Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Flip

1 2 3

Original poster

Daughter wants to sleep at friends house two doors down

72 replies

BimboNo5 · 05/09/2011 18:51

They are always in and out of each others houses, they are both six. I have said yes but now im wondering if its the wrong thing and worrying about everything that could go wrong.

OP posts:

RebelFromTheWaistDown · 06/09/2011 07:22

YANBU.
Just say no. You don't need to give a reason. It will do her no harm to not sleep over.

You are just doing your job as a parent which is to instinctively protect your own. I would feel exactly the same as you do.

Andrewofgg · 06/09/2011 07:52

Meet the parents and suss them out - if their is any likelihood of a return match they will want to suss you out too. If you are satisfied with them let it happen. It has to start sometime and whenever it starts you will worry first time. It comes with the territory.

exoticfruits · 06/09/2011 08:01

There is a diffference between instinctively protecting your own and smothering! Your DC is happy, she is in and out all the time-I fail to understand what difference it makes if it is night and she is happy and asleep 2 doors down. It is good experience for if she happens to camp with the Brownies-with lots of other girls, in a tent and more than 2 doors away.

I can see parents supporting a nervous DC, who isn't keen to stay away, but I don't see why they hold back a confident DC who wants to do it for nameless fears of 'what might happen'.

Did she do it? And live to tell the tale?!

GooseyLoosey · 06/09/2011 08:08

dd has just turned 7 and has slept at friends houses for over a year.

She has slept at lots of houses, but never where the parents were not well known to me.

I think that this would make a difference and I would prefer to get to know them first. However, if I had already been ambushed into saying "yes", I would ring up the other parents (on the pretext of making arrangements) and make sure that I was happy.

You are being a bit over protective, but you know that and as long as you know it and have it in check, it's allowed.

MrMan · 06/09/2011 08:11

First time DW and I left our first DC overnight with the grandparents - GRANDPARENTS - we first gave them a half-hour lecture on what to do in case of emergency or disaster, then called 5 minutes after we left to check the house hadn't burnt down. Thank God they had a sense of humour. I think OP has an irrational but completely understandable fear that will ease up after the first couple times, she will be joking about it this time next year.

exoticfruits · 06/09/2011 08:16

I expect they just rolled their eyes and had a laugh MrMan-wondering how they had managed to get you to adulthood without adequate instructions!

seeker · 06/09/2011 08:35

"You are just doing your job as a parent which is to instinctively protect your own. I would feel exactly the same as you do."

No.our job as parents is sometimes to over ride our instincts. Our instincts are there to protect our children from sabre toothed tigers. Non human animals don't have reason, and so have to rely on their instincts. Humans do have reason - and so can look at their instinctive behaviour and say " actually, I don't live surrounded by wild animal and dangerous swamps and vertiginous preciipices- so on this occasion my instinctive reaction is wrong"

TrillianAstra · 06/09/2011 08:43

Your job as a parent is to balance protecting your children with preparing them for being adults.

Teaching them that the world is a scary place and they are not safe unless they are with mummy is not good preparation for life.

We are in AIBU, unsurprisingly YABU. Go and meet the parents, do not let on to them or to your DD that you think they might be negligent with her.

exoticfruits · 06/09/2011 08:51

Teaching them that the world is a scary place and they are not safe unless they are with mummy is not good preparation for life

Well said-also it is very poor and lazy parenting. The difficult part, which needs to be done, is preparing them for life. There is no reason to stop a confident 6 yr old from staying in a familiar house, with people she knows well that is 2 doors down-other than a fearful mummy.

Fecklessdizzy · 06/09/2011 09:12

You sound like me OP ... I start with the fairly rational ( suppose the tent falls down ) and swiftly progress through paranoid ( wandering murderers ) and onwards towards the totally bonkers ( tent washed away in freak storm and all eaten by crocodiles that have escaped from nearby zoo in all the confusion )

Trick is seperating out the realistic fears from the mad ones ... Mine now do Cub camps and sleepovers and adventure holidays and allsorts but I still get attacks of the what-ifs, I just try and keep 'em to myself!

SexualHarrassmentPandaPop · 06/09/2011 12:08

I don't see the huge rush to prepare kids for adulthood when they are 6!
Do what you think is best OP. It was practically unheard of for kids to sleep over at friends houses so young when I was a child. It's a pretty new thing I think.

whoneedssleepanyway · 06/09/2011 12:14

Bimbo my 4.5 year old stayed at her friends house 2 streets away recently. We know the family well and the little girl and her brother go to the same nursery as my DDs. I still worried.

It was fine, they went to sleep hideously late and were shattered the next day but had fun and all was ok.

seeker · 06/09/2011 12:17

,I don't see the huge rush to prepare kids for adulthood when they are 6!
Do what you think is best OP. It was practically unheard of for kids to sleep over at friends houses so young when I was a child. It's a pretty new thing I think."
I often slept over at friend's houses 40 years ago!

And what's so adult about sleepovers?

exoticfruits · 06/09/2011 12:23

The best thing about being an adult is not having to do sleepovers!
I had sleepovers more than 40yrs ago!

SusanneLinder · 06/09/2011 12:23

You are being completely unreasonable. You know the family well,she is 2 doors away, for goodness sake let go. :)

I know she is your baby,but she has got to grow up one day and learn to live without mummy for 5 minutes. She will be absolutely fine,probably knackered, as most of my girls sleepovers involved sweeties,juice and giigling to midnight.

The worse thing about the whole idea is you will have to return the favour and you will have the hyper girls giggling till midnight.:)

Go and enjoy the peace, and have a nice lie in.....

SexualHarrassmentPandaPop · 06/09/2011 12:34

There's nothing adult about sleepovers I just think that it's a weird assumption that if you are wary about your child attending a sleepover with people you don't know when they are 6 you somehow aren't preparing them for being an independent adult. There's plenty of time for that between age 6 and when they leave home imo.

seeker · 06/09/2011 12:37

But the op lives two doors away from this family andnher dd plays with their dd a lot. And the are always in out of each others houses. That' not " attending a sleepover with peoplenyou don't know",

SexualHarrassmentPandaPop · 06/09/2011 12:39

She has said she doesn't know the parents. I agree tht it might have been a good idea to get to know them before she was happy to let her dd be constantly in and out of their house but that's another matter.

exoticfruits · 06/09/2011 13:47

I think that some parents want a CRB certificate, an inspection of the kitchen, a menu and a written essay on the parent's philosophy on bringing up DCs before they even let their DC go around for tea!! What is wrong with using your own common sense and instinct? She has already said that she is in and out of their house-what is going to happen at night? (other than maybe the DC doesn't settle and can go home)

It is terrible sad for some DCs, their parents are over protective and then when it comes time for the yr 6 residential trip they are very nervous and the majority just take it in their stride.

SexualHarrassmentPandaPop · 06/09/2011 15:27

No crb check required here but a coffee would be nice.

exoticfruits · 06/09/2011 16:55

Invite her around for a coffee-problem solved-a friend instead of a stranger.

SexualHarrassmentPandaPop · 06/09/2011 17:27

I'm not the op but that's probably what I would do.

Flip

1 2 3