Would you let your 16 year old DD drop out of college to live with a 37 year old?

[AYD2MITalkTalk]

She has mental health problems and has recently had a stay in a psychiatric hospital, her second admission. She's been meeting up with guys she's met online and it's one of those she's moved out to be with.

Okay, DD was me, a decade and a half ago. Would you have done the same? I know they probably couldn't have stopped me if I'd forced the matter, but should they have tried to keep me at home and in college?

Thank you nauticant - it's so hard to know how you're coming across to people sometimes And thanks for the good wishes.

I had a relationship with the exact same ages when I was young. My parents put it to a swift end (they were abusive, he was much less so, so I thought the sun and moon revolved around him). Sometimes I've wondered if I'd have still been with that man, or happy with him, if they'd just let me go, and if I could have avoided some of the heartache of my twenties.

You've taken something of a weight off my mind and heart.

I'm sorry, I haven't read the entire thread, I just wanted to say that parentling an adolescent is, to my mind, look walking on a tightrope. You are just guessing all the time. My sister my married a psychopath because tried to pressure her not to, back in the earlies 1960s when my sister was pregnant and less enlightened parents would have thought she should marry. Unfortunately, to this day, my sister blames my mother for this marriage. My dd had a relationship with a horrible bf and, it is all very well saying that one wouldn't allow it, but bearing in mind how my sister got married, I preferrred to keep a low profile, even though I could see how evil the situation was.
A dear friend of mine has a son who has progressed from marijuana to glue sniffing and I have never met anyone who has sacrificed so much for their child, but she still has not found the way to sort him out.

Every so often during my life, I've wondered how my life would have turned out if a, b, or c, and how other people would have reacted in same situation, which I'm sure lots of people do, and this was one of those times.

I would say that people who have few regrets or are happy actually do not wonder how their lives would have turned out. If you are questioning things maybe this indicates your dissatisfaction. Only you can change things though - not your partner or your parents.

I agree that these large age gaps often become difficult later in life - the older partner becomes too old, ill or infirm to enjoy the more youthful and active pastimes that the younger partner takes part in, creating a distance between them.

This is going to sound awful but I'd be calling her hospital, her docs and her social worker if she has one.

Does she have friends her own age?

RTFT 2nds, or at least the bloody op!

Mamia, I am questioning a lot at the moment what I want to do with my life and where to go from here - I was just trying to say that I don't spend all my time grumbling to myself about my parents screwing me over or something

I'm not sure it's that rare to think about the road not taken, as it were, though I agree people who are completely happy with their lives probably don't, that much. I don't want my parents to change anything they're doing - they're awesome and they would support me through anything I asked them to (not least by rooting for me through this level of my studies and insisting on paying for my degree and all the associated costs - my mum messaged me yesterday just to tell me how proud of me she is) - but I was wondering when I started this thread what if anything would've been different had they tried to persuade me to come back home.

I am dissatisfied with my current life, though, and am doing what I can to change it - small steps, education, that kind of thing. I regret not having done all this when I was younger (and when tuition fees for a degree were £9000, not £27,000, and when I wouldn't have had to pay to do my A-Levels! )

Thanks for your post - it's interesting to hear that so many people never think about the past and what might have been different in their lives if they'd done this or that.

I'm not sure it's that rare to think about the road not taken

It's not rare at all. The problem comes when someone dwells on it to such an extent that they avoid thinking about "where do I go from here?" If today's problems look intractable it can be comforting to retreat into the what-if world where things can look lovely. (I'm a devil for doing this myself.)

I'd say it's quite common to think 'what if'. My parents moved countries when I was younger and we were thrown into a different education system with a different culture.

I was going to go to Uni up north and ended up going to one in London instead, where I met and married my DH. There are times I've thought 'what if' we never moved or if I did go up North.

I was with an Ex that my parents wouldn't have been so keen on (even without meeting him) and now he lives in a country I'd prefer to the UK and is doing way better than he was back then. My life could have been different, then again it may have been much the same.

Do you have any siblings AYD ? If so what did they think of you moving away?

Can you recall what your parents said when you made the call to say you weren't coming back?

What did you expect their responded to be when you told them? What did your DP expect their response would be?

Whose idea was it for you to move in with him?

One of a few things that stand out for me in all this, is that it cannot be a relationship of equals between a 16 year old and a 37 year old no mature how mature that 16 year old is. It just can't be with 21 years life experience on you at the tender age of 16.

I think what is important here is you can totally change tomorrow but you can't change a single thing about yesterday.

We all have what if days but it's those experiences that make us who we are now.