Do you stay awake until your teenage children get home ?

[rickyrickygrimes]

DS is 16. He’s been going out with friends in the evenings for quite some time, gradually staying out later and later. DH and I are early birds, we both are ideally asleep by 10h30, up at 6h00. But DS wants to come home later - 11h30 or midnight. I don’t have a problem with that - he’s 16, 6ft tall, sensible, out with friends. We live city centre so he’s never more than 20 minutes or so from home on foot.

but my problem is that I just can’t stay awake till midnight ! Plus I’m deaf so even if he woke me to tell me he’s home he’d really have to wake me up 🤷‍♀️

do you stay awake till your teens are tucked up in bed ?

DS is 14 and generally has to be back by 10.30 at a weekend. 8.30 on a school night. DD is 17 and doesn't have a curfew but is much more sensible.

My mum stayed at mine for 3 nights last week and I went to a friend's birthday dinner. I don't often stay out late but I got back at 12.45 - friend lives 5 minutes away and I am 50. Yes she was still awake unable to go to sleep until I was home. It never ends and I'll annoyingly probably be the same in the future!

I heard about somebody's cunning plan on the radio recently:

• agree a curfew time with your teen
• set an alarm clock to go off at that time and place it just outside your bedroom door (or in your room if you're a deep sleeper)
• when teen gets home, they turn off the alarm clock and you sleep undisturbed
• if teen isn't home at agreed time, the alarm goes off, wakes you up and you start trying to find them

Genius!

When my son started to go clubbing I'd stay awake until he got in which was about 5 am. Why the hell do nightclubs shut at 4 am
these days? On a few occasions I went to pick him up as he'd lost his friends. Luckily he's grown out of his hat stage now and rarely goes out to nightclubs.

Yep, I absolutely cannot sleep until ds is home. He's 18, sensible and mature (doesn't drink)with a good group of mates and will let me know when he's heading home.
He went to a night out in our city last week (15 mins by train /taxi) and didn't get home until 3am. I couldn't sleep then until 4!! It's just knowing he's safe but I think I'm getting better at worrying less when he is out. I worry about other people, not him.
Makes you think fondly of the days when they were tucked up in bed by 8!

Dd texts me when she gets in, phone is on silent but if I wake I know she's home

The light bulb is very intriguing!

My parents left out bedroom doors open there was 4 of us 4 doors,you closed your door when home so if they woke they could just look out their door to make sure we were in

Mine would do this, if I had dropped off would jiggle my foot until I was half awake to say goodnight. Then I could relax.

One night he came in appeared sober got to his room, almighty crash. He'd hit the deck trying to get undressed. I couldn't lift him. OH half dragged him to the bathroom where he spent most of the night throwing up.

These days our youngest lives in Yorkshire visiting at weekends. He shares his route there and back for his neurotic mum 😂

DS isn't really a drinker but I have no chance of staying asleep as he is the noisiest human! Door bangs, drops a glass, runs upstairs like a herd of elephants. For someone so quiet in manner he makes an almighty din physically / he'd wake the dead!

Yes I do. H doesn’t. But I don’t feel right going to bed if they’re not in. Not that it’s very often, or terribly late either.

I had no problems sleeping, until DS was spiked, somehow managed to get a taxi home but then put his hand through a pain of glass in our front door. I have seen him worse for ware due to alcohol but this was on a whole different level. He actually has an off switch on alcohol because he doesn’t like throwing up.
Spent most of the night in minor injuries waiting for his hand to be stitched up.
The worst thing was that I’d slept through several texts he’d sent, all total none sense. If I’d spotted them I would have been straight down to find him ( find my phone) because even at his most inebriated he can text.
He will be 20 in a couple of months and I worry much less now. He goes out much more but it was a big wake up call re how easy it is to be spiked. He is also much more likely to notice it in others and has looked after a few friends when their behaviour has been worrying.
DS was very lucky, he has no recollection of the night and doesn’t know how he managed to get a taxi home. Thank goodness he did.

So although we all advise each other not to worry and to let them find their way in the world, sometimes the world throws a wide ball.

My 17 year old is often out until the early hours on the weekend. I go to bed but can't sleep properly, sort of doze and wake up at every noise. Then relax when I hear him come in. Although it slowly gets easier as I get more used to him being out and about, no choice I guess but to get used to it.

I miss the days when he was home every weekend, although I also want him to be out enjoying himself ...so...it's like either way there's something to worry about!

DD is in her 30s now and doesn’t live at home, but when she did, I was always awake or just dozing. I couldn’t sleep properly until she was in.

I just used to leave the landing light on and the last one in used to turn it off when they came home, if they came home at all.

Same here @TheFallenMadonna. My DD (19) goes to university many hours away and I generally don’t worry about her too much. But when she’s gone, I need to know where she is after midnight! I woke up at 2:30 last weekend to use the loo and panicked when I realized that she wasn’t home. Then I saw her text-she’d decided to stay over at her friend’s house. Luckily she understands that Mum worries about her!

I used to count the shoes by the door. Also, Ds's best friend often came back with him and always had a unicycle with him- if I tripped over that in the hall I knew he was home!

I do love the glorious insanity of the Downton Abbey style lightbulbs though. I wish I'd thought of that!

Yes. Now he’s older I leave my bedroom door ajar and he closes it when he comes home so I know he’s back ( or not ) when I wake in the early hours.

I leave the landing light on when I go to bed and DS turns it off when he gets home. I can see a halo of light around my bedroom door when it’s closed so I can tell when the light is off without getting out of bed