To give a 20 year old a weeknight curfew?

I hope she is contributing to petrol too.

@Nocameltoeleggingsplease
There's not giving a shit and being ridiculous.
A 20 yr old adult living away from home and she's got to report back to mummy when she's home? at what age does it stop?
Highly likely she's humouring you, there's no way you know she's being truthful with you.
What would you do if she didn't check in?

Sorry I forgot mumsnet rules are you kick your kids out at 18 and don’t care what they do after that.
Doesn’t everything around personal safety suggest you should let someone know where you are going etc? We don’t judge where she is going or what time she gets in, she just lets us know she’s home safe.
Sorry for giving a shit.

Yes your son is an Adult, but at the same time he is still living at home and you have the right to set rules, it is called manners and common curtesy. It is normal for you to worry especially when he is now driving and driving on country roads in the dark.

From another perspective; my DD is 20 and at uni, and lives away. When she goes out, we ask her to text when she is in and safe and well. She does this but as it’s our choice to ask for it, we don’t get to comment on what time she is getting in. If we can’t settle while waiting for the text, that’s on us. What are you going to do when he leaveshome?
this is ridiculous, the DD probably texts on her way into a club to satisfy her controlling parents.

I think a curfew is perfectly reasonable. Your house, your rules. It's nothing to do with anything apart from getting an uninterrupted sleep which you are entitled to especially on a weekday night!

My my DCs are early twenties so this is also something I faced. I didn't impose a curfew you just have to get over it.

However, if their late hours meant they didn't go to work or college whilst I am supporting them I'd have been furious.

He is ND, living at home, fully funded by you & still growing up.

A curfew is not at all unreasonable but I would have an adult conversation with him as why you are doing it ( your anxiety, sleep etc) as you can do that without making it his problem.

She texts you about her comings and goings even when she is not home?

That seems odd as a usual thing, how long do you think she will do that?

At first I thought you were being unreasonable given he is an adult but as it is your car I think it's perfectly reasonable to say he can only borrow it at certain times.

@CrazyGoatLady We will have to agree to disagree, because I take a different view (and there are different psychological theories around anxiety too!) In this case I think OP should listen more to her anxiety because I believe she is underreacting to her son's behaviour, not overreacting. If she listened to her anxiety she would realise that what her son is doing IS very risky, and she might be able to talk to him about it. In your case, I would say something similar. Getting anxious at driving on motorways is absolutely realistic, because driving is one of the ways you are most likely to die. Of course, you may decide that you want to take that risk because you need to drive on a motorway for some reason that is important to you. But it would be equally valid to decide to avoid motorways because you aren't that keen on the destination anyway, or you might put in place measures that lessen the risks such as driving carefully, driving when it's less busy or taking a longer but safer route. It's about finding a way to live well with anxiety (a normal part of being human), not ignoring it, hiding it or pathologising it. If you're anxious about something and you try to ignore it, get rid of it or even worse tell yourself there's something wrong with you for feeling it, that's a sure way to escalate the anxiety off the scale. And I am wondering if this is what's happening to OP.

I am maybe not in line with the majority here.

You can't set a curfew as such. But if adults are going to live together, and as an adult living in the home of another adults, there can be rules set down.

My 20 year old daughter now lives in her own apartment. but if she were to move back here, that would involve an agreement about certain things around the household. Like contributing to housework.

If I was a poor sleeper and she was likely to be coming in late, we'd have to address that too, frankly. I do need to go to work on poor roads myself.

It's hard when young adults don't have the option of moving out to gain their independence because of finances, and maybe even harder when they are a little immature and still need some structure. But I think it's fair to say, look kid, I'm not sleeping, and I can't do my work properly. And frankly - you are no picnic when you have been up all night either. You guys need to figure out a different time to hang out so I am not up all night weekends.

The anxiety isn't really relevant, IMO - if you are up you are up.

Another possibility - stop waking him. If he doesn't get up and he misses the bus, he misses. Maybe then he will realize he needs to get to bed on time.

Once he’s at uni’/ moves out, you won’t have a clue where he is or at what time.
You should be enjoying your last few months with him at home, not becoming a drain on his freedom.
As you say, your anxiety is YOUR problem, not his.

Would you set a curfew for any other adult living in your house? Eg if your sister or your mother were living with you?
honestly you can’t set a curfew for an adult.

psst..... this is way too reasonable for MN. Such common sense has no business on these threads 😂

From another perspective; my DD is 20 and at uni, and lives away. When she goes out, we ask her to text when she is in and safe and well. She does this but as it’s our choice to ask for it, we don’t get to comment on what time she is getting in. If we can’t settle while waiting for the text, that’s on us.
What are you going to do when he leaves home?

We have a curfew, 11pm weekdays as we all have to be up for work and uni. It goes for all of us out of respect and works really well.
Weekends are do what you like. I have an 18 and 20 year old

@Owly11 I hear you and agree about expressing feelings and listening to your gut, but only up to a point. I'm trained as a psychologist and we absolutely do not take the view that every anxious thought is worth taking seriously. I think it is worth OP chatting to him about boundaries regarding friends providing petrol money and not taking the piss, especially if he is driving in non-ideal weather conditions to help out this friend.

I'm autistic with ADHD, and if I listened to every anxiety my brain came up with I would never do anything at all. I wouldn't drive on motorways, for example, or at night, as I was terrified of that when I learned to drive. The anxious thoughts still arise when I do those things, but I manage them. I absolutely did need to learn not to listen to anxiety to the degree that I was doing at one point. Other people also did not need to listen to them over and over again - there was nothing they could say that would help, and there comes a point where it's just frustrating for others. The only person who could deal with it was me.

I also didn't have a choice but to deal with it, with two DC with SEN that I had to advocate for, who I knew would grow up to have a similarly wired brain. They needed to see it was possible to live your life despite the challenges that come with the neurospice.

It sounds like OP's DS is actually quite a sensible lad who does mind safety, as she described above he pulled over in heavy rain/poor visibility. This is exactly how I hope my DS's will be when they start driving.

It's not outrageous. Beta blockers are a standard anxiety treatment that work, especially alongside talking therapy. I'm suggesting the op gets a grip on her anxiety because it's clearly affecting her life and that of others. Anxiety especially at this level is not normal and needs treating.

I'm getting over invested in this. It's not his car to clock loads of miles up on and drive others around in like a taxi service and be driving in the early hours for someone else's convenience when the working people can't settle to sleep. It's not curfew,it's living together as a family and respecting the privilege of a car to use.

no , unless he is mentally younger ( not socially) then no. You can’t legally anyway, he’s over 18. Your anxiety, is your problem not his. He is an adult. You are being controlling even if not trying to be.

I'm not surprised you are anxious about him with his range of activities and it would make me think he has a high tolerance for risk, therefore decisions about driving might not be that conservative. I'd restrict the use of the car actually. There is a reason why some car insurances are only for set hours.

I’ve thought long and hard about this thread in the light of 63% of respondents thinking that the OP is being unreasonable. They are wrong. The fact that her DS is legally an adult is actually irrelevant. Three people in the household need to be up at 7 am, yet he’s coming home in the early hours of the morning. He needs to stick to an 11 pm curfew during the week. As for the suggestion that the OP should take beta blockers to help her cope, that’s an outrageous suggestion.

Completely understand your anxiety (I have terrible anxiety myself) but I think you'd be incredibly unreasonable to give him a curfew because of it. You need to get help with your anxiety, it isn't fair to your son.