He’s 48, the girl is 17. Yes, their relationship is legal here; legality is not the point, but morality and ethics - I don’t think it’s okay. They’ve been dating for a few months now. I only found out about it recently when he started bringing her home to spend the night (I’m 19 and live with him). Dad’s been widowed since 2023. Her parents know and support this relationship - heard it straight from their mouth when they came to visit. My family believes the girl is a gold digger so she’s the one in the wrong. My dad and I are very close, he’s always been an amazing dad, supports me in every way a person can be supported… I’m queer and being queer in Romania isn’t well received to say the least, but he’s always had my back and I feel safe because of him. Now for him to go and do something like this… I talked to both him and the girl, he says it’s just something that happened (he didn’t go looking for it); she says she loves being spoilt and how “chill” my dad is (she characterized the relationship as a cold day in bed under the warm covers). I don’t really know what I’m looking to hear honestly, but I want to talk about it.
I was 17 with my first partner, who was 34. I also had a parent who failed to protect me, instead “supporting” me, and eager for grandchildren. Yeah, 17 is too young. If you approach it like something risky where people could get hurt, that’s one thing. But trying to pretend like “everyone’s an adult” and that a normal romantic relationship between two equals can develop is super harmful.
We’re all putting our own experiences out there, yours might not have been good, but mine was, so I wanted to share it.
We don’t really have enough reliable information to say what is right and what is wrong here, if he is indeed grooming/manipulating her then of course that is bad, but I didn’t read anything to suggest that either of them are insincere.
I knew exactly what kind of relationship I wanted when I was 17, it took me years to find it, all I’m saying is they could have both found theirs.