My sons girlfriend is a problem!!!!!

[worriedgran57]

This is my first time on mumsnet so I hope I am doing it properly!! Hope you don't mind a gran asking for advice!

My son is with a girlfriend who is 17. She fell pregnant right before she was 16!! They had only been together 6 months. My son was just finishing his A levels and it was a very worrying time. He is a very smart boy, his IQ is very high and we were hoping he would go to Oxford or Cambridge.

He didn't do well in his exams. Studying went to pot, because he was of course so worried about his girlfriend!

Now I know she is still young, but she is very manipulative. She told my son she had problems with her period, so he thought she couldn't get pregnant...clearly that wasn't the case!

Since the baby (a little boy) came along, my son has had to resit some exams. He has been so stressed at the behaviour of this girl. She seems to want him to get a job, but in the long run going to university would be a better option. I told him that he needn't think he will be playing happy families with his girldfriend and the baby because he has his education to think of....he is only a boy. They are both too young to set up home together!

I also have a 14 year old daughter and I don't think this girl is a good influence....she used to go out with her friends a lot before the baby was born,sometimes not coming home until 11pm at night....she invited my daughter out a few times but I didn't allow her...it's not so much the girl herself, it's her friends I am worried about!

This girl has been allowed to do whatever she wants...taking the train to the city for the day. staying out, going on holiday with people her parents barely know....

She isn't a bad mother but she is careless...last month she took the baby out a 2 mile walk in the pram with only a coat and a thin blanket on. She takes him miles away on the bus, he sleeps in her bed....I know they are just little things but he has no routine or stability in my opinion

She is rude about our house...we have 6 cats and 3 dogs and she told my son she didn't want to let the baby sleep in his cot in the living room because she felt he was unsafe near the animals! My animals would never hurt anyone, they are rescues and very gentle and timid....she thinks our house is dirty. OK it might smell a bit catty but it is not dirty! She also refused to sit in the living room with the baby when my husband was watching TV, she said the show was too violent...

I don't feel comfortable in my own home when she visits with the baby, I have got into the habit of taking my daughter out and going to do the weekly shop when she comes round on a Saturday.

I try to be involved with my grandson but she makes it awkward. First she doesn't let him sleep in our living room, but then she suggests going for a coffee with my son, and wants me to babysit??? I told my son that we aren't there to babysit just so they can have fun.That is not what being a parent is about!

I just don't know what to do...I wish my son wasn't in this position. He is still very immature for his age. I think it's all too much for him to cope with. When his girlfriend was pregnant, I asked the school to let all his teachers know the situation, so they would be aware of the stress he was under when he was doing his exams/...but they said they couldnt because the girl was at the same school and she was their priority....I feel like my son has been overlooked from day one, but he needed just as much help!

Where do we go next?

worridgran57

Given that your not really interested in hearing advice from those who haven't been there or don't have older kids, I shall throw in that I was a first time mum at 16, I now have a fair few children most adults some of those with children of their own and a couple of tiny ones as well.

I will share with you the single most important bit of advice that you really need to take....

You're user name suggests that you are 57 years old START ACTING IT

Most 57 year olds have managed to work out that the main point of effective parenting is preparing their children emotionally for independent adulthood,

Most of them have also worked out by at least the time the first child hits 10 that part of their 'job role' is to understand that children and young people may not always follow our instructions and they need effective sexual health information.

Most of them have also managed to work out that when it comes to other parents age is not the defining factor to work out who is best.

So far there is nothing,nothing at all to suggest that this mother is doing any thing wrong,she is just doing things differently and going by the sound of some of your complaints, if this parenting malarkey was a real life game,on the baby and toddler front she would be winning it.

Only you can elect to grow up and take responsibility for some of your more spiteful thoughts and opinions and start making changes to how you view things and if you do every other member of your families lives will improve if you don't it will go even more to shit.

What do you define as an emergency? Medical stuff will be dealt with by your grandchild's mother or her family.

Do you want your grandchild to be raised without a father?

Ok fair enough needasockamnesty, I probably am a bit old fashioned and overprotective. But I'm not being spiteful,I am just a mother concerned for her son.It's not what I wanted for him

If you can't get past the anger get some professional help. Honestly if you don't it will eat you alive then spit you out.

Right now your son is terrified of his future and he needs his mum. He doesn't need anger or bitterness he needs a mum who will help him work out all his options ( full time uni, full time job or combo of the above) work out which are feasible and which he wants to do. She will love and support him unconditionally. She will help him choose what is right for him, not what her dream for him is.

You can be that mum. He will love you for it. If you just thrust your anger and disappointment onto him and stress about how he "could have been Oxbridge material" all you will reed is resentment. Don't distort your relationship with your son over one bad choice he made. Embrace the new future.

You're all about what YOU want for your son, have you asked what he wants to do?????

So if your ds was sitting his alevels, at 18, and his gf was pregnant at the time, and baby is now 13mths old...ds missed the uni intake for 2014/15...he then did resits but failed to go to uni in 2015/16 educational year (so he either failed to get the grades or did not apply). If he is intending to go to uni, he should now be applying for the 2016/17 intake (for sept 2016 start)...so he could work full time from now until at least August to get some money and support himself/his child...surely if he was 18 when child was born, he is 19/nearly 20 now so how is he supporting himself financially at this point?

So you want your son to have a relationship with his child, and you want a relationship with your grandchild (but not enough to do anything to make it happen) but would happily push the child's mother under a bus?

You want your son to reject the girl, have occasional contact with the child but if he does want to have a decent co-parenting relationship with the child's mother (whose future he fucked when he spunked in her) then he needs to be able to do stuff like the occasional coffee.

Fortunately there seems to be other support for your grandchild's mother, so you may not be able to completely stop them meeting.

Maplesglobe I did offer to babysit to give her a rest when my grandson was about 4 weeks old but she said no....then when she asks it is just so she can go out? It's not that it's inconvenient for her, but surely a gran should be allowed just to spend time with a baby and not just be a token babysitter

But it is what he has. You can't change it. You need to accept it or you will push him away and fast.

Why did you not teach your son the importance of safe sex to begin with? How are you actually managing to put all of this on the shoulders of a 15 year child?

And for what it's worth, no I wouldn't be leaving my child alone to sleep in a room with multiple animals. Are you nuts? You can never fully trust an animal. Honestly, how is it this poor young girl has more sense than you do? You're the adult - act like one!

QforCucumber I don't think the OP thinks her little boy is old enough to have his own opinions. I just hope when he is older he doesn't regret the lack of relationship with his own child.

Lol, your posts are getting very umm, interesting now. Haven't you noticed that your 'son' has been unemployed for 17 of the last 18 months.

he is on jobseekers at the minute but he is looking for work

worriedgran If he'd used a condom, the chances are he wouldn't be a parent now. You are blaming the wrong person here. You should be supporting the mother of your grandchild, not blaming her.

The mother of your grandchild obviously was an innocent, as she really believed that because her periods weren't regular, that she couldn't become pregnant. If your son didn't want to be a father, then he should have used a condom. She didn't trap him, he trapped himself by not using a condom.

Please tell me you understand this point, and that you've discussed with him, that he needs to always use a condom if he doesn't want his sexual partner to get pregnant.

So, if you are babysitting, is she supposed to sit there and look penitent that your son fucked her future?

he hasn;t been unemployed, he has been studying too. It isn't easy to find a job these days. I have offered to give him money to start up a business if he wants, but he is finding ithard to decide what to do for the best

I officially give up. You clearly won't listen to anything that doesn't state she is evil and he is amazing and has had his life ruined.

it sounds like the girls parents are supportive. so at least shes got someone helping her.

I know it must have been hard for his girlfriend, but her mum babysits the baby while she is at school, so she can still get her studying done then be with the baby when she gets home. If my son ends up working, that will be him stuck and he may not be able to go to university for years. I understand why everyone has rallied round his girlfriend but like I said it's double standards, he needs to think of his life too

Where are the double standards here? You seem to be implying that it will be easier for her to eventually get to university than for him. How? If he's done his re-takes and got his grades up then he should be applying for next year now, surely.

Why is the fact the her mother babysits while she's at school relevant here? He doesn't need a babysitter because he doesn't have the baby at home with him anyway. Again you seem to think it's somehow easier for her.

I mean, what is she supposed to do if you babysit? Sit in and cry?

Girl sounds fine. You seem to be the problem...

So the fact that he was going to Oxbridge and that has tragically been stolen from him by the Teenage Mata Hari is now just that a single teacher mentioned Oxbridge as a vague future possibility at some point when he was younger?

Maybe the son doesn't want to go to uni and the kid is an excuse. Maybe he's feeling depressed and despondent because he is cut off from his child and finding it difficult to keep a good relationship with his child's mother.