Anyone else's teen not having an exciting gap year?

[Shinyredbicycle]

DD is coming to the end of a gap year - has uni place for September. She had friends at school who, because of their cultures and family norms, don't really socialise. She's still in touch with them and they do eg meet for a coffee but definitely not parties, pubs or clubs.

It took her a few months to get a job (zero hours obvs) and she's also been doing some voluntary work and baby sitting. She's acutely aware of peers on gap years (connections through SM not friends) going off travelling and so on. She understandably did not want to do this on her own..

She's also aware of family friends' teenagers who are younger than her having huge social lives, going to festivals, going inter railing etc. Lonely, boring summers have been a theme of her teenage years, and it's been painful to watch.

The situation is compounded this year by the fact that her dad and I separated earlier this year. One outcome of this is that I haven't been able to face organising a family holiday. My preference would be that her and her brother (17) could go away with friends and I didn't have to bother. As neither of them are there yet, I've booked a few days in a European city for us. This is disappointing for dd who wants something more adventurous..

Their dad 'can't cope' with taking them on holiday, but I hope he will take them to visit his family at some point.

I don't have any family and, despite having friends who I am grateful for, am struggling with the loneliness of separating and coming to terms with the awfulness of the last year of our marriage (his affair, domestic abuse). DD is around the house a lot, and needing quite a lot from me in terms of social contact and I haven't really been able to find the time and space to grieve. Not being able to provide/support DD to have the type of summer that she would like is contributing to my sense of failure.

Did anyone else's teen find their tribe at uni after years of a meagre social life? I just cannot provide a 19 year old with the type of social life that she wants and needs, and I'm finding the prospect of yet another summer of being on the receiving end of dd's frustration and sadness utterly overwhelming and suffocating

Thanks if you got this far!

Thank-you 2fallsagain. Yes, you get it. I will make one more suggestion about revisiting the organised travel/volunteering idea, then leave it. It needs to be driven by her.

We did a trip to her uni city at the beginning of this year when she was dithering about whether to go through UCAS again and apply somewhere else. It was after that that she seemed to make the firm decision to go and book accommodation etc. Not without some 'Have I done the right thing?' wobbles, but that's normal.

Thanks again.

She does actually sound like she's made lots of progress this year. If she couldn't cope with a prom, she was never likely to manage inter railing a mere few months later. But the growth in confidence, work experience and volunteering are all useful and significant.

Is she going to be in a flat share or halls?

Yes. This year she had been to job interviews done a job in a busy environment, done voluntary work and a lot of baby sitting. All have been good for her self-esteem and confidence.

She'll be in halls in a student 'village'. There will be plenty of opportunities to meet people, and she could really do with some ordinary fun social experiences. Not massive nights out, just friends to do things with

That’s fantastic. I expect there will be a bit of a community of young people doing that and she might meet some lovely people to hang out with.

I wonder whether she would enjoy the summer school courses which take place in Oxford and Cambridge.

https://lifelong-learning.ox.ac.uk/about/summer-schools

https://www.pace.cam.ac.uk/course-type/international-summer-programme?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=23426788313&gbraid=0AAAAAq2-esu8vSwuD15L_pW9O21p-MTU_&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIwZaW4pTUlAMVi5RQBh14_Q2VEAAYAiAAEgJnpPD_BwE

Please stop beating yourself up OP.
My DD went to uni straight from school and I think she expected it to be almost like you see in the movies. It wouldn’t have done her any harm to have a bit of reality before she went. She also had a traumatic life event just before going (DH critically unwell) and then a grandparent died in yr 1. She’s ok.
You are doing your best. She doesn’t need to go in holiday if you can’t.
It will be ok.

Definitely, would be a good opportunity.

Does she play any sports?

OP you sound absolutely lovely, well done you for all that you've done. I have a very similar sounding daughter and it's really drained me, and I haven't had a marriage breakdown to contend with. I totally empathise with your exhaustion - I've honestly never been this patient with anyone or thing in my life before.

DD just wasn't ready to go to uni last year, she'd shown zero enthusiasm for the course or the university. Ill for two years, then a new sixth form which she hated and moaned about to us every single day (was entirely her choice to go there). She needed to exorcise all the demons of those four years and the second she got her A level results she announced she was taking a year off. She hasn't had a hugely exciting time gadding off around the world on adventures. Mostly she's been at home, but:

1. She's had a bar job and saved nearly 10k which means she'll have a spontaneity fund at uni. I wish she'd made a load of fun friends but it was a bit a repeat of sixth form (cool gang not being inclusive - she's awkward and young people sniff that out).
2. Hopefully learned to drive
3. Reapplied to a different course and a university that really excites he
4. Lastly, she's currently at a university abroad learning a language for two months. I know you said you had to driven by your daughter but we essentially railroaded ours into doing something that pushed her. We gave her a shortlist of ideas and this is what she chose. It's structured and that's what she needs - freeform travelling just wouldn't have worked. At first she found it hard and was desperately homesick but she's learned so much about socialising (and hopefully the subjunctive tense) and it's been a great trial run.

I think you need to think back to the way your DD was a year ago and compare it to now and give yourselves huge credit. I bet she's a different girl and so much more able to go to uni with confidence.

@Valleyofthedollymix Completely off topic, but how did you find this language course? Would love for my own daughter to go on an intensive German-learning course this summer

@XelaM

How old is she, OP?

Is she already taking German at school?

16 - no she isn't but she has some basic knowledge as we have family in Germany and she does Duolingo, but that's about it 🫤

(Sorry OP for side-tracking your thread)

https://www.goethe.de/ins/de/en/kur/srd.html?

Thanks - I'm pleased that your DD has managed to take such a big step out into the world.

I've been reflecting on everyone's kind and thoughtful comments on this thread and have decided that I need to be more hard-line with DD. She is undoubtedly still carrying the trauma of what happened at her old school. It would have been bad enough to scar a confident adult, let alone a shy, just turned 14 year old. I am hugely relieved that I managed to keep her in school to get through her GCSEs and 'A' levels. I stopped going to school for a ling time at that age (she doesn't know this) and watching history nearly repeat itself was excruciating.

For various reasons, she doesn't have a best friend or reliable group of friends to fall back on when she gets (yet another) social knock back, which is why she's so clingy to me. Understandable, but not healthy.

I think it's because of this trauma that my trying to railroad her into things just doesn't work. She just wouldn't get on the train/plane. Been there about less costly and lower impact things many times.

She needs some professional help. The experiences she's had of fitting in at work and her voluntary placement have provided some balance, but haven't repaired the deep damage.

I will obvs pick my moment to bring this up with her again carefully. She is in a better place than she was a year ago, but I can see that the engrained damage is still there.

Thanks again all.

And no, she doesn't do any sport other than the odd trip to the gym. She is naturally pretty sporty, but her fear of being ostracised has stopped her joining any sort of club or team (which would have done her the world of good, had she been able to).

I'm glad this thread has helped you, the school trauma and subsequent boundaries your DD has put up to protect herself from the rejection and exclusion will likely need to be addressed. As well as my DD is doing she is having some therapy over the summer as she still has moments of anxiety, questioning, avoidance etc and when they come they are paralysing. She recognised the pattern and is ready to get professional help.

i didn't have a marriage breakdown to contend with but during the worst year for DD my dad was really ill then died and on reflection I wasn't kind enough to myself.

So I meant to say - cut yourself some slack, you are doing a great job and look at how far she has come

I took my exciting travel gap year aged 29. I couldn’t afford it before then.

She needs to realise that adventure doesn’t land at anyone’s feet - if you want it you have to grab it yourself. Action that idea to create the adventure. Nobody is going to do it for her.

Hello, re. the question about language learning - it's not German but another European language. It's government-subsidised and at an ancient uni. I suspect the German Government does something similar given how they all want to promote the learning of their own languages. I don't know if somewhere like Heidelberg does something similar. The one DD is at has 7000 students a year doing courses ranging from 2 to 10 weeks.

OP well done again. You know your daughter best and it sounds as if it wouldn't have been right to have pushed her into going abroad. What I find hard about being my daughter's social life is you're like their friend in that they rely on your for this social engagement but you're not like a friend in that they don't feel the need to make an effort or put on a cheerful face because they know we're there unconditionally. I think it's hard to understand how draining that is until you've been through.

It really sounds as if the gap year has created a buffer from her terrible school experiences and the next stage. And that's invaluable. I'm very pro gap years however they're used.

I really feel this! I grew up in quite a boring place with friends who didn’t really have much appetite for adventure. Going to uni was really great for giving me the access to adventure and socialising that I craved, and from this I then met friends to go travelling with etc over the summer holidays of uni. It was still quite boring for me going home for the holidays, compared to other friends who lived in exciting places who were going out a lot with ‘home’ friends but it was fine really as I had enough going on in between times. As another person has suggested if funds allow she could go on one of those organised tours for teens. Or see if she can find a full-time job over the summer as this can often fill a lot of the void too. It sounds like you’ve all had quite a hard time but things certainly can and will improve.

Thanks. It's been a long, hard slog. When she was being bullied/managed out of her previous school, my mum was ill and died that December. I was the only family around, and it was awful to see her go through that.

I do make the effort to go things for myself, which does help even if just for a bit.

@Shinyredbicycle Was this a private school? Our private school is absolutely awful in dealing with bullying - they would also rather the victim leaves than deal with any of the bullies. It's utterly soul-destroying when this happens and the school gaslights you into claiming there is nothing they can do or kids are just being kids etc etc

No, ordinary state school. The deputy head let slip on the phone that they were trying to avoid a permanent exclusion of the bully (due to previous behaviour/incidents), hence doing nothing.

It wasn't this girl's behaviour towards my DD, awful as it was, that did the damage. It was the school's utter unwillingness to address it and their explicit request that my DD sling her hook. I did a Subject Access Request, which confirmed all this.

As I mentioned up thread, I eventually received a full written apology from the head but so what? No-one apologised to DD, told the bully to pack it in, or let the other kids know that DD had done nothing wrong.

However, five years down the line, the only person who can decide how much longer this situation interferes with her life is DD. I'll always support her, but she is the one that needs to recognise this and take action.

My daughter is autistic and a lot of this sounds very familiar. In particular the anxiety around committing to dates and events...lack of solid friendships and her clinging to you.

I think in thr end at 19 you cant control her social life other than encouraging her which you already are.

I had a boring gap year (hated traveling came home early and did some boring jobs )...and I absolutely loved university

If she is potentially neurodiverse I think you have to just ride this tricky year out snd remind yourself she is now an adult and you can't always solve your pain

I'm sorry it sounds tough. I really sympathise it's very very tiring when you see your child struggling socially but they are now beyond an age to help them