# Anyone living with a person from another country?



## Seniorinva (Jul 26, 2019)

Hi all, new member. I'm glad I found this message board, can talk with others my own age! 
I am living with my girlfriend who is from the Philippines. She has been living in the US since 2011. We met on an online dating site two years ago, she moved in 2 months later. She was living with a friend of hers and her friends daughter was moving back home so she had to leave. Her and her son. He's 19 now, going to a military college, good kid BUT. He does not help around the house unless asked. I was brought up with responsibilities, chores etc. Apparently in Asian culture the male child does not have to do much. My wife, who passed in 2015 was Vietnamese. We were married 25 years so I saw this first hand. And he does nothing but sit on the sofa with his phone and Ipad watching movies. I feel like I really don't have that much privacy. When his mom comes home from work it's the same. He will be going back to college in August but home for two weeks Thanksgiving and a month at Christmas. Then back again all summer. I'm almost 66, he's startimg his second year in which will be 9 years of study to be a doctor. So it'll be like this till I'm 75? I talked with his mom about getting a summer job and she said he can't find one. Mentioned I didn't really want to live like this till 75 and she of course got upset. Guess I'm feeling should I just suck it up or make changes. Could really use some honest feedback.


----------



## Leann (Jul 26, 2019)

Hi and welcome to this site. You mention the possibility of making changes. Can you explain more what that would entail?


----------



## hollydolly (Jul 26, 2019)

Hi , my first instinct is to say don't panic.. he doesn't  have to stay living with you does he?... can arrangements not be made for him to share a flat or live on Campus...

Anyway ..


----------



## RadishRose (Jul 26, 2019)




----------



## RadishRose (Jul 26, 2019)

Seniorinva. Your wife works, do you?

If not, maybe the boy thinks you should be helping his mom, not him.

Who supports him?

In any case, tell him to perform a chore each day while he's there. If your wife gets mad, you know where you are. You'll have to suck it up for awhile, but things change. He's only 19- anything could happen.

Best wishes.


----------



## Seniorinva (Jul 26, 2019)

RadishRose said:


> Seniorinva. Your wife works, do you?
> 
> If not, maybe the boy thinks you should be helping his mom, not him.
> 
> ...


I don’t work, am retired. We’re not married either. We had been dating two months and she needed a place to stay. Since I was widowed with a three bedroom house I offered her to stay here. She works part time. I pay all the bills and feel like some times taken for granted. That’s why I feel he should contribute more. I am leaning to waiting a bit.


----------



## MeAgain (Jul 26, 2019)

If you have to ask you probably don't want to know.

Either way welcome to the forum hope you enjoy it.


----------



## Seniorinva (Jul 26, 2019)

Leann said:


> Hi and welcome to this site. You mention the possibility of making changes. Can you explain more what that would entail?


I’m not really sure. She can’t afford to put him up somewhere. He’s in ROTC at college and hoping he’ll do training next summer or student exchange over seas. I need to figure out what I want out of this relationship and what I want for myself.


----------



## Seniorinva (Jul 26, 2019)

hollydolly said:


> Hi , my first instinct is to say don't panic.. he doesn't  have to stay living with you does he?... can arrangements not be made for him to share a flat or live on Campus...
> 
> Anyway ..


Thanks for the welcome! She can’t afford it to stay on campus during the summer. Being a military school they can’t live off campus.


----------



## MeAgain (Jul 26, 2019)

Seniorinva said:


> Thanks for the welcome! She can’t afford it to stay on campus during the summer. Being a military school they can’t live off campus.



Good luck with whatever you decide and hope it all works out.


----------



## Butterfly (Jul 26, 2019)

Well, I'm a bit of a hard-ass about stuff like this, but I would not be supporting someone who won't work on my hard-earned retirement.

I'd be taking a long hard look at the whole relationship to figure out if I were just being used as a meal ticket.


----------



## Seniorinva (Jul 26, 2019)

Butterfly said:


> Well, I'm a bit of a hard-ass about stuff like this, but I would not be supporting someone who won't work on my hard-earned retirement.
> 
> I'd be taking a long hard look at the whole relationship to figure out if I were just being used as a meal ticket.


That was my thinking but I want to think it’s more of the cultural difference. I was brought up with chores and responsibilities. He wasn’t so I have to consider that. If I ask him to do something he’ll get up and do it. I guess I need to accept this fact and just tell him. We had a talk tonight about it and next summer he’s going to apply for studies overseas. And I have to understand that she only gets to be with him a few months a year. I think most mothers understand that so I shouldn’t be so selfish either.


----------



## hypochondriac (Jul 27, 2019)

I sometimes wonder how i would cope if in the same situation. i wouldnt be the ideal father let alone step father. 
are you expected to finance any of his lifestyle? If so you certainly have a right to complain.


----------



## AnnieA (Jul 27, 2019)

It's your house, you pay the bills.  He has a room doesn't he?   If he doesn't have a comfortable chair or sofa to sit and play with his electronics in his room, get him one that he likes and tell him to stay in it.    He may be the 'privileged' male child in their culture, but you're the Alpha male in your home.

And welcome to the forum!


----------



## Knight (Jul 27, 2019)

Cultural difference? He is living in your home so adapting to the culture you grew up understanding falls under the When in Rome do as the Romans do. 

Your main concern seems to be what the live in girlfriends reaction might be. What exactly would she object to? For instance. Would she object to you assigning him some tasks that you feel he should be doing? If you can't feel comfortable in your own home then you have to be honest with yourself about the relationship you have. 


As others have posted Welcome to the forum.


----------



## Seniorinva (Jul 27, 2019)

hypochondriac said:


> I sometimes wonder how i would cope if in the same situation. i wouldnt be the ideal father let alone step father.
> are you expected to finance any of his lifestyle? If so you certainly have a right to complain.


Oh no, I don't support his lifestyle. His mom and his check from the reserves do that.


----------



## norman (Jul 27, 2019)

The advise always given to me was, you made your bed, sleep in it or get out.


----------



## Seniorinva (Jul 27, 2019)

Thanks all for your replies. We had a talk this morning and laid down some rules and chores for him. We'll see......


----------



## Lethe200 (Jul 27, 2019)

Congrats, you have just run headlong into the wall of Asian Culture, LOL!

FWIW, I'm a third-generation Japanese American and my DH is a first-generation Chinese-Portuguese immigrant. And yes, he is an only child, so as far as his parents were concerned - and he had two sets of them - the sun rose and set on his now-grey-haired head!

I early on realized (before we got married, thankfully) that I was essentially marrying into a family who thought like my grandparents. It made it a little easier to understand them, although there were plenty of small, ummmm....'culture clashes' .

I can tell you that my DH would have been welcome to move back home any time, with or without me. Age is irrelevant; he would have been welcomed any time, without needing to explain or justify himself.

This is a sharp contrast to the way I grew up, where my mom kicked each of us out of the house as soon as we graduated HS and no, we were not welcome back unless the alternative was homelessness - and in that case we'd maybe have 4-6 mos. before she would have kicked us out again. She was a big believer in tough love, and so am I.

But that did NOT apply to my in-laws, and I accepted that. Fortunately DH is an independent sort so he never took advantage of his parents.

In your case, maybe you are handicapped by your spirit of equality. You would be more likely to be obeyed if you simply laid down the law to your wife and stepson and said, "This is how it's going to be, period. You don't like it, tough! This is my house, my rules!"

My DH's stepfather loved him and treated his mom like a princess. But HE ran the household. If you lived in his house, you had to follow his rules. He wasn't a miser, or an autocrat. He was a fair and thoughtful person. But he came from a culture where the man is the undisputed Head of the House, and that was that. Not a lot of household rules, but what there was, if broken you had to have a _really good _excuse for doing so.

I will say that on the good side, when DH's stepfather died, his mom (my MIL) automatically accepted DH as "head of the house" and we handled her funds after she finally sold the house. This was a relief because she had no idea how to handle large sums of $$$$$ and would have handed it over to anyone who spent 15 minutes chatting and smiling with her. The bad side was, WE had to know what we were doing so that she would have enough money for her eldercare needs!

Good luck to you - I just read your last post. Hope things work out okay.


----------



## Seniorinva (Jul 27, 2019)

Thanks so much for your insight. My first wife was Vietnamese and I could not believe it when the mothers were chasing after their kids with a bowl and spoon full of rice. But I will say the kids treated their moms with great respect when they got older.


----------



## retiredtraveler (Jul 30, 2019)

Just my wife. I think she is from another planet.


----------

