In Desperate Need of Advice on Personal Issue

[ThatGuyOverThere]

Growing up, my family raised me to be extremely anti-alcohol. My dad has never drank in his life, and my mom hasn't since her college years. This attitude has hurt me in some ways, as I used to look down on kids who drank. I was fine all through high school, as my friends didn't drink. But over the summer after graduation, they all became obsessed with it. Whatever, I still had fun with them. Over time, though, I became curious as to what all the fuss was about, and was tired of being the DD so I caved and tried drinking right before we left for college.

So I get to college, and start to drink on the weekends. A couple weeks ago my mom called me, and started accusing me of drinking. I'm a horrible liar, so I decided to get it out in the open sooner rather than later. I got the "I'm very disappointed in you" speech, and was told several family members had trouble sleeping over my "terribly selfish" decision and that I had ruined the family reputation. Eventually she came to terms with it because "she had no other choice" and told me to at least be responsible with it.

Now, my friends and I back home have a facebook thread going to let each other know about our crazy stories in college. When I created my facebook account my mom made me give her my password so she could monitor it. I didn't care at first because I had nothing to hide. But she reads the college thread, and finds out that I drank a couple beers on a Wednesday night. I'm pissed she's doing this but what can I do? Changing my password will only make things worse.

She calls me up today extremely angry, and *****es me out for a good half hour, calling me a "weak-minded" person who is falling to peer pressure. She told me that she lost all respect for me and that when I come home she's going to be all over me. I'm not going to be allowed to visit friends at college or even hang out with them on breaks because "it's obvious she can't trust me anymore." She says that even though I'm 18 she still has full control over me until I move out, and though she can't control what I do at college, she can make sure I have no life back at home. She's even threatened to force me to transfer to a college extremely close to home so she can monitor me. I don't know what to do. She is acting like I've committed some horrible sin and have disgraced the family name. I'm not in any position to move out either. And now I'm never going to want to go home. What do I do?

EDIT: I'm the first kid in the family who has tried drinking, so I get to deal with all this ****. ****.

 

[KontrollerX]

Only thing you can do is put your head down and work hard at schooling and getting a good job and good pay so you can leave your mother's control as soon as possible.

You can use this as good motivation.

Doing what you want isn't that far away if you work hard in school, get a good paying job and make a sh!t load of money.

If you drag your heels over this though the longer mommy is going to have control of the reigns which is no good.

BTW, can't you just make a new facebook account that she doesn't know about or are you restricted to using a computer she has full control over which she has a ton of spyware Net Nanny type of sh!t installed on to monitor your activity and block you from having any fun???

 

[wolf116]

I never understand these situations because I found it extremely easy to leave home at 17 due to an abusive and controlling father, I'm sorry if I oversimplify things but this is how I delt with it.

I saved up $1000 from a weekend job at high school and looked for a shared house needing another house mate. End of story. All your problems are solved! Mom doesn't know where you live and you ignore her phone calls.

Tell her to go to hell, then change the facebook password.

If you haven't learnt to lie yet, you should start practising.

Sh!t, I would rather rent out a camping site for the holidays and live in a tent then go home to some controlling b!tch like that. In fact that would be awesome.

 

[Desert Fox]

I'm just like you except I don't drink and I stick with it.

I don't like the taste and I can have fun when I'm sober.

If people ask I tell them I'm eskimo and my religion says not to drink. Only seal fat is allowed.

As for lies, dude take it from me, do not lie to your parents oyu will only dig yourself a deeper and deeper hole. I'm glad you came clean with your parents early on that's good. I wish I did on some things but I didn't and now I'm in a deeper hole than before for lying. Dammit, but the hole I'm in isn't about drinking, yeah that's something good i've done.

Anyways this all comes down to personal preference if you want your parents' respect more and what their respect means to you or do you want your friends respect more and does that mean more to you. Pick one, tell the other one to fvck off, and move on.

 

[Desert Fox]

I never understand these situations because I found it extremely easy to leave home at 17 due to an abusive and controlling father, I'm sorry if I oversimplify things but this is how I delt with it.

I saved up $1000 from a weekend job at high school and looked for a shared house needing another house mate. End of story. All your problems are solved! Mom doesn't know where you live and you ignore her phone calls.

Tell her to go to hell, then change the facebook password.

If you haven't learnt to lie yet, you should start practising.

Sh!t, I would rather rent out a camping site for the holidays and live in a tent then go home to some controlling b!tch like that. In fact that would be awesome.

1000 dollars will last you a month max out by yourself.

rent will eat up 50-90% of that paycheck right there. + food + internet + gas + transportation

 

[wolf116]

1000 dollars will last you a month max out by yourself.

rent will eat up 50-90% of that paycheck right there. + food + internet + gas + transportation

A month is more then enough time to get set up.

It's still doable, I'm doing it right now. I've been doing it since I was 17.

 

[J Roc]

why the f*ck would you give your mom your facebook account information? :nono:

 

[manonfire]

Tell your mom you are a grown man and you can handle you alcahol adn you drink responsibly.

Also, justify by telling her "well you drank in college." afterall, she can't deny it.

She should not have any acess to your facebook, what so ever.

change your password and tell her you deleted your account becuase you saw no point in having one if she was gonna be monitoring it.

 

[Mr.Positive]

What do I do?

EDIT: I'm the first kid in the family who has tried drinking, so I get to deal with all this ****. ****.

I was raisied in a very conservative family, and I had a lot of "firsts" too. I can completely understand how you feel, about your mom, and her shaming, controlling tactics.

Unfortunately, it's a tough situation because you either completely disrespect your mom, and do what you want, or you try and keep the peace.

I kept the peace, or at least tried. When I was your age. My Mom once told me.."I prayed for you every single day you were in college." She knew I was out wreaking havok, but didn't want to know the details.

My suggestion is this..don't beat yourself up for breaking a lot of family "firsts". But...understand that an 18 year old son, is a Mom's worst nightmare. They worry themselves like crazy..

Also, when you get older, your Mom will mellow out a bit. They always do. So, in the mean time, I'd try and get along as best as possible. Don't tell her everything, but..tell her enough to not let her worry so much.

 

[classy broadside]

Alcohol's a drug. Why does anyone need drugs? To fix something in life. What does alcohol fix? The perceived boredom of existence. Did you believe you needed alcohol before? Why use it now? Your mom has a point. She's trying to raise you right.

 

[Desdinova]

She says that even though I'm 18 she still has full control over me until I move out, and though she can't control what I do at college, she can make sure I have no life back at home. She's even threatened to force me to transfer to a college extremely close to home so she can monitor me.

Here's what I would do in your situation:

1) Move out
2) Quit College
3) Get a job
4) Get a loan to send YOURSELF through college instead of letting your controlling a55hole parents flip the bill and feel they have the right of telling you what to do.

You're getting everything for free, but you pay for it by letting yourself be controlled by your parents. The method that I listed will cost you money, but the freedom is worth it. Trust me, I've been in your situation and once I got out of the control handed down by my parents, my self-esteem, confidence, and overall happiness improved 100%.

 

[ThatGuyOverThere]

BTW, can't you just make a new facebook account that she doesn't know about or are you restricted to using a computer she has full control over which she has a ton of spyware Net Nanny type of sh!t installed on to monitor your activity and block you from having any fun???

I can theoretically just make a new one, but then I'd have to friend everyone again and people would just be confused. That might be what I have to do though.

I never understand these situations because I found it extremely easy to leave home at 17 due to an abusive and controlling father, I'm sorry if I oversimplify things but this is how I delt with it.

I saved up $1000 from a weekend job at high school and looked for a shared house needing another house mate. End of story. All your problems are solved! Mom doesn't know where you live and you ignore her phone calls.

Tell her to go to hell, then change the facebook password.

If you haven't learnt to lie yet, you should start practising.

Here's what I would do in your situation:

1) Move out
2) Quit College
3) Get a job
4) Get a loan to send YOURSELF through college instead of letting your controlling a55hole parents flip the bill and feel they have the right of telling you what to do.

You're getting everything for free, but you pay for it by letting yourself be controlled by your parents. The method that I listed will cost you money, but the freedom is worth it. Trust me, I've been in your situation and once I got out of the control handed down by my parents, my self-esteem, confidence, and overall happiness improved 100%.

This is something I've considered. I could feasibly move out of my house and find someplace cheap and work two jobs to make it work. The problem is paying for my education. I'd have no problem taking on some loans, but I go to the the University of Notre Dame, which has a 50k per year tuition. Half of that is covered by scholarships and financial aid, while the other half is covered by my parents and my grandfather. I worked over the summer and made $2500. A fraction of that was spent over the summer, while the rest of it went towards my TV, fridge, other stuff for my dorm, and spending money for the year. I'm working right now, but I make a paltry $50 a week. There's also the aspect of alienating myself completely from my family, which I'm not sure I'm ready to do yet. But I am tired of her holding the finances over my head as justification for controlling what I do. Freedom does sound nice, no matter how expensive it may be. Desdinova, are you suggesting I quit college right now and find another more affordable one?

Also, justify by telling her "well you drank in college." afterall, she can't deny it.

She should not have any acess to your facebook, what so ever.

change your password and tell her you deleted your account becuase you saw no point in having one if she was gonna be monitoring it.

She justifies her drinking in college by saying the drinking age was 18 back then and she was responsible with it. She also says that I should have learned from her "mistakes." And I can't say that I deleted my account because she won't buy it and she has access to my brother's facebook anyway so she'll know.

Also, when you get older, your Mom will mellow out a bit. They always do. So, in the mean time, I'd try and get along as best as possible. Don't tell her everything, but..tell her enough to not let her worry so much.

I'm kind of hoping this whole thing will just blow over with time. I don't think she'll go through with all her threats and she won't just force me to stay home the whole time. Meanwhile I'll plan out my escape so I can be on my own ASAP.

Alcohol's a drug. Why does anyone need drugs? To fix something in life. What does alcohol fix? The perceived boredom of existence. Did you believe you needed alcohol before? Why use it now? Your mom has a point. She's trying to raise you right.

Point taken, but that's not the issue here. Whether or not I continue to drink I have lost my mother's trust and she will continue with her punishments regardless. I know she's trying to raise me right but really, is she justified with her Gestapo tactics? What did I do that was so terribly wrong? There are seven kids in my family, and I have an older brother who is a sophomore in college. I saw him go through his freshman year without drinking. That's fine, but he alienated himself from everyone who drank because of my family's attitude towards drinking. My mother has taught us that people who drink are "bad" people, and this has really harmed my brother socially. I am determined to not do that, and he now has even considered trying drinking. He's realized his mistake and doesn't wish his current situation to continue anymore. Really, what's so bad about people who want to just have a little fun? What is so bad about it? That's my point, I'm being made out to be a criminal by my mother. We used to constantly cut down those "stupid, mindless kids" who decided to drink all the time, but I now realize how stupid this mindset is. It can only hurt me.

Anyways this all comes down to personal preference if you want your parents' respect more and what their respect means to you or do you want your friends respect more and does that mean more to you. Pick one, tell the other one to fvck off, and move on.

Does it really have to be this black and white? I don't want to blow off one side entirely.

 

[theunflushables]

Notre Dame is a Catholic school, known as the "Fighting Irish" How the hell can someone at an Irish-Catholic school not be drunk all the time? Tell her its part of the school tradition.

 

[azanon]

I'm tipsy as I write this:

>I could give up drinking if the parents were paying for college. Freaking easily.
>Screw facebook. Live life in the real world until you're on your own.

I suggest learning to pick your battles. If I had to choose between the freedom to drink vs. college paid for anywhere, I'd go with the latter every single time, and learn the art of covert drinking in the process.

>Work on neutering that conscience of yours a bit. It takes power from you. Perhaps you can't lie because you think some big god is out there judging you. Others lie to you all the time. You need to learn to survive in a dog eat dog world.
>I second KontrollerX's advice.

 

[Bible_Belt]

Mom can fvck off. If you are religious, there is a commandment to honor your mother, but I don't think you honor her by letting her run your life and having no spine to stand up to her. Structure your affairs so that you don't need her any more for anything; lie through your teeth about everything until then. She does not deserve to be told the truth about anything in your life. Then when you don't need her, you can literally tell her to fvck off and that you don't need her.

That sounds really harsh, but mothers are women, and women will always respect you more for putting your foot down when they disrespect you. She will come crawling back and treat you with respect. Even better she will actually respect you. Right now she has no respect for you at all and kicks you around like a dog. Either she treats you well or you simply never talk to her again. The same goes for the rest of your family, the women you date, and anyone else in your life that you don't need.

btw, if you don't set your foot down with Mom, you are going to marry a girl who is just like her, and you are going to be bullied by a woman for the rest of your life.

 

[ThatGuyOverThere]

I'm tipsy as I write this:

>I could give up drinking if the parents were paying for college. Freaking easily.
>Screw facebook. Live life in the real world until you're on your own.

I suggest learning to pick your battles. If I had to choose between the freedom to drink vs. college paid for anywhere, I'd go with the latter every single time, and learn the art of covert drinking in the process.

>Work on neutering that conscience of yours a bit. It takes power from you. Perhaps you can't lie because you think some big god is out there judging you. Others lie to you all the time. You need to learn to survive in a dog eat dog world.
>I second KontrollerX's advice.

A few things:

1. That's nice, but me continuing to drink or not is no longer the issue here. Even if I gave it up completely, I still don't have my mother's trust, and there'd be no way to prove to her that I'd been clean. The situation would not change.

2. Facebook was used as an easy method in which we could exchange our college stories. I mainly go on to see if the thread has been updated. Facebook is also a useful tool to stay in touch with old friends. As long as it's not affecting my "real" social life, why not?

3. I'm a terrible liar not because of my conscience, I'm just not good at it. People can easily tell when I'm lying. And I'm not afraid of some "big god", I'm an atheist. I'm always surprised at some of the personal stuff people tell me, so maybe my inability to lie makes me more trustworthy, who knows. But I do need to learn, it's a valuable skill to have.

4. Yes, biding my time does seem to be the most financially sensible decision here.

5. I'm curious, how many of you were responsible for paying for your education? How the hell did you do it? I can understand scholarships, but how did you manage to come up with all that money without accumulating massive debt through loans? For example, where would I come up with that 200k? I can only make so much from a summer job, and there's too much going on during the school year to work that much, and any job available has ****ty pay anyway. Did you implement a great business venture or something? And did your parents really not help at all? I'm always amazed at the people who say they paid for college themselves (without scholarship). College is ****ing expensive.:crazy: I feel so spoiled. If you count my scholarships and my own school loans, I will end up paying for around 25k of that 200k, with the rest covered by financial aid (80k), my parents (55k), and my grandfather (40k). I can't imagine being on tab for that other 90% of it. I'm really lucky I guess.

EDIT: On second thought, considering that the average ND business grad makes a starting salary of around 50k a year, I could feasibly take on everything in loans. I could live on a 40k per year salary and allocate 10k a year to paying off the loans. It actually doesn't sound so bad, and the freedom would be worth it. And when the loans are finally paid off, it'd be like getting a huge raise.

 

[ThatGuyOverThere]

Mom can fvck off. If you are religious, there is a commandment to honor your mother, but I don't think you honor her by letting her run your life and having no spine to stand up to her. Structure your affairs so that you don't need her any more for anything; lie through your teeth about everything until then. She does not deserve to be told the truth about anything in your life. Then when you don't need her, you can literally tell her to fvck off and that you don't need her.

That sounds really harsh, but mothers are women, and women will always respect you more for putting your foot down when they disrespect you. She will come crawling back and treat you with respect. Even better she will actually respect you. Right now she has no respect for you at all and kicks you around like a dog. Either she treats you well or you simply never talk to her again. The same goes for the rest of your family, the women you date, and anyone else in your life that you don't need.

btw, if you don't set your foot down with Mom, you are going to marry a girl who is just like her, and you are going to be bullied by a woman for the rest of your life.

You're right. I've been dependent on my mother for many things throughout my life, to the point where she has plenty of ammo to use against me when I try to stand up to her. So far I've done ok by myself in college, but I need to take fuller control of my life. I am tired of being pushed around by her. She always uses the fact that she gave birth to me as her trump card to do as she pleases with me. When I go home, I'm not going to want to relinquish the freedom I have here. Thanks for the advice.

 

[Taviii]

Maybe your daddy should go down on your mommy!

 

[classy broadside]

Point taken, but that's not the issue here. Whether or not I continue to drink I have lost my mother's trust and she will continue with her punishments regardless. I know she's trying to raise me right but really, is she justified with her Gestapo tactics? What did I do that was so terribly wrong? There are seven kids in my family, and I have an older brother who is a sophomore in college. I saw him go through his freshman year without drinking. That's fine, but he alienated himself from everyone who drank because of my family's attitude towards drinking. My mother has taught us that people who drink are "bad" people, and this has really harmed my brother socially. I am determined to not do that, and he now has even considered trying drinking. He's realized his mistake and doesn't wish his current situation to continue anymore. Really, what's so bad about people who want to just have a little fun? What is so bad about it? That's my point, I'm being made out to be a criminal by my mother. We used to constantly cut down those "stupid, mindless kids" who decided to drink all the time, but I now realize how stupid this mindset is. It can only hurt me.

I went through college, sometimes drinking, sometimes utterly dry, sometimes drunk off my ass. I tried them all. Today, I don't drink a drop. Why? Because I realized that alcohol is a drug, and I'm depending happiness on something other than myself. Maybe you can say "augment", sure, but the ultimate question is, why do you need augmentation? Drugs can feel fun, but isn't life fun already? Can't you make fun without drugs?

Ok, this isn't a lecture about drugs. To each their own. I'm offering my perspective after having lived through each choice, each phase. And I'm sure your mom has too after evaluating the time lost to drinking, those golden years, the flower of youth. So that's probably one place that she's coming from.

And realize that because she's your mom, she's not doing it to torment you, to hurt you. Remember that mothers are biologically hardwired to care for their kids, no matter what. So you can eject whatever imaginary malice you believe your mother harbors towards you. Realize that she's going nuts because she cares about you, about your health, your future, and the company you keep influencing you in damaging ways.

Sure we all love freedom. But freedom from what? Freedom to do what? Whatever we want to do? Freedom is a means, not an end. Don't seek freedom just for the sake of it. We're all tied up one way or another.

You made a point about how your family demeans people who drink. But why choose between two extremes? Why choose one (evangelically against alcohol) or another (drink)? How about just not drinking and be chill with that? Sure your social life as you know it may take a hit, but I'm sure you can find many, many other people on campus who don't drink and aren't total wierdos (unlike myself; a shrink would have a field day with me). All you have to do is seek them out.

Finally, remember what you're setting this out to be: drink and damn the family. Is that what you want? Really? Booze over family?