Elder daughter wants food technology after class 12. The family assumes she'll just join our business

teal_compass_48706 Jun 2026

She's starting class 12 and has been clear for a year that she wants a food technology degree. She's grown up around our kitchen and our orders, so it isn't a random idea. The relatives have decided this means she'll 'come into the business' and the degree is a formality. She hates that. My partner and I would be happy if she joined us one day, but we don't want it to be the assumption. Two questions really. Has anyone's kid done food tech, and what did they do after, apart from the obvious? And how do you get the family to stop announcing her future at every lunch?

5 comments

misty_tiffin_566 Jun 2026
In my house also everyone says my son will run the lorries one day. He is 13 and thinks only of kabaddi. I tell the relatives, let him finish studies, then he decides. They don't stop, but he hears me saying it, that is what matters.
lagoon_sandal_20876 Jun 2026
relatives decided my son would be a surgeon at age 4. he has other plans. we say 'let's see' at every lunch. works about half the time
- peach_violin_85426 Jun 2026
  'Let's see' has carried us through two years of family lunches as well. On the course itself, a friend of my daughter's did food technology and now works in quality control at a dairy. It was more chemistry and microbiology than she expected, so your daughter should look at the syllabus before she commits.
umber_tiffin_12066 Jun 2026
In our family it was the same with my son and engineering. He is 20 now and doing what he chose. The relatives stopped once he was in college. Let the degree be hers.
breezy_fern_18676 Jun 2026
On the degree: ask her to talk to two or three people working in food technology now, not only read college pages. What the job looks like day to day, labs, factory floors, shifts, is what decides whether she'll enjoy it. My daughter did this exercise for a different field and dropped one option within a week.
cedar_ladle_8456 Jun 2026
Both my children are in college now and neither wants anything to do with my daycare, though they grew up in the middle of it. I was sad for one day. Now I'm proud they chose for themselves. She'll come to the business on her own if she wants to.