My 16 year olds sons Girlfriend

Hey guys, this will be a long one and I’m going to try to add everything in here that I possibly can.

My son has been dating this girl for abit over 2 years. When we first met her, my oldest son came up to me and said “there is something off about her mum, she doesn’t come with good intentions” I remember telling my son not to judge her and to give her a chance that he can’t make that assumption until her actually gets to know her. But if I’m being honest I got a bad vibe too, but I ignored it, I thought maybe I was just picking up on my oldest sons feelings.

My second youngest whom was 15 at the time when they first started dating was head over heels which is totally normal. I’m know I’ll get judgement for allowing my son to date at this age and that’s okay each to their own. From the very get go she didn’t give our family a chance at all. She’s an only child and would get very angry when I couldn’t take them to the shops or stop what I was doing to drive them wherever they wanted to go. My son would question me angrily about why I couldn’t drop everything and drive them around, I also have a young child as well and work from home in my own business so 3 children, a husband and business to run I need more of a heads up before I can just randomly drop everything and drive them places, or at least some time to make sure I’m not needing to pick my son up from school, or work work a client or cook dinner whatever the case may be. She would often tell my son that I wasn’t a good mother, my sons phone was broken so when she’d call he would have to put her on loud speaker and I would hear the things she was saying about our family, it was awful, but I didn’t say anything for a long time, I let it slide because she’s young, they’re both young and learning and I also took into consideration that she’s an only child so has been brought up differently. She would say things like your mum is so stupid, she’s crazy and needs to be put into a mental institution, she never does anything for you, she shouldn’t be taking your phone, why isn’t she letting you out, she needs to shut her mouth and stop being a C$)nt. Just some context, this happened very early on in the relationship and I was so confused as she didn’t actually know me or my family, we only met her once at this point, so I was just so taken aback. My son has ADHD so when he got in trouble at home or at school like being suspended for example I would take his phone and ground him, but I would allow him to call his girlfriend so she could let him know, so she wasn’t thinking he was just ignoring her calls and that’s when I would over hear the above. This went on for a long time, I didn’t say much to my son about it, I tried not to take it to heart so to speak. Due to my sons adhd he has trouble regulating his emotions and remembering what he needs to do. Due to missing work, chores and important things, I decided to write him a list with times and days of the things he needed to make sure he got done, the commitments he had, like going to school, going to work, doing his chores, taking some time out for himself and spending time with his girlfriend. So it was weekdays being for school and work, except for Thursdays as it was late night shopping so he was allowed to go out with his friends and girlfriend for late night shopping and on the weekends he was allowed to spend that with his girlfriend and has to be home by 9pm. This list wasn’t a list of rules, it was more like a diary for him to look at when he wasn’t sure what he needed to do on certain days, when he told her about this list, she started crying and got incredibly angry, she said wow, how stupid, why would your mum give you a list of rules, then she started to laugh and stated that I was a psychopath and needed help, she said are you going to have to start asking permission to go for a bath, or ask your mum if at 7pm if you can go to the toilet, what a load of sh&t, your mum needs help. Again I let it go, I didn’t get angry at my son but I did say it’s important to correct her when she’s turning things like me just being a mum into something it’s not, he agreed, although I didn’t really expect him to take me seriously but I felt like after everything she had been saying about me over the months and my son not correcting her I needed to intervene to encourage him to set up boundaries. He said he just agrees with her cause he’s afraid of her leaving him which I understood. Please know this was incredibly hard for me not to end the whole situation, even though he’s 15 I’m not stupid I knew that if I demanded the relationship to end it wouldn’t end, they went to school together and he would see her regardless of what I knew was best for him, so instead of making it hard on him I just stood back and supported him, let him learn and experience what he needed too. So even though he had rules and he wasn’t to see her everyday only on weekends he was seeing her 7 days a week , he would lie and say he was spending time with friends after school or he was at work, this went on for months until I figured out what was going on, his curfew was 7pm on weekdays except when working, when he would get home he would go straight into his room and on FaceTime with her, which I just thought was normal to be honest, when you’re in a young relationship you get stuck at the hip, but after a few months of this and seeing my son becoming exhausted with trying to keep up with her demands I send her parents a polite text message telling them to please let me know if my son goes to their house during the week, as he’s only allowed to go over on the weekends as long as the parents are home, I explained that he has work, school and adhd and could see him starting to really struggle. I would get no replies, the only time they would message me would be to ask my of my son could go out to dinner on a weekday that he wasn’t allowed to be out except of it was with his friends, as we were trying to keep the balance and the reason why he was only allowed to spend time with his friends during the week was because it got so bad that his friends were contacting me stating that my son wasn’t hanging out with any of his friends anymore, and that the girlfriend wasn’t allowing it, they were concerned and this was even going on at school, I even had the teachers ringing me up concerned with the changes they seen were happening with my son when he started dating his girlfriend as they were both sneaking out of class to see each other and my son was getting aggressive with the teachers and staff. I message the girlfriends parents again and explained all this, the mother replied and said she had been trying to establish rules and boundaries but they weren’t listening and the dad was not enforcing them and still didn’t address my concerns about him going over there on the weekdays and continued to ask me if he could go out to dinner on a weekday and would take him secretly out for dinner even when I said no. The thing is I followed her rules as a mum with her daughter, I also would address issues with my son when she messaged me about issues and would message her back validating her concerns but she never validated or followed by rules as a mother with my son nor did my son’s girlfriends father. Myself and partner decided to take a step back just a little bit and let our son learn what he needed too, cause he wasn’t listening and no matter what rules and discipline we put in place he would still break them and threaten to run away and not come back home, as parents we tried to navigate this situation in the best way we could trying to avoid it getting messy or heated. Again I overheard on the phone his girlfriend abusing me as a mother and said to my son “what about when you mum pushed you up against the wall and cut you” which never ever happened, and my son actually said to her that she took that one way too far and told her I never did that to him, I lost it after that, and said over the phone that I heard what she said and I will be speaking to her parents about it. So I organised a meeting with both her parents and told them what she had been saying, how I was confused as she didn’t know me or my family, how she had only ever been to my house 2 times out of the year, and that we would like our rules as parents to be respected, so we stated our rules for our son and that his schooling was suffering, and from here on out he’s not to spend weekdays at their house, they agreed although had the audacity to ask if our new rules could start in January as it was December and the school holidays , we agreed. Fast forward to the new year and the parents still didn’t abide by our rules. So we decided to really enforce them with our son, and that’s when we had enough and got quite strict and he broke them, but because we didn’t back down from the new rules set he decided to leave the house he was 16 at the time, I messaged my son’s girlfriends mother and said something like, mother to mother, my son isn’t allowed at your house and I would appreciate if you would let me know if he’s there. She got offended at my message and assumed I was tearing her down as a mother, and started to attack my personality, and told me I should be thanking her for all the times she took my son out to dinner and paid for it. I was shocked that she wanted me to thank her for not abiding by my rules and sneaking out my son to dinner when I said no multiple times. My husband took my phone and replied back after that cause I was so angry and didn’t want to say things that were out of character. I also would like to mention that we tried with his girlfriend on so many occasions but nothing was ever good enough, I never did enough according to his girlfriend. Her mother and father are divorced under the same roof and I did invite the father and daughter over for Christmas which they came it was a good night, I also took my sons girlfriend to the shops to buy her Christmas gifts including a gift she chose that was $200 yet wasn’t good enough for her. Her dad came around recently to drop off some of my sons things he needed for work and told me he didn’t understand why his daughter hated me so much, that she even hated our dog and that he noticed she hates anyone and anything attached to our son. My son and his girlfriend are nearly 17 now, and the other week I overheard her saying that she hates my 10 year old so much and the reason she hates him is because he’s like his mother and I hate your mother, she said I can tolerate your dad and your older brother but I hate you mum and your younger brother. My youngest son is 10 years old and has hardly been around her or even spoken to her, she went onto say he’s spoiled which is crap, and even if he was spoiled she wouldn’t even know cause she’s never around him to know if he is if that makes sense. After I heard that and after the amount of time they’ve been together, she’s not allowed at my house, I don’t want her around my youngest son, he doesn’t deserve that. Then my son calls saying she’s pregnant and that they can’t tell her parents, then she’s wanting me to book her an appointment for an abortion but won’t speak to me about it and wants me to pay for the abortion. It turns out it was an ovulation test that they purchased the wrong test.

Im at a loss here on what to do, he won’t listen to me he never has, I have told him to end the relationship, she threatens to harm herself if he doesn’t do what she wants. He is falling out of love with her, but scared to leave, if I intervene im worried he won’t forgive me. I haven’t intervened because he’s asked me not to and I have been afraid of losing my son if im being honest. She distanced him from his family for a long time. I know she’s been through a lot and her mother is never home or pays her any attention and my son tells me this has greatly affected her. There are issues with her father that have affected her as well. The whole situation is so toxic and it didn’t take me too long to figure this out. But I didn’t know how to handle it, what to do about it, her parents weren’t on board or respecting my sons decision. My son would often tell me that they knew their rights and that he was legally allowed to move out when he turned 16 that they both looked this up on the internet so I was always afraid of losing him, hence why I tried to tred lightly and not make the situation worse. It’s got to the point where my son begs me to say I have taken his phone so he doesn’t have to be on face time with her all the time and he can have a break. The amount of times I have had to be the bad guy so he can spend time with his family and not have to deal with her very needy needs at my son request is crazy.

This is a very very toxic situation and I have known this for a very long time but felt like my hands were tied cause when they started to date it wasn’t long before he turned 16 and that meant he would be able to move out and I couldn’t do anything about it. I was also worried about them both lying about us due to all the things she was saying about me. She’s even told my son that we brought him up wrong and on lies.

He’s nearly 17 and she’s already asked him to move out but he told her he can’t afford too, but really it’s because he doesn’t want too. She says I was horrible to her parents because I finally sent a message which I stated above about not letting my son over to their house anymore and added some lies in there as well that never happened but I honestly believe she’s convinced herself they have happened. I know she has trauma and that’s why she is the way she is and I do have empathy for her, but she’s never given me the chance to help her, so there isn’t anything I can do to help her, I also feel shes taking all her anger out on me that’s actually directed towards her own parents and there seems to be so much jealousy towards my son and our family.

What can I do? I feel so helpless and tried so hard to navigate the situation to keep as much peace as I possibly could.

I don’t message her, I don’t have her on social media, I don’t bother her. When I used to message her early on it was only to see where my son was, simple messages like “hey do you know where my son is I can’t get hold of him” but after too many awful things and lies said about myself and my family I cut contact to establish boundaries for myself and family.

I don’t know how to help my son, or what I can do to help him to get out of this situation.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.