DSD isn’t coming home for Christmas

[Andiey]

DSD is 19, she’s in her first year of uni following a gap year. Her mum passed away when she was a toddler, DH and I have been together for 12 years so I feel as though I have a very close bond with her.
Today she messaged the family group chat saying she won’t be coming home for Christmas. I asked why and she said she has a part time job in her uni town who are offering double pay to work Christmas Day and she’d rather have New Year’s Day off to go out with friends. I asked if we could come and visit her before hand and she said she is really busy with work and uni so it would be better if we waited to see her after new year. We haven’t seen her since she started in September and she was very much against us dropping her off, rather she took the train herself despite many offers.
Her older brother is always happy to come home for Christmas even now he has left uni, as are my own children. I’d go as far to say I don’t know many uni students who aren’t desperate to come home and get food made for them/meet up with old school friends/be back in their own space.
I think her decision not to come home is quite concerning, AIBU?

At that age, if you have a job where you have to work one of Christmas or NYE, I think quite a lot would choose to work Christmas and go out with friends NYE. And even, tbh, if you don't have to but get double pay. I do understand why you're a bit worried. I'm a bit surprised she doesn't want to come home between Christmas and NYE unless she's working then too. That is often dead at uni. But If you don't have other reasons to think she's trying to avoid you (rather than just branching out to do things her way) this could easily just be normal teen/early 20s reach for independence and centering of friends over family. It's normally a phase that lasts a while but isn't permanent.

Both my brother and I went to uni by train and didn't come back for the first term (we did come back for a few days over Christmas and NY, but neither of us had work). Nothing to do with not wanting to be home - more a matter of knowing home was always there but wanting to see what we could make of uni without falling back on our support. My brother's son recently went off to Uni in his own car without his dad, he just wanted to focus on his new adventure and not spend his first moments mediating the place with my brother (who he is super close to and who is in no way smothering). Some people like the sense of adventure and the freedom of not being accompanied.

My DS went to uni a 6 hr drive away. The expectation from him was that we would drive down, unload his stuff from the car, make his bed, and buggar off within 30 min of arrival. Using the loo in his room made him uncomfortable and us meeting any of his flatmates made him painfully embarrassed.

We didn’t see him during term time at all but did have a few calls.

I found it really difficult, he didn’t understand the issue.

He was fine, just compartmented his life completely. He did get diagnosed with ADHD & Autism during his time at uni which may explain his behaviour but I would advise trying just keep in contact with DSD but do it on her terms as that way you won’t lose her.

Exactly. I can't stand my mum because of her smothering me my entire life. She got blocked and is out of my life for good now for almost a year. Please do not surprise her with a visit.

Isn’t she still a teen?

She was a bereaved child she won’t be like other students her own age. She will have an independence about her and a resilience.

This is so true.
I think this is a generational topic.
The young and fancy free think OP's SD should have her 'freedom' respected.
Parental types understand their responsibilities and the importance of keeping a young, potentially vulnerable woman safe.

Isn’t she still a teen?

She had a gap year; she might be 20 by now.

So you assume you have to have a car available to go to university?

I moved away from my own town in late teens I was happy doing my own thing, loved working over the Christmas period I not only got double time but had friends I loved spending time with. I would be furious if my parents turned up unannounced or pressured me into a visit. My life away from home was my personal sanctuary.

None of that meant I didn’t want to be around my family, I loved going home and hanging out with my extended family and friends, but I also loved living a life away from my family, being me and not Toms sister, Cath and Teds daughter and so on.

if she’s recently seen her brother and agreed to seeing you guys in the NY then I’d take that as an opportunity to eye her up to see if she’s healthy, I’d only push if there are signs she’s relapsed.

She sounds very independent, enjoyed her travels and obviously dosnt feel the need to come home as much as others and that’s fine.

This and she is living her best life!
No reflection on you at all

Push it like this and you might end up estranged. Accept what is.

She’s enjoying being an adult and earning.
I did the same

Absolutely this ^
not coming home for Christmas is a red herring

DSD is adventurous and independent.
You will miss her, and tell her that.
Make sure DSD 's gift is posted in time to reach her for Christmas.
Don't forget to choose an agreed date soon after New Year and have a wonderful celebratory meal and visit with her and as many others of the family as you can gather.

Your DSD will appreciate the family Christmas when she is older, don't take it to heart.

I’m a parent and I think they should respect her wishes. Nothing generational about it. We all have different opinions. She lost her mum as a toddler, Christmas might be a painful time so she may as well work. Her brother is keeping an eye on her so they don’t need to do anything drastic just yet.

I know times have changed, mostly driven by mobiles making contact much easier and thus expected. I was at uni prior to mobiles. Once out of halls, there was no landline in the student flats, students had to queue at public phone booths to ring home! I was close to my mum and loved her, but never felt the need to keep in close contact. No one apart from students living at home seemed to have much to do with their parents.

i went home in the holidays in first year, but after that, I rarely went home. My uni city felt like home, I loved it. My friends were my support network. I never returned to live in home area. I was very independent , as were my friends. In adult life I would visit for the odd weekend, a couple of times a year. I never spent Christmas with family after 1st year at uni.

A different perspective, my parents and sibling are deceased now and the friends I lived with in my final year at uni are still my closest friends. They have been the family I chose and made. I added a husband to our happy crew along the way. Sadly my husband is now dying and those same uni friends are supporting me and our child through it.

There are many ways to live a life and although it must be hard to yearn for more contact, celebrate that your SD is thriving and enjoying her life at uni. It is after all , her life.

I think the same

She sounds very mature and independent. I admire her for that. A nice change to hear a story like this instead of the usual ones about useless adult children who don't work, won't help around the house, won't leave home or are just selfish.
You have given her wings. Let her fly.

I think it’s bound to be a question of finance for her.
She probably can’t afford the return journey home if it’s six hours each way.
It sounds to me that she couldn’t wait to start work and has been working and trying to self-finance ever since she was 16.

You help her with top up for accommodation costs and give 150 a month for food. She obviously has to work to pay for her uni course fees and the rest of her living expenses. Has your DH ever had a conversation with her about how she was expected to keep herself at university?

No wonder she is chasing every shift they can give her at work. Double time shifts must sound very attractive to her.

YANBU to be concerned about her OP and even though she is super independent, uncomplaining and hard working, I would very much want to reassure myself that she wasn’t actually in debt or struggling to keep up with course work if she is having to work so much to stay on top.

She does need rest at some point if she is to stay healthy. I do see her at a bit of a risk and I think it’s her father’s responsibility to follow up to be certain that she is thriving.

I stayed at uni for Christmas for the exact same reason, by the time you include travel time you can lose a lot of working days and because other people head home there's often extra shifts. There was always a few of us who were staying around so we'd stay in one house and have a Christmas lunch, drink and watch Christmas movies. Some of my best Christmases.

Tbh I always find it a bit weird when people who are off in the adventure part of their life try super hard to be back for Christmas, there's loads of Christmases where being back with your family will be important, but your 19th isn't one of them, nice time to try something different

Sounds a lot like my brother-in-law, who never wanted much to do with his family after he left home, and my former DH always wondered why. Did you stay away because you didn't get on with your parents? Do you ever wish you'd spent more time with them while they were alive, and did you grieve for them when they'd gone? Maybe you just didn't like them that much? Sorry for all the questions, I'm just curious, as I was very close to my late parents. Would you have been OK with your daughter rarely coming home after 18, not even for Christmas?

I find it quite fascinating how many people on this thread say that they left home at 18 and rarely went home again, not even for Christmas. It's understandable in cases of dysfunction or abuse of course, but posters who became very low-contact haven't said that that was the case.

I went away to university, and I moved to London for a few years in my twenties, and then decided to emigrate to America age 29. That was almost twenty years ago and I'm still there. (Or here, I should say, since I'm in America right now, not on a visit home.) However, even in all that, I went home a lot - or, later, had my parents to stay in the States - and I looked after them during their terminal cancer journeys. I am so glad I have a store of memories of them to last me the rest of my life. And they weren't perfect parents either, and it wasn't the perfect home. But I just cannot understand the mindset of leaving your family in the dust where there's no abuse or dysfunction.

It must be utterly heartbreaking for parents who have done nothing wrong.

He's done well to get on the housing ladder at 22 @MrsSkylerWhite so I don't blame him!

I’ve read your follow-ups. She’s a young woman who has travelled extensively and is now working and going to school.

Yet, you’re dragging her further past mistakes to wrap it up into some reason to be concerned. I can see why should distance herself from you.

Respect what she’s said and leave her be - and no, uni will not tell you anything as she is an adult. They will tell her though when you ring up and start asking questions.

Make plans for the new year with her and start respecting her boundaries.

I missed a couple of family Christmases in my teens and 20’s I really missed family way more than expected and didn’t miss them unless it’s avoidable after that. I’d go visit in the new year.

That’s just nasty. The OP didn’t even frame them as “mistakes”, you did, and certainly wasn’t dragging anything up