Living Through Somebody Else Options

[DoubleJ]

Do you feel that your parents are trying to live through you? Or do you play a game that you try to live your life like how you wanted it to be?

I am living through my little brother right now. He is going to the prestigious prep school that I went to, so I want to make sure that he does things the right way.

[brooklyneast05]

oh a prestigious prep school huh. did you wear a sweater around your neck and learn to play crochet there.



i don't think my parents ever tried to live through me. even though my dad pushed me to play a lot of sports and people always say that's why fathers do that.

[DoubleJ]

www.stpetersprep.org

That's the school. I feel like my whole family is living through me right now.

[brooklyneast05]

why do you feel like that

[DoubleJ]

On the one hand I have the people in my family pressuring me to do the fire department thing, and then they also want me to go to school and what not. Sometimes I just don't know what to do.

[libertie]

Living vicariously is something that we talk about a lot in our education classes. Last year I was a music education major, and I had to do a lot of observations for some of the classes I was taking. Watching other teachers/band directors do what they do is a vicarious experience, and ultimately it made me decide to change my major.

Not away from music, of course. It was just kind of overwhelming. I just got scared and felt like there was no way I'd make a good teacher. So now I'm a bachelor of arts major, focusing on music. Yeah, I know. That's one of those "getting a degree just to get a degree" degrees. Oh well. :S

On this topic, I don't think my mom's trying to live through me. I do think a lot of parents try to give their kids what they didn't have, but my mom is unfortunate in that she was stuck with taking care of three kids on her own when my dad left her, and the only form of child support he could provide was the benefits that automatically showed up from Social Security. Now she's started having back problems which cost her the job at the prison she had (apparently when they found out she was hurting they decided it was affecting her position as a guard and let her go). So she's in a shitload of trouble financially, and so am I.. but there's not really anything either of us can do about it.

[sixfive]

The Dos Equis guy lives vicariously through himself.

[DoubleJ]

Is it wrong for me to groom my brother to do it bigger than me?

[karmakiller]

I'm pretty much the opposite. My parents never really pushed me, and I think sometimes that they should have, especially when I was really young.

During my Junior year of high school I decided that I wanted to go to college, and most of the people in my family were surprised and respected that choice, but they really didn't offer much else for me as far as guidance is concerned, because none of them had gone to college. I have a few reasons why I think my parents didn't push us. Growing up my dad wasn't really around much, and my mom was happy with us being average, and my brother that's closest to me in age took that to heart. He just doesn't try as much as he should.

[DoubleJ]

I think that's the difference with me though, is that I hate average or even above average. It isn't enough for me.

[queen]

oic st. peter's prep. my bf went there ;]

i don't think i live vicariously through anyone. i don't really take pleasure in whatever people do unless it directly affects me or if i care about them, but then that's not really living vicariously through them. i don't think my parents live vicariously through me either, at least not anymore. perhaps back when i was in high school 'cause i was doing what they both originally wanted to do --art. but now that i'm in the science field, not so much anymore ;|

my entire family is also unhappy with "average" and even "above average". i'm probably the first to break the line with all my major hopping and "galavanting".