I am sick to my sotmach.I didnt sleep at all last time it is 5 am here I am .
I have a 20 year old daugther and she has a 22 year ole boyfriend.He was left by his roomates 4 months ago and was stuggling .and I let him move in here.I know a big mistake.
He has a job.For almost 4 months now He has not paid any bills and never no food nothing even though i ask for at least food.
I found out from my daugther that when they go out she pays and we stuggle and he knows it .
Lat night he said he was going to a friends house he left at 5 didnt returned till about 1 and my daugher and son both called and he didnt answer when he got home he said some thing like well maybe my phone was roaming .
I went to be didnt say good night and slammed the door not to mature .
I talked to my daugther and she is sick of it too so we gave him a boundarie today if he doesnt tell us the truth and start to help I want him out tonight before my daugthter gets off work.
Was my reaction to harsh and I kept telling my self the slogans it is her fight but he lives in my house and I sure dont want him useing her and me in my own house.
I like any suggestion .I know I messed up .it hurts cause i really loved him thought some say he be my son in law.
Somebody once told me "would I allow my best friend to put up with what I'm putting up with?"
I have had to, on several occasions, 'step outside the insanity box', and look at my various situations a little differently. I have a best friend, we'll call her Jane Doe. I love her to pieces and always encourage her to get the best for herself that life has to offer. She has been, like many of us, very generous and codependent at times. When she has been in relationships or firendships where she was clearly being used, I naturally was highly encouraging of her to 'kick the boyfriend to the curb', or to stop enabling someone who clearly wasn't using her as a 'hand-up', but a hand-out... There are times where she would be furious at how someone was using her up... I joined her in her feelings and was supportive of her decisions. At times when the same thing was going on in my own life, I have had to learn to turn the tables around.
Should I not set the same boundaries as those I would encourage my best friend to set? Should I not care about my own well-being at least as much as I would care for my best friend's? She is like a sister to me... isn't it time I started treating myself just as good as I would treat a friend or sister?
There are a great many things we are powerless over... but we do have some power, granted by God, to be used appropriately. ("It is the proper use of the Will"... Step 11, from the book "12 Steps and 12 Traditions") We have the power to allow, or not to allow, certain things to go on under our own roof. Believe it or not, we also have the power to allow or NOT to allow someone to use us and our home as a flop-house. Requiring that others take responsibility for themselves while under our own roof is no crime, nor is it being harsh or unloving. Requiring that others be responsible often, in fact, encourages them to learn to take care of themselves. While they may recoil at our requests for a simple donation of a few bucks, and a household chore or two, people are generally better off having some type of accountability in their lives. When we keep making excuses for them, things rarely change. Remember, nothing changes if we don't change.
I read that you would like for him to someday become your son-in-law... God has huge and wondrous plans for your daughter.. she is only 20? And what we want for them at the moment may fall way short of what God has in mind. While this fella may indeed become just that some day, do you feel that maybe he would respect you more if you required that he act, at 22 years old, a little more like an adult? There is not a damned thing wrong with asking a 22 year old man to chip in. And if he is going through some type of 'crisis' that is hidden to you... (you mentioned he is 'struggling)... whatever he is struggling with is not made better by enabling and baby-ing.
I have to think that every young person out there dreams of having their own place to live, their own source of income, and the dignity that goes a long with 'making it'. But sometimes some of us get too comfortable in the 'easy way out' to challenge ourselves to do just that... 'make it'. My aunt and dad took care of all my financial needs well into my 20's. While they encouraged and even demanded that I get a job and start contributing to my own life, I was too comfortable. I couldn't get out of the ruts I was in, because I didn't have to. Even as they were paying the bills and getting me out of various jams, I resented them. I resented them because of how I felt about myself. I resented that I was 20-something and other people were still paying my way. And I felt this way as a woman... imagine how a young man must feel.... When I finally HAD to get my crap together, I did, and I no longer resented my family. I felt proud, and they were proud of me for once. I couldn't feel any dignity, knowing I was a burden to someone else... unnecessarily. Helping is different than enabling and caretaking. I believe the AlAnon's over on the other Message Board could help you better distinguish what is helpful and what is just plain caretaking.
Back to YOU and YOUR part in this. I am sure you have the very best of intentions. But we all come to a time where enough is enough, and we start taking care of ourselves. Just my opinion and experience, but stand firm with this young man, make your requests real, and follow through on the consequences. You will be able to respect yourself more, and at the same time setting an example for your daughter that she does not ever have to 'take care of' a man.
Just my take.
Keep in touch and my prayers are with you!!
Keep making this about YOU and what YOU need, and what's best for YOU under YOUR roof!!
Thank you for suggestions and I did post it on alanon too .my part in it I want to safe and resuce and fix and that is adiction my dear friends.I set boundaries for him today he got mad so we will see.
Part of me is proud i did it and part of me is sick cause i am still sick and co depentant so i ran to a meeting .Thanks for the comments.We never graduate and we need to always one day a time and i thought of a dont in alanon dont make threaths you are not carry off.
