My wife’s younger sister (24) is about to go live full-time with her trucker boyfriend (33), only having met this guy in person once or twice. She says that she has known him online for a long time (3 or 4 years), and they recently started dating less than a year ago. A few weeks ago, she told my wife that she was quitting her job and going to live with him on the road in his truck full-time and that she will come visit her family when he gets some time off every now and then. My wife and the rest of her family were especially shocked by this because she just recently came back home from moving across the country to live with a friend that she met online and his family. She moved back home with family because her friend wasn’t really who he said he was (not literally, just more along the lines of his personality not aligning with the one he presented online), and her living environment became more than she could handle, especially being so far from her family or any kind of support. After she expressed wanting to come back home, their grandmother sent her money to pay her credit cards off and come back. Now she’s already quit her job and plans to leave within a couple of weeks. When we asked if we could meet him first, she said he would try to make it out here to meet her family, but that it wasn’t a guarantee that we would meet him before she leaves. Her whole family has been reluctant to express their concerns to her because in the past she hasn’t been the easiest to talk to, so last night I did. I basically asked if she was willing to think it through a little longer, spend some time with this guy in person first before going out on the road with him, that it would be good to spend some time with him first before just leaving, and asked if she had any backup plans in case this didn’t work out. She said that she was already fearful of things like this without her family adding to her anxieties. I asked her if she had learned nothing from her previous experience moving across the country, putting full trust into someone she met online only to be disappointed and needing a way home. Am I the asshole for saying something?
NTA obviously. This is obviously waving more red flags than a Soviet military parade, but she’s 24 and you can’t physically stop her.
I think your approach was good. You could try to work things out with her. Ask her to help YOU understand how this is going to work. You could maybe say you want to help her smooth things out with her family once you understand it.
Do most truckers have a wife that travels with them? Where do they sleep? What do they eat? Do they get time off? Will there be other people who could potentially be dangerous to her on the road? Will her boyfriend protect her? Will she ever work in the future? Does she have plans to pay the bills? What if she decides to take time to visit her family? Will he give her money from the road?
You could also ask about the previous situation. Why was the situation she got into more difficult than she thought. She knew the person really well online, right? What does she think went wrong? Surely this new boyfriend is different. What made her so confident she knows him better.
Maybe guiding her through these questions could help her realize that she’s making a huge mistake. I think that’s really all you can do, and just hope she sees the light.
This is how you wind up getting trafficked, she had zero self preservation skills. That being said she’s an adult so not much you can do about it.
This was my first thought as well.
OP, totally NTA. I hope she is safe and returns well – but wow I couldn’t imagine the guilt you would feel if you didn’t say something and something did happen. You tried your best. You showed your love for your sister. Now you can just be there for her as support – that doesn’t mean financially but just a source of comfort she knows she can come home to.
NTA.
How has your SIL not been trafficked or killed with those self-preservation skills?
NTA: Going from having met in person once or twice to living with him in a truck 24/7 is actually insane. Sounds like she’s repeating her mistake again. She seems desperate to be in a relationship instead of figuring out who she is.
NTA – the rest of her family need to step up and voice their concerns, and at minimum she needs to keep a job long enough to pay back her grand mother for the money spend paying off her credit cards.
NTA, but she’s an adult and can make her own choices, the best you can do is make offer suggestions and let her know she needs to consider her safety when meeting internet strangers, however, she’s young and everyone’s different. Some people enjoy the comforts of stability and security of a normal everyday life, whereas others crave adventure and dislike complacency.
NTA. Her plan sounds crazy. I’m glad that you took one for the team and tried to reason with her. My God, a new relationship can be rough living in a house with someone, but can you imagine how bad it would be crammed in a truck almost every day? Just an awful way to live. Aside from the relationship, very sedentary and bad for her health, without the benefit of getting paid for the driving.
People have to make their own mistakes.
Unfortunately
She is the embodiment of the phrase you can’t fix stupid. I can’t imagine being cooped up in a box with someone, never mind someone who I barely know
NTA at all, but her family is for enabling this behavior. Just out of curiosity, is your SIL bipolar?
How can you date for a year and only meet in person once or twice….doesn’t dating involve, you know, dates?
NTA. Stop worrying because there is absolutely nothing you can say or do to change her mind.
She’s got experience doing similar that went bad. When it goes bad, ignore and override. No bailouts, $, etc..
NTA Some people just have to learn the hard way and hopefully for your wife’s family nothing truly harmful happens to her.