Your teenage girl's love life

[moonlight]

For those of you with older kids (or anyone on here with a opinion! lol!) how involved are you when it comes to her love life? Do you make a point to be super supportive and involved? I ask because I have a friend that has teenage kids. Her daughter absolutely has a boyfriend because she constantly takes pictures of them and posts on FB. To me its on the creepy side when she did some sort of amateur photo shoot with the couple. These are pictures I would say are typical engagement photos. In all honestly it would be the sexiest set of engagement photos I've ever seen. Many pics of them hip to hip, holding her butt, them kissing, etc etc. Its seems like she is overly invested in a 16 year old's relationship. Or is this what teens need for the parent/child relationship to stay strong, open, and supportive?

[moonlight]

After reading that post I thought you might get the wrong idea about my friend. Just a FYI both her and her husband are upper upper middle class, and they both have graduate level education.

[diggitydot]

I don't think it's anywhere near appropriate for teens to have those kids of pics together. Our 16 y/o has a boyfriend (same kid for the last 2 years), and as much as I like him and think she made a good choice, there is NO WAY IN HELL taking pics of them kissing or holding each other's ass would ever happen in this house. No fucking way.

Parents are not setting appropriate teen love boundaries.

[Vanquisher]

I agree with DD. While I want to know what's going on, and I realize that there are going to be some things that happen that I wouldn't necessarily want for my teen so soon, I am certainly not going to condone it or enable it!

Why don't you just put a toothbrush for him in her bathroom, and announce that you are going to be away for the weekend, so he can sleep over? Seriously? No.

[medpedspouse]

Umm, I don't think I would ever take a picture where DH is holding my ass. Just typing that cracks me up. Can we say eeeww??!!

Seriously?? I can only imagine the convo..."now hold her ass and say cheese".

[Thirteen]

I'm kind of surprised that the teenage couple was comfortable doing any of that in front of the mom, anyway, regardless of the camera present.
As a teenager, any moment like that would be the last thing I'd want my parents to see: kissing, groping, etc.

Eh, maybe I'm a little conservative in that way. Not sure.

It raises a few red flags for my taste, but again, parenting is a personal thing...
I wouldn't want my children to be photographed in such a way, by another adult, period.
I also wouldn't want my children to think that moments of physical intimacy (IMO) are appropriate for portraiture.
Finally, I would not want my children to think that those actions are age/relationship appropriate.

[Ladybug]

I wonder if mom thought she was controlling the FB pics by offering to "help". It sounds like it backfired though. Mom should ask her how she thinks her next boyfriend will feel about these pictures that everyone will see and remember. Will the next boyfriend fill pressured to step the pictures up a notch to outdo the ex pictures? After all the stuff I've seen/heard happen with students sexting there is no way I'd be escorting my child down that treacherous slope. This story has a painful ending.

[moonlight]

I think my friend has the idea she is being artistic with these photos but honestly its really weird. If that is whats going on when she's taking the pics, I can only imagine what a typical weekend is like at the house. The way she carefully photographs them its almost like the mom (my friend) is just as emotionally invested in the teen's relationship as the hormonal teens. Surely this isn't new in the world of parenting?

The other thing I keep thinking is that if my daughter was friends with her teen I would HATE this woman. "Well, Kim's mom lets her do XYZ, why can't I run around like she does?" KWIM?

[mommax3]

I can tell you that there are lots of moms out there (typically moms of daughters in my experience) who get WAY involved in their kids' relationships. It's gross. I see it with some of the kids I teach (middle school), with some of my oldest's classmates (he's a junior), and DH has noticed it with some of the pregnant teenagers he sees. I don't understand it.

[niener]

... DH has noticed it with some of the pregnant teenagers he sees.

And there you have it.

[diggitydot]

Yup, mama is entirely too invested in her kid's relationship. Weirdly so, at that.

[DCJenn]

That's not even borderline creepy, that's full-blown creepy.

J.

[Momo]

there was a mom like that on the news last year...turns out she & daughter were "sharing" the boyfriend...daughter was 18& boyfriend was a minor! Mom & daughter are in jail. Husband was a politician... he divorced his wife.

[Pollyanna]

Yikes!!! Nothing okay about that! I will also note that if that is what they are doing in public I can only imagine what goes on in private.

[MrsK]

I think some moms get a thrill out of living through their daughters. They want their daughters to be pretty, popular, have a boyfriend, be cheer captain and prom queen and have the picture-perfect high school experience and they think those things will make their daughters happy. They don't know how hard that is for girls. It's juvenile. Personally, I'm hoping my kids are nerds in high school. They will have plenty of time to socialize after graduation. Any chance we can invest in serious orthodontics/head gear for K1 when he hits middle school? He was holding hands with a 3yo blonde on the playground today.