To get DD out of a rave

I loved a rave back in the day and have raised three adult DC who between them certainly kept the Manchester night time economy going.
However, if DD wants to be treated like an adult then she should act like one and tell you truthfully, where she is going, and what time/ how she is getting back.
There are very few areas of the UK that don't have WiFi coverage so I'd ask her to leave her phone switched on too.
Does she think you'd be disapproving and that's why she never told you?

I’m just relieved she’s safe, I would have been as worried as you OP.

Well thats nice for you but the OP doesn't live in London and you were taking the piss out of my post and I don't live in London either. Neither funnily enough do most MN users.

My DS could also walk of course. It's only 14 miles..

I have two DC. They both have very large groups of friends. All bar a couple were subject to very similar rules. Most were collected by parents (or one parent would bring a group of them back) or could get ubers (girls had to share to the same location so that they weren't in the uber alone). DS2 had one friend whose parents didn't care where she was and she often ended up sleeping in our spare room since she couldn't get home and was drunk.

Mine are now both at university, I still have find my friend on their phone for emergencies.

I think this is a great example of why tracking people, kids in particular, is a bad idea. Just because we can, doesn’t mean we should. It’s giving a message ‘you can’t be trusted in the world without our supervision’, which does feed through into kids’ psyches. And obviously causes a lot of unnecessary anxiety for those doing the tracking. She’d told you she’d be out until the early hours, you either trust her to make her own choices about that or you don’t, imo. And at 17 I don’t know what the other options are. I think you know all this op, which is why you felt so conflicted about it. Turn the tracker off.

Picturing ops DH as Liam neeson with his special set of skills tracking her down!

Lived in london, night buses galore! How do you think the DD got to the woods?

There have been plenty this year already in my neck of the woods.

No such thing as a night bus here. Three options to get home - parent pick up, uber or get in a car full of kids with a teenage driver.

I'll carry on picking up my child or paying for an uber thanks.

Some people are so desperate to be viewed as cool.

@BoogieTownTop
I’m calling you out on ‘it’s weird’ and ‘ridiculous’. You can disagree without denigrating the way other people parent.

No clearly not (you're just making up your own narrative there for added "cool mum" status), but whilst still at school.

Of course it would!

Shes an adult and you’ve moved into an adult relationship with mutual respect.

Yes this is most likely my DS sound system! He is at Uni in Bristol but they have a massive sound system in a lock up and their free parties have been going on all over winter, even in the depths of December. Hundreds of young folk turn up they even put free tea, coffee and snacks out for them.

OP you are really going to need to chill out and try and relax over the next few years. As a Mother to a 21 and 22 YO it can be hard and yes i am aware of alllll the dangers but you need to stop the tracking for a start.

I’d have a conversation with her about drug use if you haven’t done that already.

I'm in my 70's and I'm relieved that there was no "tracking" when I was a youngster.
My parents were bad enough with the interrogation about where I was going etc, etc
Thing was we all looked out for each other and I think we were more independent and savvy at 18 than my own DC'S were. Perhaps nowadays we are far more aware of the big bad world out there because of living in a media heavy atmosphere, without appreciating there have always been "dangers" out there albeit different dangers but our kids have to grow up and learn to live and deal with it all.
There is a very fine line between being overwhelmingly protective and just gently watching out and guiding them.

That’s fine!

Di you track her and impose a curfew?

How did she get to the woods? Op didn’t take her child?

Perhaps she could use the same mode of transport to get home?

It was after 6 when she was ready to call her mum and dad taxi, that’s light here, she could perhaps walk from the woods she’s been racing on all night to sone transport?

Dd2 17 has always seemed older than her peers shes reasonable grown up sophisticated is always recommending books we have good conversations etc. She has an epic social life with friends and long term boyfriend. Saturday job so has some money of her own. It would actually feel weird if I suddenly said to her a time she has to be home by.

Not many nightbuses in the woods !
For me collecting them is about safety , I will still collect DD aged 19 rather than her putting herself in potentially dangerous situations ( saw me in my car on Brighton SeaFront @ 3am on January 1st - the joy.) Doesn't give me the right to track her though. At 17y, year 12 I would say a bit young to be out all night in term time. Y13- well your A- levels not mine !

Exactly!

But that’s somehow deemed that we don’t worry and we’re shaming other parents!

No we’re allowing our children to become adults, as mum always said, you have children, you give them wings and you let them fly. You don’t keep them in cages.

Last point
from me… it’s a quid pro quo. She’s ringing daddy at 6am for a lift home. So him tracking her location seems reasonable to me.

once she doesn’t need dad to come and collect her, then dad doesn’t have any grounds for tracking

This! I am trying to imagine the kind of 18 year old that doesn't fall about laughing at a 'curfew '!
We can't set an age that someone is legally an adult and then impose things like curfews on said adult. In fact, we should have been preparing this young person for years beforehand to become an adult at 18.
I have a 19 and almost 16 year old, I have never tracked either of them to avoid exactly this situation. Do I worry? Of course I do but that is my problem, not theirs.

Dare i say it?!
I have to leave the discussion because I’m cooking my 17 year old a fry up before driving him to rugby training? 😂

There absolutely is. There was one near Bristol a few weeks ago.

people dress sensibly and dance - keeps you warm!

I wouldn’t go and get her. But I’d be having a serious chat about trust and safety the next day.

Of course mum is paying for it, lets her control the situation. Holding the purse strings!

If at 18 your child can’t navigate the way home without mummy paying or it, then you’ve gone wrong.

If in extreme emergency, something going wrong they need to call on you, the same as a partner or whatever would do, then fine, that happens. They navigate that.

My 18 year olds didn’t need to be tracked, they were capable to be adults.

The tracking is for your benefit, not theirs!

Sadly, young women are vulnerable nowadays and if I had seen her location I would have been very worried indeed and would have done the 3am run that your DH did. Glad she is ok OP.

You’re on shaky ground legally restricting the movements of 18 plus adults.