go swimmingly from there on in!

Does your dh suffer from low self esteem op? Or has he not fulfilled his ambitions? Was he brought up in a very competitive environment? You might ask him why he js taking this so hard? Is it out of love for his children or is it because he somehow needs to bask in their reflected glory to make him feel confident in himself?

To be fair them having cat poo in the house and handing a two year old a cake cutting knife would stress me out, as I suspect it would most responsible normal adults!

OP your husband sounds like one of those awful people who, when disappointed about something in their own life, seeks to blame others instead of considering anything their own responsibility. It’s disgusting to turn around to your spouse and blame them for what you perceive as their failures when you did or said nothing at the time. And that’s even if there was actually something wrong with your parenting which it doesn’t sound like their was.

Your husband’s pathetic whining would be enough to destroy any shreds of respect for him. And the fact that he’s quite happy to tell you that you have done a bad job with your shared children is unforgivable. Unless it’s actually warranted that’s a wicked thing to say to a parent.

Tell him to grow up!

What someone chooses or the direction of their life as a 17-24 year old is not their full life. Yes uni can be helpful for some but so are apprenticeships!

A degree also doesn't guarantee a job or profession unless a Dr or nurse (even then a job is not a dead set thing).

It took me years to get into my career and certainly wasn't straight forward. If your child failed year 1 of science degree no way would they have coped with later years.

I would be disappointed too. I guess it comes down to expectations and the hopes we have for our children and to some extent the family unit.

Degrees are so expensive now and a real investment and there is a huge pay gap between undergraduates from Oxbridge and those from much lower ranking universities. Going to the local university out of default or any institution that will have you isn't exactly indicative of someone with a strong sense of intention of making sure that the degree is a worthy investment.

I also would be really disappointed if both children had made the wrong choice regarding degree subject. It implies that they don't have a strong idea about what they want to do and their likes/dislikes. At a time when others their age will be getting experience in apprenticeships and out in the world of work it is an expensive mistake that will set them back a bit. The job market is currently appalling for grads so I would be worried that someone that has just drifted into a humanities degree as an average university will struggle to get meaningful employment and will be weighed down by a lot of debt.

Finally the holiday thing would also disappoint me as it does imply that the family isn't hugely close. I would want my adult children to have their own lives but also would want them to join us for holidays if they were available and had nothing better to do.

What I would say though is that this disappointment must be managed carefully. OP's kids are still young adults and mistakes are a natural part of life. As an older adult who has had more experience of the world, of course you will feel disappointment and regret at some of the choices made by adult kids as you have a better idea of the probable consequences of these actions. It can't be allowed though to sour family relations and build resentment.

Hasn't your husband left it a bit late to start parenting his kids now?

The cat poo? On the floor or just in litter trays I mean there is a huge difference let’s face it.

Sounds like dh is jealous of his sibling and his children. You’ve both clearly parented in different ways, with different children leading to different outcomes.

These days unless your going into medical or big science, law etc most uni degrees are ten a penny and everyone I know who’s been doesn’t do a job related to their degrees so a complete waste of time.

His wrong to put the blame purely at your feet but his probably doing that because his insecure against his own brother and his successful children.

@TudorMary between all the words you have written is perhaps a truth you haven’t properly said.

that you were an anxious parent, a parent who worried about knives, who worried about mess, whose house is always neat and tidy and who passed that down to her children.

so they are not coping with life.

you let them quit at the first sign of their being an issue, you prioritise chores and cleaning over everything else

Your husband is an idiot if he didn't like your parenting he should have complained at the time not maybe 15 years later. I assume he liked your clean, calm organised house where the children were safe and organised.

It seems like extremely different parenting between you and your SIL, she was very relaxed and didn't impose a lot of discipline, of course this doesn't mean that's why their children are more academic it's mainly just what they were born with. Where do they go on holiday? If it's somewhere really exotic or adventurous compared to where you go that could be the reason the kids still tag along.

Same, sounds like having a four year old with the confidence to engage with adults stood them in good stead for oxbridge!
Unless by "summoned" the child shouted "get over here and serve me peasant" I think thats pretty good parenting!

It's not clear how old your youngest child is but sounds like it's her a level she's mucked up. On one hand it's not fair on her to be blaming her for being the youngest and the cumulative effect of all her siblings' issues - on the other how has she completely failed an exam? Surely if you prepare you should at least scrape a pass?

Are you funding your dc through uni? If not what difference does it really make to him?
1 - would depend on when they dropped out and what job they're doing now but on the face of it, good for them, uni isn't for everyone and it's as much on you/their school for pushing them if it wasn't something they really wanted

2 - again, yes failing first year is a bit crap (isn't pass mark usually something really low like 40%) but depends on what they're doing now - if they spent the year off working and are now doing well at uni it's a comparatively minor blip in life, possibly explained by doing their exams during covid. If they spent the year off dossing around and are now barely scraping through a degree that will be unlikely to get them a graduate job then that's not great, but better to give them a bit of a kick up the bum now and get them doing work experience in the holidays than bitch about them behind their back.

It's very normal for people in their late teens and early 20s to not go on big family holidays so no idea why he's annoyed about that -if anything because they all live with you you think he'd welcome the break from them!

Yabu to judge the sisters parenting which really doesn't sound that bad
He is BU to blame how your kids have turned out solely on you when he should have been jointly parenting.

What do you and your husband do work wise?
Did he graduate from university?
He is obviously being unreasonable. We all take different paths and comparing them to others isnt fair

Yes. I came from a chaotic family, was sworn at, lack of boundaries. I went to Oxbridgd because I was desperate, believed it was the only way to be worthy of anything, and to get out.
I left home as soon as possible and I definitely wouldn't holiday with parents.

Sounds like your children are doing well, finding out what suits them, feel loved and safe enough to live at home (don't know where you live, but in my area that's normal into 30s due to housing costs). They probably wouldn't want to go on holiday as a family as you see each other daily as a family already. It's young afults who've left home who are taken on family holidays as a way to spend time together.

Either that or, as pp say, you DH isn't much fun to be around!

Yep I'd be disappointed.

I'd also be disappointed if my children wanted to become/ became a surgeon. I have friends who are, and imo it's a hard path and a particularly poor career choice for women.
In terms of uni I wouldnt necessarily pick oxford either if I had a choice...

And it is interesting that having worried about one exam rather than reassure her, that one paper isn’t that bad and she can still achieve her dreams, your research led to the conclusion she failed and needed a gap year. No she can go through clearing saying it will be ok but failure and a year out.

Our children are as intelligent, academic, motivated and ambitious as they are, due to a combination of genetics, personality types and influences, home and external. The parenting style they grow up with is just one factor in the outcomes. Your husband is giving (your) parenting disproportionate weighting because its easier for him than accepting that he hasnt fathered children who meet his own standards. His attitude is very unhealthy and danaging to his children and if they dont want to holiday with you, id be veru surprised if your 'prissiness' was the reason.

There's more to life than uni and there's more to parenthood than comparing your children to their cousins - either negatively or positively. Your husband is being unfair to them AND you however. He can't check out of speaking up for two decades and then suddenly blame you for their perceived 'failings'.

It does feel like all three of yours might be lacking something…. Resilience? Work ethic? Tenacity? It’s not been instilled somehow.
But hopefully other things have been instilled, maybe kindness, sociability, the gift of friendship?

There’s no point beating yourself up or comparing. Give yourself a bit of grace. You both did the best you could with what you had. Your kids will have to make it now with what they’ve got and I’m sure they will. Your SILs family sounds really unusual and I doubt anyone could really have replicated the results there.

Remember, we are all fucking our kids up in various unknown ways!

@Mulberryblackbird the oxbridge kids are still holidaying it’s the OPs who aren’t

If your children are happy , healthy and keeping out of trouble with the law and are not addicted to alcohol or drugs then he should count himself very lucky indeed .

But whether the cat poo was smeared all over the walls in a kind of feline dirty protest wpuld still have no relationship to the academic abilities of the children who grew up in that house. There’s no relationship that I’m aware of between household cleanliness and academic achievement.

I grew up in a tiny, overcrowded, primitive household, which contained two chain smokers, sharing a bed with at least two other people, with nowhere to do homework other than lying on my sister’s lower bunk, and I got an Oxford First. Because there’s no correlation.

ETA I should add that, like a pp, I was focused because it was a neglectful upbringing and I was desperate to leave, in part to leave more slave for my younger siblings. I’d left at 18. I slept on the sofa if I visited, but my remaining belongings were boxed in the attic, and I’d deliberately chosen a college that would let me stay on in the vac.

This presumably isn’t the case with the BIL’s family, if they’re still close and holidaying together, but I do think, OP, you should give yourself some credit for raising kids for whom being at home as young adults is a viable option. That’s not nothing.

You took to your bed after a family meal? Your daughter flunked one exam (or thinks so) and rather than reassure her, you've decided through your 'research' she has failed. Your husband thinks his children are all losers. You both drove like you catastrophise. Maybe your children didn't learn much from either of you about coping and resilience, hence the dropping out.

You've done nothing wrong and your kids are normal, so are your brother in law's, not that anyone should compare.

Your children are working out their own futures by trial and error but they'll get there, there's no rush surely. We are not living in the 1940s or whenever children left school at 14 and were forced out to work, into apprenticeships if they were lucky (my parents generation - I'm 75); they have more choices and opportunities now and I for one am glad of it.

Hopefully your husband will calm down, you must lead by example. He obviously had 'great expectations' of his children and is currently feeling disappointed. He'll get over it. I predict they will do quite well.

By the way, what is wrong with a child asking a waiter for a drink, don't we all do that? As long as he/she was well mannered it seems quite normal. As for a two year old cutting birthday cake with a knife, I doubt the knife was so sharp as to cut him, cake knives usually aren't.

It isn't sensible to give a 2 year old a sharp knife.

OP also mentioned swearing at children and telling age-inappropriate stories.

It's sensible to change course or leave and get a job instead if your initial choice isn't suitable for you: that shows self-confidence and resourcefulness.

I was an anxious child and I stayed studying a subject I disliked at a university I hated. I wish I'd had the courage and support to leave, the confidence to find a job instead, and parents who would allow me a place to live while navigating these decisions!

There's something about him being disappointed in your dc that I really dislike - like he cares more about the external view of your family than their experiences.

Laying the blame on you for how you mutually parented your dc is horrible!

Ultimately, there's lots we can't choose for our dc. We do the best we can at the time to give them love and attention and support, and it sounds like you did!

It sounds like your dh wants your dc to magically transform into academic high achievers with a good relationship with him, without actually caring who they are or what role his behaviour has in their relationship!

I suppose that she meant that getting into a university was an achievement. Not enjoying their course so either leaving and getting a full time job or transferring to a different course/university isn't anything for OP's DH to be ashamed about.

OP's DH is embarrassed because his kids aren't academic high flyers like his brother's kids. He should be ashamed of himself. His kids will realise how he feels and their relationship will be irreparably damaged.