So my 17 year old daughter is a senior in high school, straight A student, 4.02 GPA, has part time job, car which she bought with her own money, pays her car insurance and her portion of the cell phone bill.
My concern is this, she has a boyfriend who is a sophomore and she is constantly over at his house. I always make sure she does her chores and her homework is done before she goes but it seems she spends more time with him and his family (two parent household) having dinner there, going to church with them, she even tried to ditch me for Christmas day to spend it with his family. So I made a Christmas brunch and had his whole family over to our house. I adore her boyfriend and she knows that, I've taken them both out for dinner, ice cream etc so it's not like I have not tried to be involved there. But it feels like she has discarded her real family (which admitedley is just me as I am a single mother and have raised her alone with an absentee father since she was two). We've always been so close and I've prided myself on our relationship and that she tells me everything. I know she'll be soon going off to college and I soon will not be there to enforce rules and make sure she is taking care of herself.
This whole situation bothers me on many levels, one being that she has no life outside of this boy. She is involved with school activities and work but other then that, she is with him all the time. Ocassionally she'll do something with a friend if the boyfriend is busy. Two being that she seems to be a little too dependent on him for her happiness, I want her to have a life outside of this boy. Three being that it feels like I have become the discarded ragdoll which she no longer needs or wants.
She gets so engrossed with these relationships with these boys and seems to push all of her other relationships to the side, ie friends..family etc. She has been over at his house everyday this week so far and plans to have movie night with his family Friday. I like his family but I don't want to have to spend all of my time with them just to be with my daughter. I feel like I barely see her anymore and we are just roomates.
I know a lot of this is typical behavior but how much is too much? Is she too old for me to lay down the hammer and put the breaks on this or do I just try to accept it? Any advice would be much appreciated.
I miss my daughter.