Can she date on a school night?
As a former 18 year old and the parent of a 19 year old, I’d like to point out that she’s not a grownup, either.
She’s certainly of age, and the OP isn’t doing anything wrong by dating her. I just personally find it squicky. I know plenty of kids that age. They’re not date-able. They’re barely formed. They’re hazy, pale mirages of the people they’ll eventually be.
How, exactly, did you meet?
I’m pretty sure that having your teacher help you with your homework would be against school policy.
:dubious:
@ the OP: Is she real mature for her age, or are you just that immature?
Is it awkward to date someone who still lives with their parents? Like, never struck out on their own and had to move home because of the recession or something, but someone who has never left home?
Do you think most of her friends leaving affected her getting together with you? Like, if she still had a lot of friends going to college locally that she spent time at college events with do you think she would have gotten together with someone her own age as opposed to choosing a relationship with an older man?
I hope I’m dating 20-year olds when I’m your age (and yes, I’m aware that that makes me vile, immature, etc). So with one hand I salute you.
With the other I slap you for your sneak-bragging!
For Oakminster and RandMcnally, I’ve actually always been of the opinion that relationships with this big an age difference do often deserve a bit of scrutiny. And, if someone is repeatedly making a point of seeking out younger people to date, that would raise an eyebrow from me.
I have always believed that every specific relationship between two specific individuals can stand on its own merits, despite falling outside of mainstream acceptability. Still as a general rule I have always been of the opinion that two people in a relationship such as this one had really better closely examine the healthiness of the relationship.
And conveniently, of course, everyone would always want to tell themselves that they are the exception. So, relying on self-reporting of the healthiness of the relationship isn’t always accurate.
Of the various reasons that some unexamined May-December Relationships may be unhealthy, the model that I would have the hardest time defending myself on would be:
“Older Man Who Feels Unaccomlished Dates Younger Woman Who, Because of Inexperience, is Much Easier to Impress and Less Likely to Call Him Out in the way a Woman His Own Age Would”
I have been growing more and more frustrated with ever evasive career goals. I do feel more self-judgmental when presenting my achievements to someone my own age. This younger woman does think that the accomplishments that I have made are really cool, which makes me feel better about myself.
So, it is in this area that I’ve felt it important to really examine the relationship for worry that it may go down an unhealthy road. Examining the relationship in this way is an ongoing thing, not a one-off kind of a thing.
I think the danger would be that I become complacent: she’s not going to push me to do better, so I won’t push myself to be better. Because this 19 year old is impressed with me, that means I’m good and can justify my place and kick back.
. . . when in reality, I’m just a loser and this poor girl is now stuck with a loser because she didn’t know any better.
Thankfully, I think we are, so far, free and clear of that dismal, unhealthy scenario.
In contrast, I think a big part of the reason why I was feeling unfulfilled career-wise, was that I was being too hard on myself. And, though I have felt more self-judgmental when presenting my achievements to someone my own age, I realize that it has been the self-judgmental aspect that has been my own baggage and that, in fact, I’m doing fine in the estimation of people my own age. And rather than becoming complacent, I feel more able to move forward to continuing achievements.
One aspect where it could be unhealthy from her standpoint:
“I’ll rely upon my older boyfriend to handle all the ‘grown-up’ responsibilities so I can avoid having to maturely face being an adult”.
And I think we are avoiding this one as well- again by regularly re-examining it.
So, while I agree that this kind of relationship in general inspires closer scrutiny, I also believe that this specific relationship stands up to that scrutiny.
She has a very good relationship with her father. I think she finds very different fulfillment in her relationship with me.
Do you provide her with alcohol?
I have a good friend who is 33 and has, for the last 5-6 years or so, made a habit of dating college-age girls. He lives in a college town and as a result has ample opportunities to meet such girls at restaurants, through shared friends, and his work with the alumni association of the university.
Since he doesn’t drink the age difference is less important, but these relationships all tend to end the same way: “we were in two different places in our lives.” The girls inevitably graduate from college and move away for a job/attend graduate school, and that’s when it ends.
He seems to lament the fact that his relationships don’t tend to endure, but also doesn’t seem to make the connection that he should be dating women who are older and have more stability in their lives.
Oaky, as a former 18 year old, I think it is wholly appropriate to refer to teenaged females as “little girls.”
Edit:
One hundred billion dollars says the internet.
She loves music and is a real movie buff. The list of favorite movies she gave on our first date would have impressed me from someone my own age. Her youth made the list even more impressive.
She’s also a drummer, quite a good drummer, so her appreciation of music is more sophisticated than a passing enjoyment of whatever is on the radio. I am a musician as well, so we have some real connections and mutual respect here.
She doesn’t have a fake ID. This has been problematic at times, especially since most of my friends are either musicians or comics so I have always spent nearly all of my social life in bars.
Some times I’ve skipped an event I wanted to go to because it was on a night she and I would otherwise spend together and I would otherwise have to skip out on seeing her.
Other times I’ve gone ahead an gone to the event and we would try to make up for the lost time together at some other time, or we would just say “bummer” and miss each other that night.
Thankfully, we are not glued at the hip and each keep a life beyond our relationship. So, plenty of nights we wouldn’t see each other one way or another so I can make any plans without worrying about excluding her.
I don’t just blow off the critics, because I do believe that because of the age difference there should be some regular self-examining on our part. When there’s criticism it helps me to do this self-examining.
But, no, I don’t feel the need to justify it for the critic’s benefit.
Sneak bragging!
Anyway, when I met MrWhatsit, he was 30 and I was 18. Not quite as bad as the OP, but same ballpark. He started talking about long-term commitment fairly soon into the relationship, I told him he was full of crap because I was 18 and not committing to anybody that early, and then we had a rocky on-and-off four years after that until we succumbed to the inevitable and moved in with each other.
Hope it works out for you, OP. Even if you are totally a sneak bragger.
I’ll go with braggart.
Do you believe this relationship has the potential to go the distance or do you not look to far into the future and just take it as it comes?
Is the sex good?
I do a comedy-music act. I was performing at a rare (for me) all-ages event. I met her (and her mother) at the event. She bought a CD and found me on Facebook.
Her Facebook profile photo at the time showed her playing drums and her page had a link to her YouTube page where I could hear that she was quite a good drummer. So, when she began correspondence I was open to getting to know her.
We got together once on a non-date. As she was a musician and we had begun corresponding discussing music and live performances, I told her about a show where I was working the door. Thinking she’d want to hear some new music at a live venue (all-ages, didn’t have to sneak her in), I invited her to stop by to hang out.
When she showed up clearly wanting to present herself as “datable”, and when she stayed all the way to the end of the show, I invited to to get something to eat afterward.
The getting-to-know-you late night at the diner felt like there was some potential, so I asked her out for a “real date”.
Mine was a legitimate question and I will ask it again but in a different way; as an under-aged PERSON, has she consumed alcohol in your presence?
No rationalizations or justifications, just a simple Yes or No.