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Older Daughters
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hey, who said your teenage years are the best? I had a blast as a teenager, and yet, they really weren’t my favorite season of life! LOL =) You might gently remind her that when she is down, that there are actually lots more opportunities for her as she gets older with less resrtictions as far as age, time, etc. =)
sheraz, I couldn’t agree with you more!
The best years of my life have been the last 3-4…happily married, happily homemaking, and happily home educating. There is no comparison between my teenage years and now! I’m so glad I finally outgrew the stage when I cared more about what others thought of me than I did about my own dreams and convictions.
That’s great encouragement!
I don’t have any words of wisdom, but wanted to share a resource that you, Linda, your dd’s, or others here may find an encouragement. There’s a new book out by Voddie Baucham’s adult daughter about staying at home after the “school” years. There are some other items, too from Vision Forum; a DVD The Return of the Daughters. The book is called Joyfully at Home.
Rachel
Just wanted to share the other view… around where I live, kids seem to be staying home a LOT longer, and parents seem very happy to let them do so… that seems to be the society norm around here. BUT that is all done with the kids doing nothing but mooch.
I grew up with the expectation that at 18 you either paid rent at home, or were going to school fulltime. The rent at home would be less than an apartment, but was something.
Ok, so I want to chime in here, and say that in my experience many of the kids who went away to college ended up back at home the next year. Some didn’t return to college while others stayed home and attended local community colleges. More recently, my neighbors just graduated their 4th (all public schooled but great kids). Of the two that decided on college, both lived at home for the first year. They also worked part-time. They ended up after the first year (maybe the 2nd for the one kid) moving on campus because of time constraints for their work and school schedules. So what I’m saying is that I really don’t think the “norm” is neccessarily for kids to immediately move away to college. Your neighbors don’t know what they are talking about! 🙂
When my daughter gets down about missing the best years hse is talking about her equestrian training – sure she can learn as she gets older but her horse riding is where she wants to make her career – she wants to do equine science and classical dressage – she had the opportunity to try out at a place in Germany near to my relatives which trains the classical form of dressage, and she hoped to be able to do that and then pass her German exams and come back here and do the Equine Science and then teach. Unfortunately there is an age limit to get into this rather prestigious school – so she has missed that opportunity. Also her training has gone very slowly because of her illness – so that has been a big disappointment to her. She knows she can catch up, but quite a few opportunities for experience in the field are passing her by. She chose the equestrian life because it is her passion and she also knows it is a skill she can carry into married life and still teach dressage. So for her the years before her illness were the best they could be, and then it all came to a grinding halt – I can relate – at 16 I was chosen to run and hurdle for a huge athletic club in the UK, which trained future olympians, a few weeks after getting the news, I was run over by a hit and run driver and my ankle was badly damaged and I have not run since. For me it was also a huge disappointment. My daughter knows she can still move in the direction she has chosen, but it is going to be much tougher and the European training will likely be much more difficult, and to learn classical dressage that is where you need to be. She is also disappointed that she has been unable to continue helping with the riding camps for the disabled over the past years as she was not strong enough and it is something she loves to do. So that is what she meant by her teen years being the best. Our girls are both hard workers and I know that they will not turn into moochers, I would not stand for that but it is not who they are – they are always busy and always engaged in helping around here or at the barn or in the community. The daughter who is ill has had to curtail some of that lately, but she still tries as sitting around is not her thing. I think we will just choose to ignore the negative remarks and try and let them ride over us. Linda
Just wanted to share this enlightening resource from Voddie Baucham’s daughter. It is about older daughters living joyfully at home until marriage….
http://www.visionforum.com/browse/product/?productid=38482&search=Baucham&sortby=0
With 3 daughters of my own, I am thankful to have found some wonderful wisdom from others who are ahead of me on this journey!
Blessings!
This link too has the book, along with a video series about daughters at home. 🙂
Linda, I was not trying to be flippant about your daughter’s sadness. I just was thinking about the times that I hear people say that 16 was the best part of their life. I will be thinking of your family and praying for you all. On another note. maybe the Lord is preparing her for another blessing as well. Whichever happens, I hope that it will work out for the best. You sound like such an amazing person…really there are so many on this site, I wish that we could be there to give each other hugs on days like this! =) Sheila
Thanks Sheila, I did not think you were being flippant, I was just explaining a 19 year old’s point of view – she knows that there are often better plans for the future, actually she realized that her illness at one point led her to a different instructor, one who is so much better and a real Godly person, so there is a God element to everything as always – teens don’t always see the way God works until it is pointed out lol. However I can see a few God things that have happened, that are to do with horses that she did not initially see until we talked – she has recently met some awesome people to encourage her in her healing journey and in her riding, so it is working out. You are also right about this site – there are many awesome women and men (man) here who always have a new perspective or a neat way of looking at things – I am much older than most of you – but I can assure you, it is possible to teach an old dog new tricks – hmmm, perhaps I will regret calling myself an old dog once I have posted this…but you know what I mean I am sure…awesome women and awesome support across the spectrum on schooling and home. Blessings, Linda
Linda,
I’m just seeing this, and want to encourage you and your daughters to visit this site – The Stay-At-Home Daughter My 19 year old dd has taken a year off between graduation and college. She is planning on attending a junior college in the fall and will remain at home during that time. I can not remember how I found the above blog, but it is helpful to read this young lady’s words when those all around us are tell both my dd and my dh and myself how “odd” it is that she won’t be going away, and other comments similar to those you and your dd are fielding. While R’s ultimate goals may be slightly different than Ashley’s (blog author), it is nice for my dd to see another young lady who is secure in her choice to stay at home.
Hi Linda,
I don’t have any daughters, but I do have lots of young ladies around me (family/friends). Several of them have chosen to stay at home and attend college as well (oldest I know of right now is 22). I don’t know of anyone making them feel bad or weird for doing so (actually they are doing what my husband and I would do if we had girls). They are productive, helpful, smart and seeking the Lord’s will in their lives. Their parents (my friends) have always kept the door open and have not held to the idea of them getting out as soon as they turned 18. I am very proud of these young ladies for taking advantage (in a respectful way) of their parents’ desires to be there for them until they are ready to live on their own. Now, if they were disrespectful, mooching, causing trouble with the youngers, etc. that would be a different story (completely different approach in parenting/lifestyle, etc. may be going on anyway, who knows).
Now, I do have other young ladies around me that have chosen to get married/have babies at a very young age (imo) without having gone to college/live a little and some seem to think that that is okay, too. Their parents (homeschoolers, too) seemed to want them out of the house and with the first opp. to marry, go figure. With all that said, it seems to depend on the child/parents/dynamic of the family, etc. I think you are a wonderful ‘mum’ and doing exactly what is right for your dds.
I also wanted to add that my grandma was married with child at 15, my mom at 18. I don’t always believe that this generation is trying to shove kids out the door anymore than generations before us. It seems that in years passed young ladies were married off pretty early (the older generations at my church were married in their teens) and that was just what they did. I understand that they were getting married to start a family, a more noble idea than what some youngsters are planning these day, but those around me didn’t have parents that were nurturing their relationships/daughters by them staying home. They (the parents) wanted them out as soon as they could marry and have babies, whether they were ready or not. I think that each generation seems to think that generations before them were doing ‘such and such’ but when I ask my mom, dad, grandma, elderly I worked with, they look at me like I’ve lost my mind. My mom remembers how uninvolved her parents were, how my dad was a total pig, etc. We have this idea that the 40’s and 50’s were sooo much different than it is today, but lots of people were born out of wedlock/secrets kept, etc. Just my .02.
I just wanted to encourage you and let you know that there are plenty of families doing what you and your husband are doing. Unfortunately they are spread throughout the country:) Don’t quite know what we will do with our boys as it seems more appropriate for girls to stay at home more than boys, but we’re making plans now to be prepared for that (our boys are 12, 8, 5). I certainly do not want ‘moochers’ and if letting them stay home encourages that, then we’ll have to take action:) If they feel ready to move out and learn on their own I’m okay with that, too. My husband has been on his own since he was about 16, myself included, and we are probably more responsible than my sibling who did not have to take care of herself. Either the experience created hard-working ethics, or we already had that in us, don’t know. I do know that I hope my boys turn out to be as hard-working as their dad and I don’t want to enable any laziness, boy there is a balancing act with that, isn’t there??
Okay, I’ve said enough. Blessings to you and your wonderful family.
Blue Jay, My 3 Boys and all of you who posted, thanks for the encouragement it is so appreciated – the girls will know when they are ready to fly the coop and when that day comes we will be pleased for them, until then they can grow at their own pace. They have always thankfully been very helpful girls, cooking, cleaning, helping with bake sales, neighbors children at the barn and so on – and that has not changed all through these teen years, even my daughter who is ill still does her best to help outt – so we are blessed in that – as such we are comfortable we are not encouraging idleness or anything like that – they are hard workers always have been, so I know that for us it is right. Thanks for the blog it is most interesting and encouraging. Have a blessed weekend. Linda
I stayed home home until I got married, so did my sister. We both got married a year after high school so it wasn’t that long but still. It wasn’t an option really as my father would have into other way. He didn’t believe that young women should live “alone” as he called it, but with parent or husband. My sister-in-law is currently living at home too, she will be getting married in about a year.
Maybe it is not the norm these days but oh well. People are so quick to throw their kids out like suddenly overnight they become adults.
Hubby says the boys have to go but the girls can stay…yikes…good thing I have 10 more years to change his mind.
I think people just assume that they are mooching as stated before but it really is none of their business!
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