If I read one more post about how slutty LW #1's daughter is, I'm going to hurl my monitor! First, the writer admits to being judgmental and trying to fight it. That should be your first clue that what she's saying about her daughter might be exaggerated. When she goes on to call her daughter a slut (cloaking it as what Grandma would say), that clinches it: Mom has a hypersensitive slutometer. Further evidence is rife in the letter: LW says the daughter only pulled this stunt "recently." Not "often." Not "twice." Just once. Second, this is a nearly forty year old daughter who went out one weekend with a single friend for drinks. Where does the mother get off claiming she might have "created a monster?!" You get the idea.

Here's what I glean: if daughter lives a day's drive from mom, and she and hubby or alternately, she and friend, drive a DAY to stay for the weekend and go out partying, and later mom says, "go to a hotel" -- that tells me daughter probably lives in dull old exurbia, and mom's in Fun City. Who knows why daughter's inattentive husband "has to work" on a weekend. Maybe he's a workaholic, maybe he's a hero, maybe he's having an affair, maybe they already divorced and she doesn't want to tell her judgmental mom!

Many years ago, Iso worked as a bartender in Manhattan. There were countless times that women would come to a bar/nightclub/dance club where I was working, either in pairs or in groups. They would hang out together, socialize a bit with other patrons, and all leave together. I seldom if ever saw a woman get "drunk" -- we weren't allowed to serve anyone who appeared drunk, at any bar where I worked. In most cities this is the law. And in most cities the bar will call a cab for patrons who shouldn't be driving. Why? Because again, the bar is legally liable if they send someone to their car inebriated. There is absolutely nothing in this letter that indicates the two women were alcoholics, or that they had ever had a drop of alcohol before or since, for that matter.

Further,the daughter told the mother her plans. If LW#1 didn't like it, she should have said so on day one. Or day two. Instead, she waited until the daughter asked to come visit again, to tell her to stay in a hotel. Mother overreacts, daughter overreacts, now mother is catastrophizing (yes, it's a word): daughter isn't coming back with her gf and kids to party, mom's now convinced she'll never see the grandkids again.

My conclusion? Mother is a drama queen, and daughter has a touch of it herself. The rest of the judgmental crap from Prudie and some of the posters here, is more a reflection of their own inner drama than anything seriously wrong with Daughter of LW#1.

The mother sounds like my grandmother - I bet she was pouting about the daughter not spending all weekend with her. As one otehr poster said - that's probably why the daughter didn;t say goodbye - mom was hiding in her room pouting or was so obviously pissed she just figured she's better leave.

The daughter sounds like my sister - drive a whole day to see your parent(s) just to blow them off and avoid spending time with them. My sister will do all she can to avoid spending down time with family, but I can see her going out of her way to visit once she has kids because she'll feel like she has an obligation to make sure the kids spend time with their grandparents. (which she will of course resent)

They're both wrong, and it all has little to do with drinking or partying or sex (where did this slut thing come from anyway? No mention of men in the letter!) It could all have been solved with a simple, "I was really hoping to spend some time with you also, instead of just the kids. Would mind if we rented a movie and watched together here after the kids go to bed instead of you and your friend going out?" from the mom.

Yeah, I'm with you here.

Interesting how "coming home late" becomes 3:00 or 4:00 AM for some commentators. Could be 11:30 for all we know - my mom's "late" and my "late" are two different beasts. Same goes for "drunk". No numbers, no facts.

As the Germans say, "Zahlen, Daten, Fakten" - numbers, data and facts. Without them the rest is bloviation.

The real answer for LW #1: talk to your daughter, tell her your expectations, listen to hers, and apologize for coming on too strong and not speaking up earlier if something bothered you. Yawn. Much more fun to be a drama queen! As far as the effects on the kids, hey, therapists need to earn a living, too.

P.S. How did she get past the bouncer, anyway? Sounds like she's old as fuck. (Not for the earth, you know, but for this club.)

If Mom had acted like an adult, and treated her daughter like one during the phone call alone, the letter would never have been written because this tempest would have stayed in the teapot!

I just don't get why Prudie has turned into Carrie Nation. If she doesn't drink, that's her choice. Why does she have to condemn every mother who takes a night off and has a drink? She flat out calls them bad mothers and alcoholics. She's more than once recommended a woman go to AA or a family member pinch hit with the kids on such slim evidence it's mind boggling. I mean, I'm from New Orleans. If every mother who tossed back a daquiri had to turn in her kids, that place would be Lord of the Flies, and not just because of the locals.

Has she ever made a crack like that about a father?

In Prudie world, women that go to bars are drunks & if they go with out a guy, they are sluts, if they have kids, they are horrible mothers. Men that are not complete doormats are abusers. Parents that actually see their children naked are molesters, even during bath time.

I get into the fun clubs too, and I'm old enough to be her, well, babysitter I guess. Bouncers don't care how old you are, they care how hot you are (oh, and how female).

Srsly, that's another reason to think she didn't get as toasted as mom says. The grownup bars are even more stringent than the millennial mosh pits.

How far removed can you be from human nature and still be considered alive? Not that I want to find out.

It’s funny, I normally consider any woman who agrees to go to bed with me, to be a blessed miracle sent by God. It’s only after the deed that I realise, yeah, she’s just a dirty whore.

 

I don't disagree with any comments about the letter writer (can we stop using LW?).

I disagree with your conclusions about bars serving drunks. I also worked in bars and package stores back in the day. I have gone to many a bar. I have gotten shit-faced drunk in many a bar. I don't go to real bars nowdays but I see people who would be classified at least as tipsy leaving bar and grills. I imagine they and full-up drunks are present in full-up bars.

If bars weren't serving drunks and calling cabs for those unable to drive, there wouldn't be so many DUIs. People get drunk in bars even when those serving them are trying not to do so.

I never understood how that worked. Men complain about how they can never get laid and how sad and terrible it is, then whoever's dumb enough to feel sorry for them, or god forbid actually finds the guy attractive enough... well, you get the picture. And men wonder why women are so standoffish.

I didn't work at those kind of bars.

;-)

I'm the one who said the daughter didn't say goodbye because mom was probably fuming and pouting in her room when she left.

It's this same passive-aggressive behavior that made the mom not say anything when the girls "arrived and announced that they were going out partying on the two nights they were here and they were leaving the children with me." She had ample opportunity to nip this in the bud before it even got off the ground - and she didn't! Even if she adopted a wait-and-see attitude, she had ample opportunity to nip night #2 in the bud - and she didn't. That's her own fault.

To me, it just sounds like the mom was desperate for a break from her two young kids and when she asked hubby for help he said "hell no I'm not going to watch the kids so you can go out partying with your friends" and she said "fine then I'll just take them to my mom's" and she thought "in for a penny, in for a pound" and I'll take my chances with mom's judgements later (which I am well aware of), right now I need a break and I'm takin' it.

Not good, but not the alcoholic adulteress whore people are painting her to be. Jeez!

Maybe grandma needs to think about visiting her daughter and grandkids so daughter can get a break. If hubby works on the weekends, mom's got them all that time and probably all during the week, too. Grandma could say "I don't feel comfortable here with the kids while you're out drinking but I'd be glad to give you the whole day to go shopping or to a spa with your girlfriends and then maybe we could all go to a movie tonight." Just having her there for someone new for the kids to bounce off would be a relief, I'm sure.

Seriously. A friend and I were discussing how her otherwise perfectly cool 13 year old was "afraid" because she babysat for a couple who came home slightly tipsy after a big party. (And no, they didn't have to drive her home, her thoroughly sober parents did). The kid was all about how the woman (who is a respected minister, by the way), has a problem and isn't facing it yadayadayada, based on no more evidence than that one slightly tipsy encounter. My friend asked her daughter if she understood that people enjoyed alcohol and sometimes had too much because it felt good. The kid was appalled.

Seems we are raising a nation of Carrie Nations. I toast their demise.

Hear, hear, Iso!

I shudder to think what the alcohol zealots would think about me! I have a glass of wine just about every night, sometimes two. Same with The Boy! Sometimes we have actual cocktails! I'm just waiting for the day when we're living under a bridge, eating garbage and letting our teeth rot because we're such terrible alkies!

What I don't get is why people have such trouble telling people do mind their own bloody business? How is it that adults seem so willing to both sit in judgment of total strangers and be judged by them? Who cares?

I'm with you on the distance thing. We live literally over a thousand miles away from our families, and we have a better relationship because of it.

One of my former coworkers complained about this indoctrination with respect to his son. My coworker liked to have a beer or two with dinner. His son hit a point where he'd get hysterical because dad was "using drugs" and might "lose his job" and "had a problem".

One thing I've noticed with the kids that I've TAed is that it is sort of backfiring when they get to college. They start with the idea that "alcohol is bad and will turn you into a horrible person who can't function." Then they go to a few parties where drinking occurs, and they see sucessful peers drinking without anything bad happening. Then they have a drink or two and the world doesn't end. At that point, they decide everything they've been told about alcohol is crap and go on a bender.

I think the best example was a girl I had who in the space of a quarter went from complaining to me that her lab group wasn't serious enough about school because they went drinking, to getting drunk enough to fall down and both break her arm and chip a tooth.

In my opinion, moderation is always the key! My observation is that anytime something is done to extreme, it ends up backfiring.