To let DD age 8 sleep in a tent by herself...

[TheMoistWorldOfSeptimusQuench]

... on a campsite, with me & partner in another tent right next to her, and surrounded by a load of other responsible adults and family friends?

Only asking because it hadn't occured to me that this was risky, but friend who is organising the trip has just expressed outright and horror at the idea.

DD loves the idea - she is already trying to work out what selection of sleeping bag, cushions & quilts she'll be able to cram in the car to make her nest.

My relationship is a new one (although we have known him for years & DD is very comfortable with him, very keen on him coming camping etc) so I'd really prefer to be sleeping with him - although I won't if you all think I'm being ridiculously negligent!

Am I?

Have my daughter, Oblomov? She's been begging for her own tent for YEARs (and has finally been allowed one, at 8).

'Everyone else' has been allowed to sleep out on their own since they were toddlers, according to DD. MaybeI don't know any real-life MNers?

I find the over protection of children sad too - brecause I'm thinking about the future, and what sort of adults these molly coddled children become.

Dp has children coming to Scouts who at the age of 11 have never struck a match, done any cooking at all, or done anything at all alone.

If that's not sad, I don't know what is.

i can't see the difference between sleeping in a different compartment and sleeping in a different tent next door

Another one who is contemplating let nine year old DS have his own tent this August. Lots of good sense here.

I camped in a mosquito net throughout Zaire and the worst that happended to me was I woke up on a nest of giant millepedes!

It is amazing that totally sensible people suddenly develop total paranoia when it comes to their kids.

do you lot not =know how nosiy tents zips are?

i used to wake everytime anyone went in and out of our tent as a child. zzzzzzzziiiiiiip and out popped someone to the loo.

zzzzzzip on the way back in.

ziiip fir the sleeping comparentment.

heck even the neighbours zip wake me up.

Seeker, I camped recently with an 11 year old whose dad was furious with me for teaching her how to put together a trangia & warm up a pan of beans.

Poor little Sophie Hook was abducted & murdered 15 years ago. The reason people remember the case is that it's vanishingly rare for small children to come to harm whilst camping in public campsites or private gardens.

OP, I'd go for it.

I'm sorry for not reading whole thread - laughing too hard

walkie talkies?1?
baby monitors?!?
rape alarms?!?
bells on zip!?!

Have these people ever camped. If she so much as breathes heavily you will hear it.

And don't even think about sex unless you have a very thick skin. The whole campsite will know exactly what you are doing, no matter how quiet you think you are.

A tent only blocks vision - it will block no noise whatsoever and in some instances actually amplifies noise - a tent zip being opened is one of the loudest things on a campsite (yes, you will wake everyone when you go for a wee )

Let her stay on her own, if she changes her mind it is dead easy to swap around sleeping arrangements.

I used to sleep out in the back garden on my own all the time - she is even safer as you are in tent next door...

lol raven - we made firestarters with the cubs. with boiling wax.
and then we let them light fires with them and cook stuff on sticks.

there are bears where i live.
and cougars.
mwah ha ha haaaaa.

Oh let them judge. I'm always judged for the freedom I afford my 10 yo son - esp. by my brother and his helicopter wife. At 9 he walked to school on his own he has to empty the dishwasher on his own - and that include knives he knows how to start a fire and this summer is flying to America on his own . Truth is, it's really, really hard for me to even let him cross a road on his own but it's who he is. He enjoys his independence and I believe it's healthy.
Heck, I walked to school alone at 5!
It gives us soo much more to talk about and I find he is infinately more interesting than those children that are tied to their busy mums.
Oooh sorry, rant over, I would let her do it, but position the tent so the the DOORS are next to (or facing) each other closely. Then it's no different to sleeping in a big 8-10 berth tent with seperate bedrooms.

Hmm. Maybe I have a blind spot on solo occupancy in tents, but I still wouldn't put one child alone in a tent for choice. We take our 6-9 year old youth group children camping and that organisation (woodcraft folk), like scouts etc, has a 2-to-a-tent rule.

We do a lot of other adventurous stuff with them, they light fires and cook meals in teh woods and make overnight bivvies and learn to whittle (it's blood and burns all over the place) but I still feel uncomfortable about one child in a tent alone in a place with lots of strangers about.

Does anyone think that the response might have been weighted differently had the child been a boy, and / or the OP had not mentioned her eagerness to be with her new partner?

Yes Blu, I do. But I think the only deciding factor is how the child feels. If the are keen to show their independance then the mother should embrace that and take her own steps to ensure her safety.

This thread and the opposing views has made me really think about my own parenting.

I was raised by my father and had a very changeable, bohemian upbringing and spent a lot of time travelling in some not particularly safe/sanitised places - watching Kate Winslet's film Hideous Kinky brought back tons of memories for me.

I had some amazing experiences which have made me who I am and yet... I did have several scrapes and v serious near-misses some of which I still bear mental or physical scars from.

I don't want the same for my own DC and so whilst we'll try to give them a taste of independence and the big, wide world, I'll probably err on the side of over-protectiveness when it comes to weighing up the possible risk of injury or worse.

Of course, what they get up to when with their Grandfather will more than make up for my helicopter parenting

"The real nightmare ones are unlikely to happen but why take the chance."

Because it would be a great experience for the OP's daughter.

I honestly believe that letting kids take responsibility for themselves (which obviously involves an element of risk because kids can be eegits) is the safer policy in the long run.

Unless of course you intend to be one of those loons dedicated parents who accompany their kids to university.

The Sophie Hook case was FIFTEEN YEARS ago. One kid abducted every 15 years (and counting) is not enough to curtail the freedom of thousands of others.

So OP in answer to your question

YANBU, in fact you have your head properly screwed on, do it and report back.

She will love it

How the hell would you steal a child from a tent with her Mum a few feet away?

I doubt I'm alone in having an 8yr old with an exceptionally loud shriek.

None of the 'bad' things that could supposedly happen would worry me at all, they really wouldn't, mainly because they are so ridiculous.

I think the worst that will happen is an upset child in the night, but hey if that happens, her Mum is feet away, and she'll know she doesn't want to have her own tent again for a while, or maybe not, if her Mum is sensible, and it sounds like she is, she'll rationalise any fears in the morning, and her DD may well realise there was nothing to really worry about.

OMY GOD OP! I can NOT believe you are even thinking this is acceptable. ALL campsites hire child abducting paedos during their summer season....summat to do with equal rights..or, whatever.

The numbers are usually 10 child abducting paedo for each child...the tents surrounding hers will all be full of them just waiting until you turn your back for a split second then they will abduct her.

If she exits her tent at night to go to the toilet there will be 20 of them outside it and probably about 5 to 10 inside the actual toilet itself. Don't ask me how but they do fit in. They will then drag her down the toilet if she uses it.

So the answer is NO. 20/30 years ago it wouldn't have been an issue. Paedophiles didn't exist then. They were only created with the internet, but they're everywhere now.

shudders

Am horrified by some answers......My children camped alone, they even travelled over half of Asia alone......we take our granddaughter camping andshe plays outside ALONE (well we keep an eye on her), she's learning to cook. Cut onions, peel eggs, make mayonnaise, how to light the BBQ (with supervision), so that she learns how to deal with fire and not burn herself or the house down. Goes into shops to buy bread, while I wait outside. She's learning to be independent. OK she's grown up now. She's 5. We do not live in the UK (thank goodness!!) And yes, we would let her sleep in a tent alone (next to our's) but not her little sister (2). Sorry if I'm shocking you. But must admit that I'm mighty amused by some answers....but then again...don't live in the UK, so it might be terribly dangerous over there.....Sorry, Couldn't resist posting.

lol bigfish

noluck where are you?

noluck- HORRIFIED to be concerned about our kids over here? Would you say the word horrified was apt?

And, if she doesn't exit her tent, all those cars will be waiting to run over her, missing every other tent but hers.
The aliens will be watching too, and will land just before the cars get to her.

Oh, and of course she may get her neck stuck in the zip if the car drivers/aliens/paedos have fallen asleep.

Awful, just awful things happen to kids on campsites these days, the worst being they have fun..

It's fraught with danger...

My 8yo DD sleeps in my sleeping compartment with me, why wouldn't she?
Camping itself is an experience, I don't need to go the 'whole hog' by letting her sleep on her own - she's blooming 8!!

Got to add my opinion to try and balance things out a bit.

I would. I probably wouldn't with my 10 year old because she is rather dizzy and would probably cause some minor disaster, but the boys would be fine at just turned 9 and nearly 7.

It isn't statistically very risky. It just isn't.

I also remembered the child abducted when camping in the back garden years ago. I also remember the murder of the school girl inside in a youth hostel in France.

People are murdered, raped and abducted because of a series of events and circumstance that leads to a certain fate - not because of parental neglect generally. And this is not even a case of neglect. This is about exposing your DD to 'life'. Life carries many risks and one may come a cropper whatever measures one takes.

I think most of us probably remember the awful things that have happened, but that's because they are so rare.

I doubt many of us even have the capacity to remember the millions of children who were fine camping, even if it was reported.