Is This Weird?

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Irish_Girl_68

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My sister’s daughter is 17 and still in high school. She started dating a classmate about six months ago or so. Relatively early in the relationship this boy’s parents started inviting my niece to extended family functions. This included asking her to spend a weekend at their family lake house and participate in birthday celebrations/gatherings for the boy’s grandparents. More recently she was invited to spend Christmas with them. What the heck?! She has her own family! My sister didn’t let her go but otherwise thought little of it. I told her I though the parents seem a little off. This is just a high school romance. If they were engaged or even in a position to be married I’d get it. This just seems a little creepy. Thoughts?
 
It’s creepy, weird, and inappropriate. And, from what I see in the families in my own small town-- COMMON.

Ugh.

I see parents encouraging these high school romances in this way and it completely baffles me.
 
Irish_Girl_68 said:
My sister’s daughter is 17 and still in high school. She started dating a classmate about six months ago or so. Relatively early in the relationship this boy’s parents started inviting my niece to extended family functions. This included asking her to spend a weekend at their family lake house and participate in birthday celebrations/gatherings for the boy’s grandparents. More recently she was invited to spend Christmas with them. What the heck?! She has her own family! My sister didn’t let her go but otherwise thought little of it. I told her I though the parents seem a little off. This is just a high school romance. If they were engaged or even in a position to be married I’d get it. This just seems a little creepy. Thoughts?
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Yeah, the part I bolded seems quite bizarre to me in particular. Six months of high school dating is not grounds for treating her like a member of the family as of yet.
 
Sometimes the family wants to see what kind of person their young relative is dating and what kind of relationship these two young people have. They can chaperone, basically.

The Christmas thing seemed a bit unusual, but I suppose that some people will not talk about party plans in front of other people unless all people present have been invited. IOW, the would-be “hosts” might not have expected that the girlfriend would actually accept their invitation. Other families I know have “open house” Christmas functions where they essentially invite everyone they know to drop by at will on Christmas afternoon. Sounds like a nightmare to me, but their neighbors look forward to it.

As for the extended family functions, well, some families figure that if you don’t invite the friends of the young people, the young people won’t come. If it takes inviting the whole football team in order to get the high school relatives to come to the family function, well, get a 100 lbs of extra hamburger and all the fixings from Costco, let’s have them all come!

As 1ke noted, I think this is more of a small-town thing.
 
Sounds strange to me, too. If I were her mother I’d speak with the boy’s parents about it, bold but respectfully. That just strikes me as inappropriate. I hope they’re not encouraging fornication. That would be terrible.
 
Jennifoo said:
Sounds strange to me, too. If I were her mother I’d speak with the boy’s parents about it, bold but respectfully. That just strikes me as inappropriate. I hope they’re not encouraging fornication. That would be terrible.
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The OP is not the girl’s mother, though, and is unlikely to have ever met the boy’s parents. If I were the girl’s parents, I’d put meeting the boy’s parents fairly high on my list, though.

There aren’t many parents of teens who “encourage fornication”. There are too many who utterly fail to discourage it, though. Still, I would not jump to the conclusion that this situation is anything other than this:

We’re going to the lake this weekend.
I don’t want to go to the lake. I want to be with Sally.
We’re going to the lake. Uncle Bob and Aunt Jane are going to be there. You’re going.
I don’t want to go to the lake. I want to be with Sally.
You are not staying home and entertaining Sally with us out of town! You’re going to the lake.
C’mon, Mom. What am I going to do up there? I want to be with Sally.
Listen, you can invite Sally, we have plenty of room, she can sleep in the extra bed in Melissa’s room, but YOU ARE GOING.
Thanks, Mom!
 
Come on, what is wrong with treating someone as family? Jesus treated everyone like His family. I find nothing strange about it. I think its important that the parents accept the girlfriend. If the parents approve, why not? My parents try to be accepting of my girlfriend as possible.
 
Irish_Girl_68 said:
My sister’s daughter is 17 and still in high school. She started dating a classmate about six months ago or so. Relatively early in the relationship this boy’s parents started inviting my niece to extended family functions. This included asking her to spend a weekend at their family lake house and participate in birthday celebrations/gatherings for the boy’s grandparents. More recently she was invited to spend Christmas with them. What the heck?! She has her own family! My sister didn’t let her go but otherwise thought little of it. I told her I though the parents seem a little off. This is just a high school romance. If they were engaged or even in a position to be married I’d get it. This just seems a little creepy. Thoughts?
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Keeping the kids together under the watchful eyes of family is effective chaperonage. If they invited her for Christmas, they might not have expected acceptance, but wanted to make the gesture.

Also, some families are just the kind that invite everyone to everything, pretty much. For instance, the woman might run into a casual acquaintance at the grocery store she hasn’t seen in months and say, “We’re having a barbecue for Granny’s b-day tomorrow, please come, plenty of food and bring your husband and kids.” And mean it. That’s just how they are, I’ve known several like this. They don’t think anyone is a stranger.
 
Jennifoo said:
Sounds strange to me, too. If I were her mother I’d speak with the boy’s parents about it, bold but respectfully. That just strikes me as inappropriate.** I hope they’re not encouraging fornication.** That would be terrible.
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Now no offense, but thats a bit much. First of all, I think it is nice that the family is being inclusive and accepting of the OP’s niece, especially since she is an important person to the family’s son. Just because they are inclusive, why would they be encouraging fornication? And secondly, just because they are teenagers, does not mean they are having sex. It seems as though adults either forget that, or have never dated in high school. Having said that, yes it is an issue. But that does not mean they are doing such a thing, and I’m sure that that family would not be so irresponsible.
 
Julia_Mae said:
Keeping the kids together under the watchful eyes of family is effective chaperonage. If they invited her for Christmas, they might not have expected acceptance, but wanted to make the gesture.

Also, some families are just the kind that invite everyone to everything, pretty much. For instance, the woman might run into a casual acquaintance at the grocery store she hasn’t seen in months and say, “We’re having a barbecue for Granny’s b-day tomorrow, please come, plenty of food and bring your husband and kids.” And mean it. That’s just how they are, I’ve known several like this. They don’t think anyone is a stranger.
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That would be my first guess.
Jennifoo said:
Yes I’m aware of that. I’m only stating what I would do if I were a mother with that situation.:doh2:
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I’m not exactly sure what you’d do, though. You’d boldly call the parents of your daughter’s boyfriend and boldly suggest that you hope they’re not encouraging fornication? 🤷
 
EasterJoy said:
Sometimes the family wants to see what kind of person their young relative is dating and what kind of relationship these two young people have. They can chaperone, basically.

The Christmas thing seemed a bit unusual, but I suppose that some people will not talk about party plans in front of other people unless all people present have been invited. IOW, the would-be “hosts” might not have expected that the girlfriend would actually accept their invitation. Other families I know have “open house” Christmas functions where they essentially invite everyone they know to drop by at will on Christmas afternoon. Sounds like a nightmare to me, but their neighbors look forward to it.

As for the extended family functions, well, some families figure that if you don’t invite the friends of the young people, the young people won’t come. If it takes inviting the whole football team in order to get the high school relatives to come to the family function, well, get a 100 lbs of extra hamburger and all the fixings from Costco, let’s have them all come!

As 1ke noted, I think this is more of a small-town thing.
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👍 I read your posts a lot, and I always like them. Being a city boy from the north, hospitality is sometimes hard to come by!
 
DavidSears said:
Now no offense, but thats a bit much. First of all, I think it is nice that the family is being inclusive and accepting of the OP’s niece, especially since she is an important person to the family’s son. Just because they are inclusive, why would they be encouraging fornication? And secondly, just because they are teenagers, does not mean they are having sex. It seems as though adults either forget that, or have never dated in high school. Having said that, yes it is an issue. But that does not mean they are doing such a thing, and I’m sure that that family would not be so irresponsible.
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I stated that I HOPED that they weren’t encouraging fornication-not they were. I try to give people the benefit of the doubt, but I’m not stupid. I know parents who put their daughters on birth control because they EXPECT them to engage in fornication, and I’ve worked in the baby room of a local day care center where most of the parents are unmarried and a fair amount are teenagers. We have a baby girl whose father ISN’T OLD ENOUGH TO DRIVE. We had one baby whose mother was dating a new man and living with him under the same roif with his parents. These situations are far more common than you may want to believe and we must not turn a blind eye. If I ever have a child of my own I will protect them from impurity. I make no apologies for being a faithful Catholic or for being concerned for the welfare of children.:gopray2:😃
 
EasterJoy said:
That would be my first guess.

I’m not exactly sure what you’d do, though. You’d boldly call the parents of your daughter’s boyfriend and boldly suggest that you hope they’re not encouraging fornication? 🤷
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Really?

I guess I thought it was obvious that one can be boldly honest and respectful at the same time. If I were in that situation I would explain our religious beliefs in an open manner, including our beliefs about sexuality and morals. I would attempt to understand their beliefs and then see how we could work together. And yes, one can do yhis in a non-accusatory manner. I make no apologies for being a faithful Catholic or for being concerned about the eelfare of children.
 
Jennifoo said:
I stated that I HOPED that they weren’t encouraging fornication-not they were. I try to give people the benefit of the doubt, but I’m not stupid. I know parents who put their daughters on birth control because they EXPECT them to engage in fornication, and I’ve worked in the baby room of a local day care center where most of the parents are unmarried and a fair amount are teenagers. We have a baby girl whose father ISN’T OLD ENOUGH TO DRIVE. We had one baby whose mother was dating a new man and living with him under the same roif with his parents. These situations are far more common than you may want to believe and we must not turn a blind eye. If I ever have a child of my own I will protect them from impurity. I make no apologies for being a faithful Catholic or for being concerned for the welfare of children.:gopray2:😃
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Agreed, it happens quite often. I don’t agree with sex before marriage, nor do I condone it by any means, but the parents cannot stop it if they were to. They have free will. They should be educated and advised against it by the parents however. A father who neglects to teach his son right from wrong… well he is guilty as well! I’m sorry if I seemed to come off confrontational, but as a teen who dates, I sometimes get defensive. I apologize. Who knows, maybe the parents of the boy are devout Christians, which is why she is invited to hang around so much. Christian hospitality!
 
Jennifoo said:
I stated that I HOPED that they weren’t encouraging fornication-not they were…
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The thing is, parents can do this without having any such intention…that is, they can provide opportunities for excessive intimacy without realizing it, so it’s not that I don’t appreciate your point. I mean that they might be encouraging just that, but because they are encouraging in practice but not in intent, they’re going to react badly if someone suggests that they don’t care what their son might be doing to someone’s daughter. They’ve spent time with her, they like her, they care about her. You can see where they might be indignant if this suggestion came in their first substantial interchange with her parents.

It’s also that parents can also encourage their 17 year old to spend his time with his girlfriend in their presence precisely because they want to keep the two of them chaperoned and don’t know what kind of boundaries *her *parents have. They may be very much concerned about keeping an eye on the two of them.

Mutual suspicion between parents is the LAST thing anyone needs here. They don’t have to agree about everything, but parents need to understand each other and respect one another’s boundaries, whether or not they agree. So don’t get me wrong, I don’t mean communication is a bad thing. I mean that if the parents aren’t already acquainted, it can take some forethought to get the communication accomplished in a diplomatic way.
 
Yes, the weekend and Christmas thing is odd, but birthday parties and other family functions, not so much, IMHO. I’m just thinking of my sibling and when she dated in high school, she was invited over to his grandma’s a lot, although in the same town as they were in. Now they’re engaged. I remember during that first year being our two family’s having dinner together once as well, and his family coming to my graduation party (first time we all met, a bit awkward, but it was fine).

I guess it all depends on the other family dynamics as well. But if I had a daughter, I’d rather her be with her boyfriend’s family than them two alone.
 
First of all, I would hope that both sets of parents have met. Especially if kids are hanging out at each other’s house. My mom would make it a point to meet my friend’s parents and my boyfriend’s parents.
I grew up in a small, southern town so getting invites to the boyfriend’s grandma’s birthday party wasn’t uncommon. I probably knew Meemaw from church, school, cheerleading, or whatever.
I met my husband in college and I was invited to family gatherings pretty early in the relationship. I would sleep in a seperate bedroom. No biggie. I think it is great that this family accepts this girl. A lot of momma’s are very particular of who their boys date. Be thankful that this family isn’t hateful to your niece.
 
Irish_Girl_68 said:
My sister’s daughter is 17 and still in high school. She started dating a classmate about six months ago or so. Relatively early in the relationship this boy’s parents started inviting my niece to extended family functions. This included asking her to spend a weekend at their family lake house and participate in birthday celebrations/gatherings for the boy’s grandparents. More recently she was invited to spend Christmas with them. What the heck?! She has her own family! My sister didn’t let her go but otherwise thought little of it. I told her I though the parents seem a little off. This is just a high school romance. If they were engaged or even in a position to be married I’d get it. This just seems a little creepy. Thoughts?
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My initial though was, yes, rather strange.

But, on reflection, there are various possible scenarios. A couple have been suggested: a teen who wants time with his girlfriend who is then invited to join a family ‘holiday’; the boy’s family wanting to check out the girlfriend and ensure the youngsters spend time together, but supervised. Another thought, perhaps the children in the boy’s family have always taken a friend along to the lake house - now that he is older he would rather take his girlfriend than a buddy, so his family don’t find it strange.

It is up to your sister to enquire and satisfy herself about the reasons for these invitations, but they could just be an acceptance that the young man is growing up and making it possible to keep him part of the family and therefore including the person who is currently important to him in family events.

I would like to feel that my grandchildren were encouraged to bring their special friends to family gatherings to celebrate my birthday (one day when they are teens).
 
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