AIBU to not let DS go out with friends unless he specifies where

We have pets too, but I still don't feel the need to ask DH where he's going, who he's going with and when he'll be home. If he's out, I'll sort the animals - if I'm out, he will. It's really not a big deal if the cats are fed late or if the dog doesn't get walked at a certain time.

As for when I'll be home - most of the time I don't even know that myself. He can sort his own dinner (as I do when he's out).

I find tracking a mobile quite controlling, personally. We don't do that and just talk to one another instead. Try it sometime.

I don't find it mindlessly boring to hear that DD2 is going to Covent Garden with a certain set of mates and that they'll be back around 5pm.

I really hope you are just bored on half term and will be back at school next week.

Exactly.

No-one has said every single detail.

DD would tell me she is off to Covent Garden or Camden with A, E and A, and what time roughly they'll be back. Then if their plans change or the trains are messed up or something she would call.

I'd say the same if I was going out "I'm going out for dinner with my writing group mates to J's house, I'm sharing a cab back with S and should be back about 10.30pm."

It's just knowing when someone will be back in the same house, whether they will want dinner! It's not difficult or controlling. We also have pets and need to think about things like who is going to be around to walk the dog, feed the cats etc.

We just talk, laugh, share stuff. Sorry if that upsets you and the other poster who responded similar. Not sure why you just made up the next bit and added a laughing emoji.

Respect is DD telling me that she is going into the city centre with friends, will get the bus so doesn't need a lift, and will be home for dinner.

Controlling is expecting her to tell me exactly what bits of the city centre she is going to (which she potentially doesn't know until she gets there as they will play it by ear what shops they go to, if they go and get any food, or if they find it too busy and go and sit in a nearby park and chat instead).

Controlling is also requiring her to update me if she gets the bus to a friend's house nearby prior to coming home as that doesn't materially alter the plan.

Chances are DD will tell me exactly what she's done when she gets home as we do actually talk to each other, but I don't need an in depth account of it in advance or as she goes along.

I don't think most of us plan our lives around the remote possibility of the police ask you who you'd likely be with and a rough location
You realise that level of anxiety is not healthy, don't you?

There's also sharing some information, and boring the other one to death with mindlessly uninteresting details. Who has time for that anyway?

As it happens, our lives are more interesting because we don't spend it tracking everyone else and because we have interesting things to say instead of going on and on about everything.

What is shit parenting is treating your 16 year old like an 8 year old, and then be shocked they are unprepared for real life, or they avoid you like the plague as soon as they can get away from you.

If anything happened to one of you and the police ask you who you'd likely be with and a rough location and you can't answer that would be massively helpful wouldn't it? And it's shit parenting of a 16 year old.

Why would I live my life based on what the police might need to know in the ridiculously unlikely event that something happens?

They could just track my mobile if that was the case, anyway.

Yes, controlling. He's 16, he doesn't need to tell his mum every single detail of where he goes, what he does and who with.

As for getting grown adults to give you that much info - well, I'm just glad my DH doesn't insist on being told all of that

Really, controlling?! Hardly, it’s called respect.

Don't be ridiculous, it's not a questionnaire or interrogation but information freely offered up in conversation. I was at a work do the other day and DH knew not everyone who was there obviously but that it's an event most colleagues go to and he knows the name of several of them as I talk about them. Same with his work. He also knew what venue it was at. It just basic sharing of information with family you live with and sharing an interest in one another's lives and not remotely controlling!

If anything happened to one of you and the police ask you who you'd likely be with and a rough location and you can't answer that would be massively helpful wouldn't it? And it's shit parenting of a 16 year old.

My 13 year old regularly goes out without a specific destination, why are you so controlling over your almost adult child's movements? You need to start letting go.

you all talk, or do you nag them about every little single petty detail because you are bored and don't go out enough by yourself? 😂

We TALK, but I wouldn't bore my husband to death with the complete description of any random day, and I wouldn't listen if he decided to go on and on about "how he went there on his day off, met xyz, had coffee with that one in that place, did this with the other one, then had lunch at that place because it was only 45 mn drive away"

Who's got time for that amount of nonsense 😂

Our rule is I know who you are going with and where you are going. Update me if plans change. We don’t do curfews, just keep me updated. As long as the plan isn’t crazy, I won’t object.

I extend the same courtesy to my teen. I let her know where I am going and update her on when I will be back. My plans rarely change, but I update on that as well.

it's a big difference between a normal conversation and a "if I don't have exact details of everything, you are not going out"

It's a bit of a worry if you can't comprehend the difference

We talk. Before I go out I would either say going out with some friends today or maybe give a name if it's just 1 or 2. The response to which is have a nice time. When we get home more specifics are shared such as did you go anywhere nice, did you have a nice time and so on

Doesn't the same thing apply if he says he's going to "Greenwich"?

Unless it's a very specific location (such as a specific restaurant) and he stays there the whole time and never moves, you are not going to be able to go there and get him. This isn't a 9 year old going to the local park.

My parents tried to control where I went and who with.

so I lied.

obviously.

16 is way too old to be stopping him going places. He’ll just tell you he’s going to James’s house and then bugger off where he wants.

Did you just completely gloss over the part where I said we do talk? 😂

But I am a grown adult who can go out, meet her friends and socialise without needing to give my husband all the details. Sometimes (shock) I don't even know my plans until I get there, and sometimes, I bump into someone and go for a coffee without telling DH.

It's almost like I'm my own person or something.

Ok. I’m happy with my world then where we all talk in my household.

Agreed. I can't see what good at all saying he's going to "London" will do 😂So if he doesn't come home for his tea the OP can nip into "London" and fetch him home?!

Jesus the world is going mad.

Of course I talk to my DH.

However, I don't expect to have to give him every little detail of my plans because I am a grown adult, not a small child who needs to be kept "safe".

What the fuck?!?!

Put an AirTag on a 16 year old boy when he goes out with friends?!

What?!?

do you guys really live lives where the people you live with don’t talk to each other in any kind of pleasant way?!?