Priorities

[Gardening Grandma]

A friend of mine confided that she recently had liposuction. She also confided that she'd borrowed the $4K for it.

The other evening we were talking about summer plans (my DGS is the same age as her son) and I talked about some summer computer camps that I'm looking at for him. They ARE pricey - $800 to $1K per week, but still.....

Her response was "that's an awful lot of money!". Well it IS a lot of money, but what's the priority? Cosmetic surgery or an educational opportunity for your kid?

Thoughts?

[Urban Chicago]

Does your friend have kids? If she does, and is getting liposuction instead of providing them with a meaningful Summer experience, then yes, her priorities are screwed up.

[tea4me]

I see a lot of people with their priorities screwed up.
fancy cell phone instead of utility bill
thousands of cable channels instead of rent payment
clothes instead of food
etc., etc., etc.

[whoisjohngalt]

Holy canoli, for $1K a week is that camp in Buckingham palace with Bill Gates as their counselor or something?

A few thoughts came to mind: 1. $4K for something that will last longer than a week might seem more reasonable than $1K for one week.
2. This might make the worst mother of all times, but I don't think that once you have kids ALL of your resources should be directed towards them. Why are you so ready to judge her just bc she did something for her vs her kid? May be this liposuction thing was super important to her. So what?

May be she is looking at you thinking "wow, $1K for a 8-10-12 yr, that's way too much money, unless he is the next Albert Einstein in the making".

It's not about priorities, it's about perspective.

Lena

[Gardening Grandma]

It's not about priorities, it's about perspective.

Interesting. I posted because I didn't know whether I was being too judgemental...

Holy canoli, for $1K a week is that camp in Buckingham palace with Bill Gates as their counselor or something?

No, it's at a major university. The instructor to kid ratio is 1:6 and the instructors aren't teenage CIT's (Counsellors in Training). They are undergrad students. They have courses in java programming (which is what my DGS wants to take). They also have gaming design, c+ programming, robotics.

[Gardening Grandma]

daphne87
Was it MathPath, by any chance? That's the one we've applied to.

[whoisjohngalt]

I should have said, to be fair, that I have no idea what camp prices are, I "assumed' that they were in a range of $200-400 a week. And also, for the record, I don't have anything against expensive camps.

I think I am just getting a little tired/frustrated that ever since I had kids people think that my life has ended. In every single card that my SIL has send me, she writes the exact same text "well, now that you have E and B, you don't need anything else". Yeah, whatever.

Lena

[Gardening Grandma]

I'm familiar with CTY - Great reputation!

DGS won't be 13 til later this year, but we'll look into it down the road. MathPath is for 11-14 yr olds and is focused only on math (his strongest subject) but it's $4K for 4 weeks. They do have a very generous financial aid program, however..

[Gardening Grandma]

Thanks Daphne,
He hasn't been accepted - yet. I am hoping to find out this week..... Please keep your fingers crossed for him.

[pushingit]

Jan 18, 2011 11:45:30 GMT -5 Urban Chicago said:

Does your friend have kids? If she does, and is getting liposuction instead of providing them with a meaningful Summer experience, then yes, her priorities are screwed up.

B/S. It's not all about the kids. It's her money. As long as her kids are well cared for, it's not necessary to spend money on them and only them to be a good parent.

I mean, taking a nice expensive vacation with your husband alone instead of taking your kids on a meaningful summer vacation is ok, so why isn't liposuction?

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

Her response was "that's an awful lot of money!". Well it IS a lot of money, but what's the priority? Cosmetic surgery or an educational opportunity for your kid?


Why are her priorities screwed up? You don't know her son, maybe he'd hate the camp. Just because she has a son doesn't mean that she needs to spend all her money on him.

Maybe it is an awful lot of money for her for what the camp entails? Maybe she doesn't feel that $1k a week is worth the price of the camp?

Maybe he is like my brother and starts a ton of things only to drop out half way thru? My parents finally said enough to my brother wanting to join sports because they would shell out the money only for him to quit half way thru.

I could send my DD as a teen to the local community college to get the same computer education for $100 or less per class. Unless she was especially technical or wanted to go into computers no way I'd be dropping $1k a week on a computer camp.

Bonus being the classes at the community college would transfer if she decides to keep going and get a degree.

I suppose that makes me a bad mother.

[Gardening Grandma]

I do think she's a very good mother. She is a great person: warm, caring and she's also a very good friend.

I don't know her son well. He's a nice kid, but she's complained that they can't give him any access to computers because he's addicted to gaming. He IS bright and she's said that math is his best subject.

I just have such mixed feelings about the situation. She does send him to a regular camp (the kind with canoes and campfires).

And she probably DOES think MY priorities are strange....

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

she's complained that they can't give him any access to computers because he's addicted to gaming.

It's possible. We had to send our computer out because DH got addicted to those online gambling games. I had to go in and set the computer up so he can't download them anymore.

[BeenThere...DoneThat...]

...another possible point to her defense:
...when I hear the words, "summer camp," I'm thinking canoes and campfires, too... not computer classes... so if you tell me you're dropping $4K on campfires, I'd wonder... but it you tell me you're dropping $4K on summer school and college prep, well, more power to ya!

[telephus44]

Another point - if she's in the doctor's office thinking about liposuction, they can probably arrange financing and offer her an easy payment plan. I bet that the summer camp doesn't.

Also, she might have other reasons for not wanting to send him, and "it seems expensive" is an acceptable reason, rather than having to dive into all the details.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

Just because math is his best subject doesn't mean he wants to go into it. My best subject in school was English but no way in hell I wanted to be an English major in college.

Just because you ace a class doesn't mean that is what you want to spend your entire summer doing.

Maybe he LIKES the traditional summer camp as opposed to sitting in a classroom learning computers?

Then I agree with sroo, if he is already addicted to computer gaming probably the best thing for him is to be forced outside to exercise at his age.

[jkapp]

For $1000 a week, you could just buy the kid a kick ass computer and he can teach himself.

[Gardening Grandma]

For $1000 a week, you could just buy the kid a kick ass computer and he can teach himself.
Really? Using that logic, you could buy a kid a car and expect him to become a mechanic.

[thyme4change]

Using your logic, you can become a mechanic in one weeks worth of training.

[jkapp]

Jan 18, 2011 15:47:41 GMT -5 Gardening Grandma said:

For $1000 a week, you could just buy the kid a kick ass computer and he can teach himself.
Really? Using that logic, you could buy a kid a car and expect him to become a mechanic.

Heck ya...I learned what small amount of knowledge I have on cars from owning my own. Now I couldn't rebuild an engine but I can troubleshoot problems. I just recently troubelshot an oil issue with my car from the sound of the engine and watching the erratic oil gauge.

[HoneyBBQ]

Honestly, mothers are always lambasted for doing things for themselves and spending money on themselves.

That said - it seems like she doesn't have the money to pay for her own lipo - I think borrowing money for that is whack.

[Gardening Grandma]

Using your logic, you can become a mechanic in one weeks worth of training.

Really? The only thing I expect him to learn is some java programming and (hopefully) get exposed to a wider range of possibilities for his future.

[debtheaven]

GG

My initial reaction was exactly the same as yours. But reading the comments, I have to agree. Although liposuction is exceedingly low on my list of priorities, it's her money to spend. We too tend to spend any disposable income on our kids rather than on ourselves. I'm not sure that's always such a good thing.

I think the real issue here is that you have raised your kids, so you are talking about your grandson, and your friend is talking about her child. She has to find a balance that you have probably already found without even thinking about it.

[debtheaven]

Sorry for the novel LOL! This is something that has always intrigued me, how people spend their money.

[❤ mollymouser ❤]

How does she look after her liposuction?

[Gardening Grandma]

How does she look after her liposuction?

Honestly, I cannot see any difference...

[Frappuccino]

What does her child usually do during the summer while she is working? Is she regularly choosing to spend money on herself instead of her kid, or does she usually spend her money on her kid and this was just one little mid-life crisis splurge on herself? I made payments on my adult braces purely for cosmetic reasons, and my son did not go to computer camps because summer is football conditioning time - and luckily football is cheaper than these expensive camps that I had no idea existed. I am a bad mommy.

[Frappuccino]

I've heard of summer camps, just not these $1000 per week computer and math camps

[Knee Deep in Water Chloe]

I'm totally using "nice shirt" from now on. That is awesome!!!

What were we talking about?
Well, I've paid, two years in a row, $675 for a one week (six nights) college-prep camp. They stayed on campus, all food was included, counselors are college students, etc.

I don't know. I guess I go with the perspective line-of-thought as opposed to the priorities line-of-thought.

[❤ mollymouser ❤]

I think that there will always be people who choose to prioritize their wants and their spending differently than I would choose to do so. And that's fine. But the troubling part of the initial story is that the person borrowed $4,000 for liposuction and then immediately commented that she couldn't afford to send her child to an expensive camp. At some point, that would make me wonder how her overall budget is ... since my recommendation would be (of course) to save up money beforehand and pay cash for elective cosmetic procedures.