My son has been going with a young women for about a year. I have tried to
like her, we have had dinner together, made holloween costumes, chatted on
the phone, etc. I have given it my best effort. But she is a liar, cheat and takes
advantage of my son to no end.
She told me she quit her job when she was fired. Nagged my son until he
bought her a $100.00 even though her lease prohibits it. She doesn't have a
job, and only attends college part time. Now they have moved in together.
He is also a college student he works part-time and pays most of the bills
(her father pays the balance, but he has to go to a friend's house when
her father is in town, because she is lying to him about the living arrangement.
She has managed to alienate him from all his freinds, monopolizes his time
and treats him like dirt. Whines, lies and cheats. How do I make him see
the light and dump her, he can do so much better. He is too young to be
living with this girl and I am afraid she will trick him into marriage if she thinks
he is even thinking of leaving.
Help.
He is a very smart young man (the deans list) but with very little
common sense.
Mother in California
These days we mothers seem to have to go through all the agonies of
watching our children make poor choices and suffer the consequences.
Family break-ups are more the rule than the exception. An easy
acceptance of divorce seems to contribute to easy liaisons which are
doomed from the start.
Your son might be coerced into marriage with this apparently totally
conscienceless woman and if they have children the result might be a
whole lot of suffering by a lot of people. Trying to prevent it now
could put you into the unenviable position of an interfering mother,
and a despised mother-in-law, who will become the cause of all sorts of
fights between the young couple later.
Since the girl is young, there is always the hope that with maturity she
might eventually lose her bad habits and become a decent human being.
Not much of a hope to pin your dreams on, but at least it is a far-out
possibility and we've all seen such miracles happen.
But the best scenario at the moment would be for your son to distance
himself from her for a while and think things over for himself, without
her presence to sway him into making a possibly catastrophical decision.
How could you get him to take a sabbatical, away from his girl friend,
and get some advice from someone he trusts; not his parents because
children seldom realize that their parents know anything?
Who are his really best friends? Can you confide in someone who would
invite him away for a week, or even a weekend? Does he listen to anyone?
Is there a teacher, or a coach who would help you? I know the person you
choose will tell you not to interfere, and that's good advice too, but
it seems important to me that somebody other than you should be getting
him to think through this situation.
Fooling her father to get him to pay expenses is reprehensible, but I
don't see it as a cardinal sin. Kids do those things. Putting myself
into her shoes to understand her, I recall when I was a young mother,
wife of a university student, my mother used to send me money to pay for
domestic help and I spent it on groceries.
You tell me she alienates him from all his friends, ... treats him like
dirt ... whines, lies and cheats. Maybe he's in love with her and that's
enough friends for the time being. And do you really mean "all" his friends,
or is it just that he spends so much time with her that some of his old
pals miss his company?
Does she really treat him like dirt? How is that? Does he like it? Are
they expressing their familiarity with one another in that perverse
backwards manner we see in so many young people, where they use insults
to prove they are close?
Whining sounds awful. Some women seem to be doing it all the time; I
guess she's one of those. They are the ones who never see good in
anything and forever complain, to attract attention. If she is a whiner
you can count on no change, ever. It has been my experience that people
who whine do it forever. I'm sorry for him, but I guess there must be
enough good stuff in the girl to overcome the whining, in his estimation.
Lying and cheating are a matter of degree. We all lie and we all cheat
and some of us are never found out. If her lying and cheating is obvious
to you now, it will become obvious to your son eventually and he'll cope
with it as he sees fit. There's nothing in the world that you can do
about it so just forget it.
Getting him to stand off and consider all sides of the relationship
would be the best possible action for him at this particular time.
Before he comits to a marriage he must have time away from her to
reflect, and discuss it seriously with someone who cares for him and
whom he respects. Your task will be to find such a person and persuade
them to intervene now before it's too late.
Good luck,
GG
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