Mom Tells Her Son's Girlfriend To Break Up With Him Because 'She Deserves Better'
Just because someone asks for advice doesn't mean you should always give it.
fizkes | Shutterstock Getting involved in other people’s relationships is rarely a good idea. Friendships have ended over simple relationship advice, meaning you never really know how the drama you inadvertently cause could come back to haunt you.
But what about family? Shouldn't a mom be able to speak freely when it comes to her adult child's partnership? Turns out, no, especially when that advice is in favor of her child's girlfriend.
One woman learned this the hard way after telling her son’s girlfriend she should call it quits when it came to their relationship.
A mother posted on Reddit asking for advice because she was concerned that her actions ruined her 20-year-old son’s relationship with his girlfriend, Lily. She explained that her son has been in a “rut” lately. “He has very little work ethic, has no desire to get a job or go to college, and spends most of his time gaming or partying,” she wrote.
His girlfriend, however, is the complete opposite. “Lily, on the other hand, is the polar opposite,” she explained. “She’s very studious, has aspirations to be a doctor, is a very good swimmer, and is currently away at college.”
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The mother provided some background on her son and Lily’s relationship, explaining that they had been together for three years. “When my son and Lily first got together in high school, they were an excellent match,” she said. “We loved having Lily over and my son definitely took more care of himself. Since then, it’s rapidly deteriorated.”
“I know my son still loves Lily, but he never gives her the attention she deserves and with her clear potential, I just feel she deserves better,” she claimed.
Recently, the son's girlfriend came to visit, and things quickly went downhill.
"She was visibly upset,” the mom shared. “I asked her if she was okay, and she told me that she didn’t know what to do and wondered why my son had such little ambition and was so lazy.” The mother then gave her a critical piece of advice that changed the course of their relationship. "I told her I didn’t see it changing anytime soon," she wrote. “When she asked me what I would do in her situation, I told her to put herself first and [do] what she wanted."
Just days later, this advice sent shockwaves through the family. “My son comes downstairs in a rage telling me that Lily had broken up with him via text,” the mom said. “I asked him what she said and apparently the message referred to ‘discussions with your mom’ that had made her rethink the relationship.”
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Her son was understandably upset. “My son was livid that I’d gotten involved and said I’d overstepped boundaries,” she stated. “I told him that I didn’t advise Lily to leave him, just said she had to make her own choices and decide what was best for her.”
While the relationship was unlikely to last due to their differences, the mom should have stayed out of it.
Many Reddit users felt that the mom was not in the wrong in this situation. As one person commented, “You didn’t tell her to end the relationship, you told her to consider her needs.” Many chimed in with similar sentiments. After all, the mother hadn’t explicitly told Lily to break up with her son. Rather, she had empowered her to make her own decisions. In this case, that decision just happened to be breaking up with her son.
Others were less sympathetic and took issue with the mother’s attitude toward her son. One person stated, “Having no work ethic or ambition does not make him a bad person … Have you considered maybe being more encouraging instead of acting like he is beyond repair?”
Becoming an adult and handling adult relationships isn't easy, and parents never want to see their children struggle, no matter how old they are, but there comes a point when boundaries need to be set in a parent-adult child relationship. Although she had the best intentions and realized that the relationship wasn't headed for the long haul, she should have remained neutral and held her tongue instead of offering her son's girlfriend any advice.
Writing for Psychology Today, parent-child relationship expert and author Peg Streep explained, "No matter how close you are to your adult children or they to you, it isn’t a friendship, and there are ways in which it never becomes a peer relationship." There are issues that need to remain private among and between adult children and parents." She went on to stress, "Boundaries permit each of us to maintain our own space and autonomy while sustaining a close emotional connection; they permit our partners in that relationship, whether they are parents or adult children, lovers or spouses, friends or relatives, to maintain their own space and autonomy as well. Perhaps most important, boundaries are the foundation for mutual respect."
While it could be said that this mom merely encouraged Lily to put herself first, the ultimate issue was that it wasn't her advice to give. When Lily expressed why she was upset with the woman's son, she should have stressed that she speak with him about her concerns and left it at that.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.
