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I've heard lots of people tell stories about how they or their children didn't turn 21 until halfway through their senior year, and how terrible it was to be left out and not be able to go out with their friends. However, whenever I tell people about how my son will be graduating this spring after 5 years while he had to watch all his friends graduate last spring, it gets brushed off by everyone, even those who simultaneously think that they or their kid had it rough by not being able to go to bars with their friends. I understand that there are much bigger problems in the world than social isolation. What I don't understand is why it's understandable to feel left out when your friends go to bars without you, but not when your friends graduate without you.
Why didn't he have friends in the class as he?
After all that time in school, he should have made some friends that would have been graduated with him.
I've never in my life known a college town anywhere that didn't have alcohol available to underage undergrads by the truckload. Everywhere from frat parties to college dorms. And let's not even get started with Spring Break. In fact, binge drinking by underage college students is a serious problem that colleges struggle to combat.
I'm also a parent of three daughters. The oldest graduated college in 2020, the middle one is a college Junior, and the youngest starts college next fall. I have run into a LOT, and I mean a LOT of other parents of college students over the years. Everything from Facebook groups to parents weekend. And not once EVER have I heard any parent ever complain about alcohol being too unavailable for their college student children. Not once.
Social conformity in order to be an alcoholic is more valued in American society than education is.
lol. Apparently there's something to this. IDK, I didn't turn 21 until the year I graduated, but none of my friends were interested in bars or alcohol anyway, so it didn't matter. OP, I'm surprised your son didn't find other students who shared some interests with him, and who weren't into the bar scene. Such people do exist, and they're fairly numerous. They just don't advertise themselves.
this reminds me of the pity party i held for myself, when i noticed at work that there was all kinds of sympathy and willingness to hear from people describing their (all real examples here, i kid you not, and all of these were in just the first year i worked in this department) brain surgery, cancer, throat surgery, hole in the skull that was left open (different person by the way than the one who had brain surgery) and she had to be seated in a special area where no one would accidentally bump into her head when she was sitting at her desk, foot surgery.
but nooooooooobody wanted to hear about my root canal, gum flap surgery, abscess of my front tooth, several teeth extracted, and back to back oral surgeries. sure, they wanted to see the hole in the lady's skull, but nooooooooooooooo they did not want to see me walking around the office without my front tooth.
Dude, let it go. Your kid will be fine. A year or two from now, no one is going to give a sheet. Heck, right now, most people don’t care. I took 13 years to finish my undergrad, went to grad school, and do perfectly fine in my career. And I dont really talk to, or even remember, most of the people from undergrad. You, and your son, are making a mountain out of a molehill. If all of this is really as distressing to you and your son as you make it out to be here, I honestly suggest that you both seek some sort of counseling, because the problem is likely a bit more than simply taking another year to finish college.
...However, whenever I tell people about how my son will be graduating this spring after 5 years while he had to watch all his friends graduate last spring....
Well, maybe less bar hopping and he'd have been able to graduate in 4 years.
I've never in my life known a college town anywhere that didn't have alcohol available to underage undergrads by the truckload. Everywhere from frat parties to college dorms. And let's not even get started with Spring Break. In fact, binge drinking by underage college students is a serious problem that colleges struggle to combat.
I'm also a parent of three daughters. The oldest graduated college in 2020, the middle one is a college Junior, and the youngest starts college next fall. I have run into a LOT, and I mean a LOT of other parents of college students over the years. Everything from Facebook groups to parents weekend. And not once EVER have I heard any parent ever complain about alcohol being too unavailable for their college student children. Not once.
Correct. This is how you can tell who has actually been to college and who has not.
Alcohol, weed, Adderall, etc. it was all over the place.
What I don't understand is why it's understandable to feel left out when your friends go to bars without you, but not when your friends graduate without you.
I'm not comparing being left out of graduation to third world problems; I'm only comparing it to being left out of bar-hopping. I can understand not having sympathy for people in either situation, but it makes no sense to think that the latter warrants sympathy, but not the former.
I'm not comparing being left out of graduation to third world problems; I'm only comparing it to being left out of bar-hopping. I can understand not having sympathy for people in either situation, but it makes no sense to think that the latter warrants sympathy, but not the former.
Literally, wut?!?!
Sounds like wallowing in self-pity.
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