Your 18-yo child has an older lover. What's the minimum age difference you're comfortable with...

In My Humble Opinion
21

Oh, my goodness. I am in a dilemma here. First, since it is my daughter we are speaking about, then nobody is going to be good enough for her to begin with. My daughters were sequestered from the male population once they reached puberty and were released (actually they escaped) many years later.

OK. I wasn’t that bad. My dear departed spouse was considerably older than I when we married and my parents were a bit put off by it, but it worked out very well. More than 2 decades of love. So, honestly, whoever she wanted to be with would be acceptable to me. And same sex? That wouldn’t be a problem either. Pretty much I would expect my daughters to marry inside their species. And to avoid shape-shifting denizens of the lower realms.

Unfortunately, it appears that one of my lovely children didn’t follow that injunction.

22

I am not a parent, so take my opinion with that appropriate amount of salt, but I’ll tend to agree with about 22 as the realistic maximum. It’s not because of the age itself, but what stage they are in their life.

If one is 18 and in high school or just starting college and the other is in college or just starting to work, they’re at the outter bounds of having that in common. So if you get much older than 22, they’ve now been out of college for a year or two and working and been a full responsible adult whereas the 18yo will still be several years away from that. Even if they’re both reasonable people, it’ll be a huge problem for them to relate as equals and it will put a lot of strain on the relationship. It might be able to push a little longer if the 18yo isn’t going into college but still has some kind of reasonable job skills to start a career rather than just having a job, but that’s pretty rare.

Another scenario would be if the older one didn’t go to college. If they’re 22, it’s not all that unreasonable that they might still be doing jobs rather than settling into a career or may be in the beginning stages of a career, so they can still have some stuff in common. But if they’re 23 or 24 and didn’t go to college, they’ve now basically spent 5 or 6 years in high school not really doing anything to further their lives. Especially if the 18yo is going into college, they’ll end up having difficulty relating as equals, but the pressure might be reversed where the older one is less responsible and a negative influence.

And really, it’s easy to think that one’s kid might be more mature and thus only relate well with people a little older, but if you look at it from the other end, what draws someone to want to date much younger people? Often times when I’ve seen large age discrepancies, the older person isn’t looking for someone who they’re really compatible with and they just stumbled onto someone who is younger, they’re actively looking for someone who is less and manipulable. So sure, your 18yo may really be as mature, intelligent and worldly as an average 25yo, but would someone like that really do well with an average 25yo? In a few years, they’ll either have surpassed them and be unhappy, or have possibly been held back in their development.

I think, if college is involved, once you get past that, age really doesn’t mean very much anymore, or without it a little younger, but 22 seems like the maximum reasonable age for an 18yo to date in pretty much any but the rarest circumstances.

23

Depends on how much money the older person has. If they could put my kid through college I’d be mostly for it.

24

Depends where they each are in their lives, but I can’t really see someone with any sense who is older than about 23 wanting to be with an 18-year-old.

25

This is more or less what I heard about the age spread, though I do not actually care about an age spread, it is in the personality of the lover. I would not want them with a loser. If a son, I do not want him with a bubble head who doesn’t think no matter how pretty she is.

Money is not normally a consideration, but parity would be nice - I don’t want a gold digger of either sex, nor would I want a Bill Gates of either sex- too much money can be as bad as not enough.

26

The minimum age difference that I would be comfortable with would be the Planck time. In this family we obey the known laws of physics.

With apologies to Homer Simpson.

27

Just in terms of age range, probably early thirties at the oldest. But honestly it would matter a lot more what kind of person they are - lets say, for my daughter, a single 30 year old guy, who is maybe a little socially awkward but has a professional job, no criminal record, never married, living on his own for many years and they met in a somewhat normal way like say, church or at work rather than at a bar or something would be fine. I mean, I could see the appeal in a guy like that if my daughter turned out to be the responsible, non-partying type. Divorced 30 year old guy, with 2 kids, living in his parent’s basement with a job at McDonalds would not be fine, despite being the same age.

28

Pretty much agree with this (except the church bit but that’s splitting hairs over an example).

My daughter is 21 and son 23, both are in relationships with people round their own age. I’d have a hard time feeling comfortable with them having a partner who was closer to my age than theirs but would depend on the person.

29

22

30

One of my HS BFs started dating and eventually married a guy 11 years older; when the relationship started she was 17 and evidently the more mature one. He wasn’t sure whether he even wanted to do anything with his life; she was in charge of a father with cancer, a mother and almost-unemployable brother in denial, and had very clear Plans. He’d had his government job since he was 18; she was going to leave HS after graduation (see family situation) and work towards a government job (got it on the first try). She also intended to attend long distance university to get her law degree (she eventually did).

I’d totally freak out if the guy was 40 (what, he just separated and is now looking for a copy of the woman he started dating 22 years ago, aka “a younger model”?), but anything under 35 I’d examine carefully before freaking out or not.

31

Personally, I’d only be comfortable with 19 or 20 for an 18yo (sexuality doesn’t matter at all). It’s one of those cusp ages where I’d prefer my kid was mainly interacting with her own age group - university freshers, in this case… The jump in awareness and life experience from 18 to the commonly-cited 22 is too big for my tastes, acceptable to some absurd algebraic equation or not.

32

When I was 34 I started dating an 18 year old.
Her parents forbade nothing, but they certainly took an even keener interest than they would have if there had been no age difference. We did the whole “Meet the Parents” thing much earlier in the relationship than I would have if I were dating someone my own age.

I recognized their concern as being totally valid- despite the fact that I myself was dating someone much younger, my general feeling was and is that such a huge age gap is a valid cause for concern. Her parents addressed their own concerns in the best way I could have asked for: by meeting me and getting to know me. Her parents decided pretty quickly that they thought I was a good guy, and they recognized that we made a good couple.

We dated for nearly two and half years. It’s been a year and a half since we broke up and the friendship we developed post-breakup has been a great friendship. I had a good relationship with her parents while we were dating, and that relationship has remained good. Her mother was quite disappointed when we broke up.

I don’t expect to ever have kids (the stated reason she broke up with me, actually) but if I were the parent I would be concerned if the age difference was more than 5 or 6 years. I expect that I would address that concern the same way her parents did: by meeting the person such as to have an opportunity to evaluate the person thus lessening the significance of the age difference.

33

When I was 22 and entering my last year of university, I worked at a summer camp and hooked up with an unusually mature 17 year old who was going into her last year of high school. Admittedly, the time continuum does not follow the normal rules at camp!

21 years together, 14 years of marriage, 2 kids later it seemed to work for us.

I think that I’d be ok with a 5 year difference for my girls.

34

Maybe 25. This may be partly because my daughter is likely to go for very geeky people, and people who aren’t all that outgoing, so they might have got started with the whole relationship thing a bit later.

Sexuality does make a little bit of a difference, I guess, in that the older you are, the more likely you are to want a relationship that produces kids, and I’d prefer for my daughter not to be a parent in her teens. For two women, having a child would require a lot of forethought and doctors’ visits with no accidental pregnancies. For a man and a woman, all it could take is a mistake with contraception and then deciding to continue the pregnancy. (not that abortion is fun either). So perhaps I’d be more comfortable with her having a female 25-year-old partner than male.

35

Sorry for reviving this dead threat but, just wanted to say bienville I read that thread with some interest when you posted it. (I’ve read this board casually for a few years, just joined recently). I’m sad to hear you broke up, it seemed like a very nice relationship at least from the little you posted about it. I’m about to turn 33 in two weeks, and I’m generally attracted to younger women, so I’m taking some inspiration from you :slight_smile:

I don’t have children, but if/when I do have them, and when they turn 18, I don’t think I’d have age preferences in terms of who they date. Knowing how immature I was at 18-22, I’d probably prefer (especially if my child was a girl) they pick partners who are older, that can care for them better and provide them with some more guidance. In general I’d be more concerned if their partner had compatible views about religion, dating/relationships, family and childrearing, etc., if they were generally a good person, and if they had a decent job and work ethic.

I’d be more concerned about their dating lives before they turned 18, and I’d encourage them not to have sex till they were out of high school.

36
  1. And even then, it would be none of my %^%# business.
37

Skald the Rhymer what’s your opinion?

38

My partner and I have a 20-year age difference, and it’s not at all an issue. If I had an 18-year-old, I’d be supportive regardless of the age difference.

39

When I was 16 I also dated a 21-year-old (or two…) and my parents didn’t have a problem with it, so I don’t see myself having a problem with it… but I don’t have kids of any age, so I can’t say for 100% sure. It’s just that when I was younger, I dated guys who were older and guys who were my age, and frankly there was not that big of a difference in terms of their maturity levels, in my opinion.

It wouldn’t matter if my kid was gay or not. It might be different if it was my son vs. my daughter. I think I’d be somewhat less comfortable with my son dating an older woman. Maybe because I would be able to relate to a daughter who wanted to date older guys, but not a woman who wanted to date much younger men.

I think it would also depend on my kid’s personality and their emotional maturity. I know that my parents let me do certain things at an earlier age than my siblings, and remember my friends’ parents doing that, too.

40

Letting work distract you from posting? *Quelle horreur! * :stuck_out_tongue:

I’ve got a son. I think I’d be a bit worried if, at age 18, he was dating a woman in his late 20s: I’d be wondering what’s in it for her, because so far the reasonable expectation is that he’s not going to be overly mature for his age.

If he did get involved with a woman substantially older than himself, I’d suggest they agree, in writing, that unless and until they married, any offspring from their relationship were legally hers alone - he would give up any custody and visitation rights, and she would give up any right to hit him up for child support.