teenagers and long-distance relationships

[Brianne]

I married the guy who was supposed to just be a summer fling. We've been together over 17 years now.

The best thing my parents did for me was to trust my decisions without judgement. They did admit to me years later that they thought I was nuts, but they knew I was going to do what I wanted anyway.

Be available for her if she wants to talk about it, but she is an adult now. Trust yourself in knowing you've done what you can to put her on the right path.

 

[faeriegrl]

I was 20 and met a guy locally who said he was 18 but turned out to be 17. Illegal here!!

I would watch out for that first.

Long distance can work for some people. I am now married to a guy that was long distance with me for 9 months. He was from Austin and moved here to Atlanta. He was also an adult.

Let them work it out. If it's meant to be, it will.

 

[powellrj]

I started dating him during my Jr year in High School. We dated through high school and became engaged right after I graduated from High School. I was only 17 at the time. I stayed home and went to a local college while he was still at his school 4 hours away.

We married the following May when he graduated from college and I dropped out after my freshman year. That was over 30 years ago.

Now that I have children that are that age I can't believe my parents let me date at guy that old and then become engaged at the age of 17 and never said a word. I shudder to think about it now.

 

[Disney Doll]

I am choosing not to offer an opinion because my daughter is very much like me...any time my mom offered an opinion of a boy...well, if she didn't like him, I discovered that I was madly in love. it's only now, 30 years later, that I understand my mother's point of view.

the boy in question is very nice, very ambitious, wants to go to medical school. but I want her to be more involved with college and the poeple at her school.

we'll see how long it lasts.

So it sounds like you like the kid but have concerns about the long-distance thing.

I'd probably say very little negative about the young man or the relationship for that matter. You might draw her out by asking about the people she's meeting in college, ask her if there are any groups or clubs that she thinks she might be interested in joining...from a "you have a whole new world of experiences opening up for you, how exciting" perspective rather than a "I want you to be more involved in college and less involved with the boyfriend at home" perspective.

My mother made very little commentary on my boyfriends. About the only thing she ever said was "If it is meant to be, it will be" when we broke up.

And guess what Mom??? YOU WERE RIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[kellyg403]

When my son was 16 he started dating a girl from his work who was a year older than him. She graduated the next year and went to college 3 hours away. I thought for sure it was the end of it..they were in two different worlds. They somehow made it through, son graduated and then he went to college 3 hours away in the other direction. Long story short, they have been married 3 years now and the proud parents of one sweet baby girl.

I never would have guess this would have been the outcome. But, it was a good experience for them. My son is in Afghanistan now until next March. They are going to make the deployment just fine. Dil is self sufficient.

I didn't offer any advice either. I just figured I would be there for the fall out and hurt feelings when they broke up. Even dh couldn't believe it lasted!
Good Luck!

Kelly

 

[skuttle]

DH and I started dating in high school when he was a senior and I was a sophomore. He went off to college about 4 hours away in 1994. We stayed together, although it was VERY hard on me. You know how much drama a teenage girl can imagine! Two years later I started college in 1996, but a different college from DH and we were still 3 hours away. By the end of my freshman year of college, DH dumped me. That was in 1997. Three months later we ran into each other in our hometown and got back together for a couple of months before he dumped me again. DH really struggled in college for a lot of reasons. Anyways, by the following January (1998) we were back together, in August 1998 DH decided he had to get away from where he was and the situation he was in so he left college and moved to the town I was in. We were engaged by December 1998.

We just celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary. DH eventually went back to college and graduated in 2005.

 

[sk8ingmom]

Three weeks before I left for college (14 hours away), I met a cute boy from my hometown area. I figured it would just be a summer fling. Then, I got to college and figured it wouldn't last the first semester. After freshman year, I transfered to a school much closer (only three hours away), and he came up once a month. I had a very full college life, full of friends and activities. When he came up to visit, he was a part of it - when he wasn't there, it wasn't like I was pining away just counting the days until I could see him again. We dated all through college and after I graduated, I moved 3000 miles across the country with him. we just celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary this past June. So yeah, they don't often last, but sometimes things are just meant to be.

Very well said. Congrats on 10 years! I never felt like I missed out on any "college life" because I had a long distance BF. If anything, I was the ultimate 'wing man'. I swear my name was "M.-she-has-a-boyfriend" since that's how my friends always introduced me!

DH went to a military academy, so we only saw each other every 2-3 months, including summers. When I graduated, I followed him from Ohio to an island off the coast of Alaska!