To be so upset, worried and angry at son

[dogsdieinhotcars]

Son is 16. Text about 21:00 saying he's staying at a friend's. Someone I don't know. So I say no, don't know them or parents. He's 16 (just). He says everyone is so he is. I'm saying no. Where are you? Says somewhere vague about 3 miles away. I insist. He continues to say nonsense about why and can't get back coz he got there by taxi. Basically I ring him. Tell him he has to get home. Where are you? Asks his friend who laughs and says somewhere about 6 miles away. I am angry and shout telling him I need an address to pick him up. He won't give it. Don't know! Puts phone down. I text. His dad texts saying you Ave until 22:00 to tell us the address. He must turn his phone off after I text how disrespectful he is being. And he has not answered nor text since. I have gone through anger, to hurt and now fear. I am so worried and yet immensely disappointed. I never raised him to be like this. I have to work at 07:00 and I am so churned and anxious. He is still my child, and I thought he was a friend to me. I don't know what to do.

Totally agree, math. And my son has also changed his mind about going to parties once he found out that a particular person/group of people were going, or just because something was said that set his spidey senses off. It's important for them to feel they can do that without feeling like they will lose face.

nooka I agree, the son didn't behave in the best way this weekend, but maybe he would have also handled it differently if he'd been parented differently and the 'space' between he and his his parents felt different.

Cauliflower She might have known where he was going to be in the middle of the night if she'd asked rather than just issuing a ban.

It's easy to just say it wasn't a great idea to say "I'm not your friend anymore" but I think that says a lot about the relationship between the OP and her son.

My son and I are becoming friends. He's nearly an adult. One day, I hope we will be. But for now, I am still his parent first and foremost and I don't care whether he sees me as a friend or not. I certainly wouldn't ever say to him, "I'm not your friend anymore" (either directly or indirectly through a third party), largely because i'm not in primary school anymore and I'm not manipulative.

Nooka, he did it because he knew he would be stuck at home if he had asked ahead of time.

It's not presumptuous - the climate and the style of communication that have been created by the OP and her DH have clearly made it difficult for the DS to broach the subject of socialising without causing an OTT reaction. It is not the job of a child to mind the feelings of a parent, or shield them from their irrational fears by staying home. Being forced to pander to a parent's anxiety is not healthy. There is a reversal of roles here.

This is a mother who thinks the world is a terrible place because she is a nurse and obv what she sees in hospitals reflects the danger there is out there. But she doesn't see the 99.9% of people who go to parties and simply have a good time with nobody losing an eye.

When a parent's thinking is so black and white and a parent's equilibrium is so fragile, and the relationship seems to hang on so fine a thread that friendship is lost overnight, there is a lot going wrong. Teens will respond either by giving up, staying home and not risking sending a parent over the emotional edge, or they will grab whatever chances they get to get out. This is actually the healthier choice even though they are very likely to make stupid decisions, go to the wrong parties, trust the wrong friends, and not call on parents for help if needed.

This could all be so different.

Blimey, you are all still here giving it some. You do not know me or the dynamics of my family. I don't need lectures, as that is what many posts appear to be. So that's how it's coming across. So we all come across on social media very differently than real life. And those are not helpful when times have been bad really are they?

If you can call this lecturing then we are all entitled to identify in your tone and choice of words what we see too.

You chose the words you used. There is always a good deal of truth revealed in what people post.

You are coming across in a certain light here, to a great many people, and elements of the relationship you have with your DS too.

goodness gracious mathanxiety, don't you ever shut up?

If we are coming across as lecturing OP, have a think about how you might be coming across. Prickly and dogmatic are 2 words that spring immediately to mind.

goodness gracious mathanxiety, don't you ever shut up?

You prove my point exactly op

In response to the first two pages the lad is just 16, in year 11, doing GCSEs and last night was a school night. He shouldn't have been out at all, let alone staying over.

Mine are 18 and nearly 22. They have never been out socialising on school nights (Sunday to Thursday). DS was a very social animal and came home with the milk regularly but the rules were that he had to stay in touch and for safety reasons let us know where and who he was with even on a people I met through x basis. He understood why and so many boundaries were pushed, the frantic night he went under the radar because he had his phone stolen, the night he was 17, went to a party and came home at 4pm. Countless threads on here where I was generally supported.

For want of a little poor phrasing there has been much horridness to the OP.

I hope you are OK OP. You will all learn a little on this baby step towards adulthood. Being a parent is hard; it simply prepares you for the hell and trauma that can be the teenage years. Eventually peeps of the delightful child they once were start to reappear.

You and he are probably both physically and emotionally exhausted. Try to keep your cool and have a proper chat in a day or two when you are feeling stronger.

Rather than bristling at anything other than your own opinion, try actually reading what people are saying. If you'd listen, it might help you move forward with your son in a more sensible manner.

All teens rebel in some way otherwise they never learn to take risks and stretch their wings to leave the nest. Although it is not ideal and very stressful for you both as parents as you don't know his whereabouts and who he is with, it is part of what most teens do as natural progression from child to adult. You do need to have rules for safety, however teens will often defy those rules. That does not mean they don't still love you, and still do need you to love them, but it does mean they are needing to break away in some way from the nest, to start to feel more of an independent person

oldroses RTFT - this was at the weekend, not a school night.

I'm on the fence with this one. Teenagers are so complex. When dealing with young children, there are certain techniques and strategies that will work with most of them in the absence of any SNs.
With teenagers, a particular approach will work with some but have the total opposite to the desired effect with others. Some PPs have related how getting a bollocking at that age pulled them into line whilst others have said that authoritarian parenting just made them lie to their DPs and rebel even more (the latter was true for me. I have awful memories of my DF turning up at a friend's house at 8pm on a Saturday and practically bundling me into the car).
I don't think YABU to want to know where he is. YABU to not want him to stay with anyone whose parents you haven't met. DD is 14 and has a close knit group of 4 friends and they take it in turns to sleep over at each other's houses. I've only met one of the girls' parents.
There used to be a long running thread on the teenager boards for parents of extremely challenging teenagers e.g. Stealing from their parents, trashing the house, taking drugs, getting excluded from school etc. Just be thankful you're not dealing with that and that you just have 'normal' adolescent behaviour to deal with. I know you said that drink was involved- it's fairly normal for boys his age to experiment with alcohol.
And you really need to quit the emotional blackmail, it doesn't work.

Oh ok fenella. Thought it was last night. It is different then. There have been some real meanies about though.

OldRosesdoomed speaks through experience
" Try to keep your cool and have a proper chat in a day or two when you are feeling stronger."

I have lost it with my teens a few too many times over breaches of rules and it just undermines you as a parent and pushes them further away toward more nonsense Maybe could you all go out somewhere neutral and discuss calmly after all involved have had a good sleep and work out a way forward that allows freedom to participate in social events with peers, yet with safety

That there was alcohol involved doesnt surprise me even a little bit!

At parties at 16 this happens.

All you can do at 16 is give your DCs the toolkit to deal with it. To learn about consequences. Accept that they will get it wrong sometimes.

I actually am listening. But some posters sound like dictators. It's not helpful. It's ridiculous. Initially I thanked everyone no matter what their opinion. They just weren't being so mean.

Word of wisdom from Mathsanxiety too
When a parent's thinking is so black and white and a parent's equilibrium is so fragile, and the relationship seems to hang on so fine a thread that friendship is lost overnight, there is a lot going wrong. Teens will respond either by giving up, staying and not risking sending a parent over the emotional edge, or they will grab whatever chances they get to get out

Teens are reacting to us, whether we like it or not, so although it is hurtful that your son blatantly lied (and who hasn't had a child who hasn't taken their turn to defy us), it will be forcing your son into a corner if you actually react coldly or with hostility and emotionally cut him off
Having said that, I too have been hurt by my son's disrespectful actions and reacted with hurt rather than waiting for all to have a night to sleep on it. But there is a lot of sense in talking in "shades of grey" rather than black and white terms, and making a compromise for a smart, sensible solution for all involved This is not about keeping control of your son, as he is nearly an adult , it is about ensuring safety You can do this calmly, focusing on being a role model of a calm, fair, inquisitive, understanding parent. You can teach him stuff and he can teach you stuff, teens do have lots of stuff that helps us understand pressures they are under, and they may keep this from us if we take the cold punitive approach

I've got two 17 year olds.
They go to lots of parties, gigs, sleepovers.

They always tell me where they're going to be.

That said, they know that this is a courtesy as opposed to a condition of them going out. I know some of the kids they hang with and some of their parents but not many.

The only time I ever say no is when the logistics are ridiculous; getting back when the last trains have stopped or asking me to collect at 4am.

I hope all is OK for you tomorrow and all goes well OP
I would be so worried and upset too

'Haters'? 'Dictators'? 'You've lost a friend'?

It all becomes clear now. The OP is reacting a bit like a teenager herself.

Glad your son is safe, but for the sake of your future relationship you need to calm down.

Think big picture here.

And yes, I will be following math'S advice. She seems pretty clued up.

This post has just come on my radar.

I have a 15 year old and his rules with regards to sleepovers are:

• give me notice. Ideally before dinner so I can feed the others and myself and not waste time waiting for him to get home.
• no sleepover if it's school the next day.
• he needs to let me know how he's getting home and what sort of time.
• if he's running low on battery and can't blag a charger then to text me about that just in case.

Not knowing the parents isn't an issue for me. My son's hanging around with the children not the parents and can call an ambulance or whatever in an emergency. "Good" parents are not a guarantee of "good" kids and vice versa.

I know that teens often lie about where they are and who they are with. Allowing them to keep that area of their life private strangely means that they open up about their friends more. (The positives and negatives)

Ds has seen people make bad choices like drinking and drugs. When/if he screws up too he will be physically close enough to fix things. He knows for example that the rule about making travel arrangements is for both our benefits because he's been stranded before and Ive been unable to help as I'm a single parent with other kids.

(eyebrows - get your DS a mini portable charger, they only cost a few quid and can fit in a pocket. It'll give enough charge for a sleepover.)

I totally agree with you. I, too, am the mum of a just turned 16 year old ds and would be fuming if he just announced he was staying out all night on a Sunday, with school the next day and I didn't know where he was or who he was with. 16 year old lads still need guidance and parents have a responsibility to know where they are. If he had ended up getting into trouble the first thing people would do is blame the parents, for not knowing where he was, what he was getting up to etc. He is still a child. He is not yet classed as an adult. Why shouldn't you be a "friend" to your son, as well as a parent? I have the same relationship with my son and I am proud of it. He has loads of friends, but I like to think he can come to me and tell me anything, that is being a friend as well as a parent - I understand exactly what you mean. I agree that he probably felt embarrassed in front of his mates and didn't want to "lose face" but he knew his behaviour was unacceptable. I have had a similar situation and its all part of growing up and testing the boundaries. Be proud of yourself, you are obviously a responsible parent. I work with teenagers every day and it sounds like you are doing a great job!