Parents’ Weekend at UT is the one time of the year when your parents are granted full access to your personal lives at school. Whereas Facebook and Instagram allows your family into select pieces of your social life, the game is entirely changed when your creators set foot in your young adult bubble. You cannot control the people you run into with them, who you see or what they hear. When in your element, your parents are bound to ask—so who is that boy/girl I’ve been seeing you in pictures with? Are we going to meet him/her?
For anyone, this question can induce nervous sweats and laughter birthed from fear. Our generation isn’t exactly the fastest to put a label on a situation—the word “relationship” is a significantly larger deal than the “relations” leading up to it. In a philosophy of “try it before you buy it,” consistently hooking up with an individual does not necessarily make them parent-meeting material. So, when is it appropriate to introduce your family?
Because our parents were raised in a different generation, their views on when it is time for a meeting may differ from ours– tremendously. I posed the question to my own parents this past weekend, who have met numerous prior relationship partners of mine and have been open with their opinions of each of them. When they were growing up, it was expected that one would introduce any individual that he or she continually saw to their parents. This ideology does not translate to our generation, and my family did not compute. I covered all the stages of today’s romantic (?) interaction with another person—talking, hooking up, friends with benefits, seeing each other, dating, untitled exclusivity, open relationships and finally, boyfriend/girlfriend status.
“You guys need to take ‘dating’ out of your vocabulary,” my father said to me over Pizza Fusion. “You don’t understand the meaning of the word.”
This lack in common terminology can be detrimental to the meet-the-parents situation, when/wherever it may take place, because the hardest place to begin is at square one—introduction and title. “Mom, Dad, this is the boy/girl I have been consistently hooking up with the most out of all the other boys/girls I’ve been sleeping with,” doesn’t have the same ring to it as boyfriend or girlfriend. Aim to make your parents proud, and not left wondering about the severity of your promiscuity.
While our beliefs may not necessarily translate properly, that does not mean that our parents are always unsupportive of our endeavors. This was exemplified to me at the Parents’ Weekend Barbecue, when a student pointed out a girl he had slept with to his father, who then stood up in disbelief and yelled “Are you serious? THAT’S my boy!” before rewarding his son with a congratulatory high five. Only moments later, a student was approached by another’s parent and informed that they were marriage material, and that their own child would be lucky to have them. Some parents play a larger role in their children’s love lives than others.
So, what happens when you’re constantly seeing someone that you’re not dating and your parents ask to meet them? Many hope that this concept will only remain a nightmare housed in the depths of their unconscious, but for some, this horror becomes a reality. In the words of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, “Parents just don’t understand,” – and explaining to them that you’re “not dating” but are seeing each other can be a challenge.
Today, the significance (or lack thereof) of meeting the parents is difficult to interpret—and in itself has the ability to make or break a relationship. If we are willing to arbitrarily introduce our parents to any person we at least sort of know and run into on campus, then why should we make the effort to avoid the people with whom we share more intimate connections? This is because the nudge in the direction of potential seriousness can put your relationship on solid ground—or push it over the edge, killing it on impact. This depends on the views of your partner.
In college, we are all in different places in our lives. Some are after the infamous “MRS Degree,” whereas others want to take more time to “find themselves” and even more haven’t given any thought to the idea of marriage either way. While many of us are just playing around, formally meeting a partner’s parents makes the relationship (if you choose to call it that) serious. You have involved outside parties—your founders—and have increased the stock in your partnership. More is at stake when one meets the parents.
For an individual who only wants to be something along the lines of friends with benefits, he or she will take this as their cue to run. However, for a potential couple that is on the fence with becoming official, meeting the parents can add just the right amount of seriousness that will convince both parties to fully commit to one another. This is because the parental introduction creates an additional layer of closeness between two people, and expands the circle of those informed of the partnership (more specifically, people who birthed one of the partners). As a result, this can be a step in the right direction—assuming that the meeting goes well.
The opinions of parents can force serious pressure on any relationship. This is exemplified in movies, books and TV shows from today and all stretches of time—the most notable being Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Two feuding families led their children to run away and secretly marry, and then by the result of poor planning, kill themselves in an effort to be together forever.
If your parents don’t like the person you’re seeing, don’t be so quick to drink the Kool-aid and hope you meet up in the afterlife. Instead, take the time to set up a second and/or third encounter and give your parents and partner the opportunity to get to know each other a little bit better. After all, first impressions aren’t always our best, and it’s easy to cave under the stress of meeting the people you are supposed to impress.
In the event that your parents still despise the person you are with—do not dismiss their opinion. Though it may feel natural to believe that they will never understand what the relationship is like from your point of you, try to remind yourself of what the relationship looks like from their point of view. As two people who literally made you, their biggest concern is only to make sure that you get the absolute best of what life has to offer. The best may not be what you’re currently dating. As a result, one with a good relationship with his or her parents should not be quick to dismiss their opinions.
When your parents and your partner get along, it can make a serious relationship much easier. There is no arguing about having them over for holidays, special events or random weekends at home. If the relationship reaches a marital point, it will be much easier to justify your parents spending the extra cash on your wedding (because I refuse to walk down the aisle for anything less than a twenty piece orchestra playing “Young and Beautiful” by Lana Del Rey) when it’s to someone they like, rather than someone they would prefer to see go up in flames.
The donors of your genetics can help to make or break a relationship. Like any other business, group or idea, a relationship needs support from both the outside and within. By choosing a partner that you and your parents can agree on, you are allowing yourself the comfort of continued support by your parental unit and all that they have to offer (like finances and… finances. Pick a real winner and they may even pay for an especially nice honeymoon).
If you’re on the fence about whether or not to introduce that semi-special-you-guess-someone to your parents, I advise that you do exactly that. The worst thing they can say is that you’re a huge disappointment and they thought they had raised you better than that. (With love, of course).
Terry Preston can be reached at terrence.preston@spartans.ut.edu