Concerned that my daughter dates too much?

It also concerns me how little she seems to care for any boyfriend that she’s had. Maybe it’s a good thing how independent and unreliant on a guy she is, but I’m the opposite and when I start a relationship with someone, I was the type to fall deeply. The last guy she was officially with, she was the one to break things off and I honestly felt bad for the kid. When I asked my daughter why she’d broke up with him seeming as they didn’t have any issues, she shrugged it off and said how she didn’t feel much for him so she let him go so he could find a girl who did. And now she’s already with someone else at her college.

“I just don’t want her to be confused about what she wants because she’s been with so many people.”

Well the good news here is being with a lot of people should allow you to learn exactly what you want and not worry about “is the grass greener” later on.

The question is does she date so much for fun since she’s young or because she has underlying commitment and insecure attachment style issues. As her mom and with her already being an adult, it’s probably not really your place at this point in her life to figure that out for her. It’s good that she wants to let go of men who want something different than she wants and give them the chance to find it instead of leading then on for the attention. That’s a mature and respectful approach to dating, especially for a 19 year old!

The most you can do is maybe make sure she’s aware that attachment styles exist, and if as she gets older she takes it upon herself to question why she doesn’t seem to get too attached to boyfriends, she’ll have a starting point. But as Raven said, if she’s making her own decisions to have fun and it’s just a youthful stage, the best thing is to have already prepared her about how to be safe: have safe sex, be careful of roofied drinks in bars, or drugs from unknown sources (like at raves). Then let her live her life. You can’t control how she does that, even if her choices are different from yours. Most educated women these days aren’t concerned about getting married when they are 19. That doesn’t mean she won’t want that later, and the right guy for her isn’t going to judge her past.

You also have to trust you already did a good job and she is capable of having a good head on her shoulders even if her cousin lives with different values. I have had plenty of friends who had different lifestyles, and it didn’t mean I was impressionable to follow them blindly and make similar decisions. I learned from them (and went to clubs and stayed out all night but rarely drank and never did drugs even if they did) but still did what I believed was right for me. If you start seeing signs of mental health issues or hard drug use, then you can take a big step in. Hopefully it never comes to that and she’s (most likely) just being a typical 19 year old in college exploring new experiences.