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Dear Abby: Son Jumps Into Online Dating by Asking Personal Questions
DEAR ABBY: My 40-year-old son signed up with an online dating site. He has a 17-year-old son and has never been married. During his initial contact with one woman, she mentioned she had several kids and my son asked if they were all by the same father. She said he was out of line to ask that question!
I realize people today think one's sexual history shouldn't matter, but doesn't my son have a right to know how many other men he's going to be involved with if he becomes involved with her? How does one find out this kind of information relatively soon into the relationship? Waiting until he knows her better seems like a waste of both parties' time if he's not interested in someone who brings several other families into the relationship.
Relationships are hard enough when a man brings his family and a woman brings her family together in the marriage. It's harder when the man and woman have exes. Each ex increases the level of difficulty to make the relationship work. Love is a choice, and it would be painful for my son to give up a young lady he really cared for because he found out after a few dates that a future with her involved four or more baby daddies. -- OUT OF LINE IN ARIZONA
DEAR OUT OF LINE: Although it might be "painful" for your son to give someone up after a few dates, he should make the effort to get to know the person before asking a question like the one he posed to a complete stranger. Frankly, I don't blame her for being offended, because it implied he thought she was promiscuous.
Your son fathered a child with a woman he didn't end up marrying. It happens. What if the same thing had happened to her, but more than once? One would think that as a mature adult, if he had feelings for someone, he would continue the relationship and see where it led. And why are you the one who wrote to ask me this and not your son?
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As for the LW, besides stipulating that this is Not Your Damn Problem To Solve, I am going to be very kind and assume that both you and your son are being honest when you say that your concern is how many other families he'd be dealing with in this relationship and not, say, a masked concern over how many men the woman had slept with.
(Sidebar, Abby: if LW's son is looking for women in anything like his age range, then having slept with "several" men is nothing like promiscuous, and can we lose the judgment there, anyway?)
Anyway, Abby's implicit advice to LW ("Butt out") is good. I am loathe to give advice to son as his motives and wants are being filtered through his mother, but something like, "don't borrow trouble" seems appropriate.
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(Run away run away!)
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But that's not the question that her son asked. He didn't say, "Are their fathers around?" or "Did you raise them on your own?" or some other question about her current situation. He asked if they were all by the same father, i.e. how many different men impregnated her.
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The exes are only relevant if they're around or if there's a bereavement that might change how the kids view their mother dating. (Well, I suppose they might also be relevant if the guy thinks she offed them and might want to lure him in in order to murder him, but if he's assuming that about people on a dating site, why on earth is he there?)
I don't know, but the LW is definitely coming across as creepy.
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