Hi,
I was wondering if anyone could offer me some advice, this is long I'm afraid. Over the last week or so, my hubby and I have been trying to calm a situation between his ex's mum and her 15yr old boy. She has been at loggerheads with her older daughter for a while, and the two of them are continually phoning social services against each other. In his infinite wisdom, despite knowing the arguments between them, the lad has been visiting his sister thus causing issues with his mum.
He was taken out of school last year through lack of attendance and causing issues at school. He can just about read but can't particularly write or spell, to the point where he's been asking me how you spell "round" and "now", although he has just started a part time course at college. He is forever being kicked out of the house for hours at a time, often without shoes or a jacket and at times as early as 6am (without breakfast) so has recently started to come to us as we only live across the road. He tells us that she hits him with things, or kicks him etc, sometimes over trivial things like making a coffee for her that she didn't like. She tells us that he's lying however, my husband briefly lived with them whilst dating her daughter, and he saw her knee her son in the face in temper.
Last week he arrived at 11am, having fallen out with his mum because he'd been with his sister, at which point his sister wouldn't let him stay with her either. He went home continually to try and sort things out and was basically told where to go. After collecting my hubby from work at 10.30pm, we went over. He ended up staying at hours, because his mother had gone to bed. We had woken her, and she said this was fine. The following day, we mediated so he could go home.
This past week, she has continued to throw him out at all hours of the day, so he has been over at ours. He missed college this week as she chucked him at just before 7am and threw his uniform on the grass outside and it got wet. He went to get it, but she'd taken it in and gone out. He doesn't have a key. Again, that night, all day she refused to have him home, so later in the evening, we arranged with her for him to stay. We sat and talked to him, and spoke with her to try and mediate somewhat, but within 5 mins of going home, he was back on our doorstep and she was texting to say he was aggressive and wouldn't leave her house so could he stay with us. He wasn't in a bad mood when he left and he was extremely upset when he came back. She assured us, that she would pop over to talk to him, but then didn't although she did ring to ask if he would babysit her younger kids. He went home, and within a few mins, she was on the phone telling me he was no longer welcome at hers and that she would give me her child benefit money each week to feed/clothe him etc. She requested that he collect his stuff later but when he came back without it, saying there weren't any bin liners to put it in.
This was after Social Services closed on Friday, so my hubby and I agreed that he could stay for the weekend, that we would discuss it and we would work things out with Social Services this week coming. We were hoping that she would calm down and change her mind.
My husband and I have discussed making arrangements for him to legally live with us, however, we have a 1 yr old of our own, on a fairly low income where I was made redundant earlier this year although we do not receive any benefits other than child benefit ourselves. Aside from the affordability factor, we are concerned that now he's out of his mother's house, his sister is in touch. Where we all live within 1/2 mile of each other, this will rapidly aggravate his mother, and being so close that we can see his mother's front door from our living room, she will then pop over to give him a hard time over it. She has already been over today to tell me how awful he is and to get him to get his stuff etc.
We are now completely torn about what to do. We really want to help him, as from what I've seen and we've heard from other people, he's actually a good kid with a really awful upbringing. We also don't want to reject him too. However, we don't think there's a single thing we can do to help him at ours the whole time his mother is able to just pop over whenever she feels like it to give him grief. We especially don't want trouble around our daughter.
We have discussed calling Social Services with her, and from what I understand, they have told her that they won't put him in fostercare as he'll be 16 next summer. She has given us the name of his social worker to call though and she has said as far as she's concerned, it'll be his own fault if he ends up in care and she doesn't overly care. Her older daughter contacted Social Services at a similar age to have them remove her for similar reasons.
What are the options for him? We don't want him to get lost in the system if we refuse to have him, as he really needs guidance and people to care about him who will help him get some sort of education. We don't feel that we can provide what he needs, purely because of the outside influences of his family.
I'm sorry this was so long, I felt I needed to explain some of the background to enable the best advice to be given. If you made it this far, thank you for sticking with it, and many many thanks in advance to anyone who might be able to offer any insight.
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Help regarding someone else's 15yr old son
4 replies
nik106 · 01/10/2012 00:08
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