How do you manage taking a phone away as punish?

[southofmanc]

DD is 13 (nearly 14, year 9). She has a pretty good life- friends, sport, nice school plus two reasonably indulgent parents- she gets a good allowance, lots of lifts, allowed friends for sleepovers, reasonable freedom etc. It's all good.

She is a grumpy arse at the moment and I've had enough. I have 2 hard and fast rules- no phone in the room when she's doing homework and no phone in her room at night. 3 times in the last week I've found her trying to circumvent this- leaving just her case in the charger and sneaking phone upstairs for example.

This happened again last night and she was horrible as well when it was discovered. Apparently she wishes I wasn't her mum. (This is galling as that day I'd given her 3 lifts, paid her allowance, helped her with homework and bought her new running trainers.).
So I've taken the phone away.

It's carnage.

She's gone from disbelief to anger to grovelling apologies and now tears.

However- she has a sports meet this evening. She's getting a lift from the coach and needs to text her whereabouts. I also need to know when to come and get her after it's over. All her homework is on a school app and we can't remember the password for the website because she never uses it. Also we don't know when her training tomorrow AM is as it's on a WhatsApp group. She's supposed to be meeting a friend now to work on a joint Latin presentation - they need to make a video! She can't text the friend to arrange and will need a phone to film.

Is there a way round this or should I just accept that phones are so embedded in her life that I should find another punishment, even though this is reasonable and VERY effective?

Title should obv read "punishment "

Natural consequences:

she has a sports meet this evening. She's getting a lift from the coach and needs to text her whereabouts. I also need to know when to come and get her after it's over.

She misses her sports because of her actions.

All her homework is on a school app and we can't remember the password for the website because she never uses it.

Password rest on family laptop or PC that she can use whilst you’re in the room.

Also we don't know when her training tomorrow AM is as it's on a WhatsApp group.

Again she misses it because of her actions.

She's supposed to be meeting a friend now to work on a joint Latin presentation - they need to make a video! She can't text the friend to arrange and will need a phone to film.

You supervise one text to friend to organise then friends phone is used for homework video.

This is what I would do. Natural consequences of their own actions teach them best in my experience.

Greysheep indeed I could (except password reset. Because it's a school and they're super cautious you have to email school for a new password and obv there's no one there.)

However- the sport is something I wholeheartedly approve of. At an age when girls' sports participation plummets she's voluntarily giving up lots of time in evenings and early mornings to train. And if she doesn't show then the coach who volunteers her time is inconvenienced and her teammate with the sick parent who gets a lift home with us will be stranded... the repercussions aren't just impacting her.

I would vive her your own phone to text/call people, and ask her to borrow someone's phone when she needs to text you to collect her. Or tell her to get the bus.
I'd allow her to use her phone to look up people's numbers, under supervision.

I think it is sensible restrictions. Fine if she quickly needs to text about sports or school, otherwise she doesn't get it for recreational purposes. Tonight let her have the phone and then take it away again.

I do think sometimes it has to be punishments that work as a family though. In this case removing the phone entirely clearly is an issue. Maybe pick something else like stopping her attending something, or just restrict the phone use as above.

What my friend does is every month she plans something she knows her daughter will enjoy e.g nice trip out with friends, getting manicures or whatever. If her daughter doesn't behave then it doesn't happen. She used to remove phone too but it was a serious nightmare for similar reasons

I can lock down my kids phones from my phone. It’s under screen time on Apple products and works on all devices.

I agree that she misses the sports trip tonight or else she is in agreement that the sports coach is informed she has no phone and asked to text you themselves (if they say no, then she misses the trip. She needs to learn and phones are not that embedded in our lives.

How long is the phone ban for?

she has a sports meet this evening. She's getting a lift from the coach and needs to text her whereabouts. I also need to know when to come and get her after it's over she is allowed it back whilst she's out at sports.

All her homework is on a school app and we can't remember the password for the website because she never uses it does she normally do all her homework on her app? "perhaps an hours usage vs then returned. If she's caught texting it's removed. Get it reset and written down for next time.
also we don't know when her training tomorrow AM is as it's on a WhatsApp group. you check it.

She's supposed to be meeting a friend now to work on a joint Latin presentation - they need to make a video! She can't text the friend to arrange and will need a phone to film. supervise text them remove phone. Friend can film it

I fully agree with sports as DD is massively involved herself. But sometimes natural consequences include her letting others down and the repercussions from that.

A punishment is not meant to teach us that only the convenient consequences are felt.

At the end of the day, it sounds as if you don’t really back up the punishments consequences. That’s your prerogative of course but it weakens the lesson you’re trying to teach so you might be best finding an alternative that’s more convenient for you.

Some food for thought. Thank you everyone.
So she's texted her friend under supervision and her friend will film the homework.
She can have her phone whilst at training tonight and I've used it to check WhatsApp messages about tomorrow.
She's not allowed it otherwise so will miss out on the evening of silly texting etc that usually happens on a Sunday.

We've spoken more clearly about the consequences of her actions. The poster who mentioned the treats got me thinking as she gets lots of nice things. She has a hair appointment booked next weekend which will be quite expensive and she's been begging for. I asked if she felt she deserved it under the circumstances- the iPhone is frankly the final straw in weeks of horrible behaviour. She agreed that she didn't, do that has also been cancelled It'll be reinstated once we agree that her behaviour is better.

Other sanctions, combined with the loss of phone whilst just hanging around seems to be effective.

I agree with no phone in room overnight but I would rethink the rule about no phone when doing homework. My dd sometimes chats with people about clarification for homework, no different from us phoning friends for help with homework back in our day.

And by 14 they really need to start regulating themselves. When do you plan on lifting the restrictions?

I completely disagree with letting other people down as a consequence of her not using her phone.

OP, other than being grumpy (and teen girls are!), what is her general behaviour like?

I use the screen time restriction on our Apple phones when I want to restrict usage and to turn them off overnight.

Nokia PAYG of shame!

She can text and contact people. Put the name of the co favs she says she needs in the phone book for her. Check phone yourself for any info she needs.

Her friend can do the videoing. Or use an old camera etc.

She won't stick to the rules if there no reason to and the most appropriate punishment for breaking phone rules is phone confiscation.

other than being grumpy (and teen girls are)
That's really unfair. What a sweeping generalisation. Some teen girls are, just like some teen boys are violent/whatever. Some teen girls aren't grumpy at all - so let's not perpetuate any myths.

I would allow it for the homework and contact of people she needs and to do it beside you.
When I am restricting my dd phone I only let her message bf and drama group and i check she has not messaged anyone else or used any other social media.

@JockTamsonsBairns I did not mean that at all. I wasn’t trying to say all teen girls are grumpy, I meant they CAN be and some really suffer the effects of hormones etc so don’t be too hard on them!

@twosoups1972 apologies, my post came across a bit more harshly than I'd intended. I just see it a fair bit on MN, this assumption that all teenage girls - as a homogeneous mass - are moody/grumpy, and immediately jumped in to challenge that. No offence meant

None taken @jock