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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To not remind Ds of the time?

40 replies

Kim82 · 13/10/2015 08:40

Ds is 14 and in year 10. Every morning I get him up at 7am so he has plenty of time to be up, fed and ready to leave for school at 8.30am. Every morning I have to shout upstairs that he needs to get a bloody move on or else he'll be late as he spends ages pissing about in his bedroom doing nothing.

This morning he went upstairs at 7.30am after his breakfast and sat in his room for half an hour. At 8am he got in the shower, it is now 8.38am and he is still in the bathroom doing god only knows what. AIBU to be fed up of time managing him in the morning and just leave him to be late in future until he sorts himself out? His 11 and 8 year old sisters manage to get themselves ready and out on time, so should he!!

OP posts:

Original poster

Kim82 · 13/10/2015 08:41

I should add that school starts at 8.50, he isn't dressed and it's a 10 minute walk to school...

OP posts:

DeepBlueLake · 13/10/2015 08:44

YANBU. Let him suffer the consequences of faffing about and poor time management, he will soon get his act together after getting bored of school detentions.

MrsTedCrilly · 13/10/2015 09:00

Yanbu, like Deep says, he needs to learn the consequences. When he gets in trouble he'll know it was his fault. The adults I know who are either very messy, disorganised or are late to everything are the ones who had everything done for them.

Original poster

Kim82 · 13/10/2015 10:09

Well he left at 8.52 and complained that I hadn't told him what time it was. He was late before he'd even set off and still had a 10 minute walk (or 5 minute sprint) before he got there.

I pointed out that he has a clock, a watch and his phone in his room that he could check the time on so it's his fault and that in future I'll get him up at 7am but then it's up to him to get himself sorted on time. No doubt I'll get a text or letter from school letting me know he has detention soon...

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Minisoksmakehardwork · 13/10/2015 10:38

Could you help him out every so slightly by setting a series of alarms on his phone, that go off every day without fail. Dh sets daily alarms except for weekends so he's up in time. That way it's his choice if he ignores them, but when school come back and ask what you're doing to help him get to school on time, you at least have something to show other than 'I've given up as he just won't listen to me'. Unfortunately I'm led to believe that even though they are teenagers and want to think they're all grown up and can do it themselves, schools still expect parents to have a degree of responsibility.

Junosmum · 13/10/2015 11:02

14 and your still getting him up?! I was 14, up dressed and breakfasted and helping the younger ones out the door!

Junosmum · 13/10/2015 11:03

Gosh, that make em sound really Dickensian doesn't it! All I meant was at 14 I expected to sort myself out and organised myself in the morning, including that I had a clean uniform (mum washed it if it was in the wash basket, she didn't come and get washing from my room).

Alibabsandthe40Musketeers · 13/10/2015 11:06

Maybe if he slept longer he'd be more alert? An hour is surely plenty of time when you have only got yourself to sort out?

DisappointedOne · 13/10/2015 11:09

I pointed out that he has a clock, a watch and his phone in his room

I'm betting the phone in his room is the key factor here. Take the phone away at bedtime and give it back in the morning when he's ready for school (will probably be 7:20am )

DadWasHere · 13/10/2015 11:09

Stop enabling him.

Moln · 13/10/2015 11:15

Talk to him tonight. Tell him from now on he is reponsibile for his own time management, from getting up to getting to school on time.

Don't set alarms for him though, you might suggest he does.

Original poster

Kim82 · 13/10/2015 11:17

We make sure he's in bed with all electronics downstairs by 10pm so he's getting plenty sleep (he picks his phone up when he gets up in the morning) and I don't mind popping my head into his room at 7am to get him up as I'm awake anyway with my 14 month old. I am just sick to death of having to chivvy him along to get ready every morning. As Junosmum says, he's 14, he should have been getting himself ready without any input from me for a long while, his sisters manage it and they're 3 and 6 years younger than he is!

I'd have let him get on with it ages ago if it wasn't for the school sending letters and texts asking for "parental cooperation" in this sort of thing. I get it's my responsibility for him to go to school but surely there's only so much I should be doing for a child his age (i.e. Making sure he's up on time and has the correct uniform/equipment etc) and he should take some of the responsibility himself in getting dressed and out the door.

He is a lovely kid, well behaved and doing great at school, he's just so crap at time management and this has been an ongoing issue for years and with me being on his back all morning he's never going to learn whereby if I leave him to it he'll have to sort himself out eventually won't he?

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KittiesInsane · 13/10/2015 11:19

Crikey.

DD's morning routine is to roll out of bed at 7:30 and leave at 8.

She's a scruffy blighter though.

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 13/10/2015 11:19

At 14, all of my dses were doing paper rounds, getting themselves up in time to cycle to the shop, do their rounds, get home, shower and get to school on time.

I think he needs to get bollocked for lateness by the school a few times.

I think I would sit down with him tonight, and tell him that it is up to him from now on - he needs to set whatever alarms he needs, and get himself up, showered, dressed and out to school in time. And tell him he is old enough to take responsibility for getting himself to school on time, and that from now on, if he pisses around and is late, it will be entirely his responsibility, and it is NOT yours!

snowgirl1 · 13/10/2015 11:22

Maybe don't let him have his phone until he leaves the house in the morning, so that he has an incentive to leave earlier?

Original poster

Kim82 · 13/10/2015 11:27

Okay, words will be had tonight. He has a paper round on a Sunday and gets himself up and out for that, it's just getting ready for school he takes ages over.

From tomorrow morning he's on his own, I won't wake him and he's not allowed his phone until he's ready to go. I know the school will mention it to me after a couple of late marks but I'll have to tell them to take it up with him rather than me...

OP posts:

Purplepoodle · 13/10/2015 11:30

No electric gadgets in the morning?

strawberrypenguin · 13/10/2015 11:30

I think you should give him an initial wake up if your up anyway and leave him to it after that. Or does he have an alarm clock you could help him set tonight?

ElviraCondomine · 13/10/2015 11:36

My DD2 can't manage time to save her life.

After many years of getting cross/ yelling/ threatening to leave the house without her/ wondering why she gets sidetracked / setting alarms/ leaving her to set her own alarms (add all possible varieties of response to this already lengthy list) it turns out she has dyspraxia.

This just means we have to work much harder to keep her organised and on track but it also means that there is no point getting cross because it's not a character flaw, it's the way her brain is wired.

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 13/10/2015 11:36

Does a 14-year-old really need help to set their alarm, though, strawberry?

StarOnTheTree · 13/10/2015 11:38

I often woke DD1 (19) up or checked that she was already up when she was still at school but I made it quite clear that it was her responsibility to get up and get ready on time. That way I couldn't be blamed if I forgot or if she faffed about. DD2 (15) has never needed me to do this.

I watched an 18 year old on TV a couple of weeks back saying that he hadn't made one single lecture at uni because he didn't have his mum to get him up and make his breakfast

JammingtonDodger · 13/10/2015 11:45

Goodness, leave him to it!

Oysterbabe · 13/10/2015 12:46

I would change the WiFi password everyday and only give it to him once he's up, dressed and ready.

CurlyBlueberry · 13/10/2015 12:58

No YANBU. My MIL used to wake my husband up when he was still living with her, for school AND WORK, until he moved out. Now he finds it incredibly difficult to wake up in time in the mornings. He just keeps snoozing his alarm in his sleep. Even if it's in the corridor so he has to get up to get it, he will turn it off and get back into bed. I honestly think it's because previously he's always had in the back of his mind "oh mum will get me when I REALLY need to get up". As I am not his mother, I have detached totally. If he is ready when I am then I will walk to work with him. Otherwise he can go by himself and be late. It isn't fair really as I have to get myself and two toddlers ready in the morning, whereas he ends up just getting himself ready, but I don't see what else I can do.

Please don't let your son get to that stage!!

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 13/10/2015 13:02

When my father started his teacher training, he lived in a student hostel (I'm not sure what they were called then) - and after two or three weeks they noticed that one of their number was, to say the least, rather whiffy.

They tackled him about it, and it turned out that his mum had always told him when to bathe, when to change his shirt, his underpants, his socks etc - and because no-one was telling him to do it, he just hadn't!!

Dad and the other students made him a chart, showing him what to do and when. I think they also had to show him how to do his own laundry, because mum had always done it for him.

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