Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Original poster

Husband keeps tracking our daughter on find my friend on iPhone

471 replies

staraw · 12/08/2018 21:36

If she goes out, it's every 15 minutes he's tracking her. I'm not too sure how to address this, thanks.

OP posts:
FermatsTheorem · 13/08/2018 11:40

If I was your daughter, and had (as you point out) already tried to switch off the tracking (which suggests your daughter is not happy with this), and my father said "if you don't switch it back on, I'll take your car away", I'd hand him the car keys, walk out the door and never go back.

There's no way of spinning this - he's a controlling arse.

user1495390685 · 13/08/2018 11:43

@BigSandyBalls2015
12 am is midnight, 12 pm is noon:-) Easily mixed up though!

Dungeondragon15 · 13/08/2018 11:44

She probably just leaves the phone at a friends house and goes off where she wants with another phone and why shouldn't she? I know some off DDs friends do this..... I am quite a anxious person but I would never do this as apart from the fact that it seems wrong and controlling, it probably doesn't work anyway.

Graphista · 13/08/2018 11:46

Yep I think there's a distinct possibility of this young woman going (as several of us did)

"Your house your rules? Fine I won't stay in your house!"

You're going to lose your dd if you don't address this op.

Shampooeeee · 13/08/2018 11:55

There are two options here:

  1. He’s a normal man who has become addicted to the tracking technology. He knows it’s not healthy but he can’t resist checking again and again.
  1. He’s a creepy misogynist who thinks of his daughter as belonging to him and so he has a “right” to know where she is.

1 is unlikely given that he openly berates her for turning it off. 2 is much more likely given the other comments about his roof, claiming financial power over you, etc.

I can’t see why you’d want to be married to a man like that.

Anniegetyourgun · 13/08/2018 12:47

12 am is midnight, 12 pm is noon:-)

Er no, not exactly. Ante meridian means before noon, post meridian means after noon. 12 noon and 12 midnight (on the dot) are therefore the only times that are neither am nor pm.

MaggieAndHopey · 13/08/2018 12:53

I got myself into some right scrapes as a teenager. Drink, drugs, underage, unprotected sex, you name it. My father was really strict and controlling - he'd certainly have pulled something like this if the technology at the time had allowed it - but that didn't stop me or protect me in any way, it just meant that I became very good at living a double life, and there was no possibility I could ever go to him, or my mum, with anything I was worried about.

Sweetsongbird1 · 13/08/2018 12:57

Is he tracking her in case she has a boyfriend op ?

ASimpleLampoon · 13/08/2018 13:05

OP, I am 43 and the child of an abusive and manipulative man. I also have had to escape from an abusive ex partner, thanks to my unhealthy view of relationships as a young adult.

I was 39 when I finally went NC with my father, after decades of emotional and sometimes physical abuse.

I no longer talk to my mother as she has always stood by my father and chosen to stand by him rather than protect me.

You and your daughter are being controlled and abused and you need to make plans to leave and make a better life.

This behaviour and attitude is not normal or healthy.

Do not make the mistakes my mother made. I feel sorry for her but not enough to put me and my own children at risk.

Get help.

Oliversmumsarmy · 13/08/2018 13:08

*pedant alert>

12 am is midnight, 12 pm is noon:-)

Er no, not exactly. Ante meridian means before noon, post meridian means after noon. 12 noon and 12 midnight (on the dot) are therefore the only times that are neither am nor pm.

BrynhildurWhitemane · 13/08/2018 13:10

Er no, not exactly. Ante meridian means before noon, post meridian means after noon. 12 noon and 12 midnight (on the dot) are therefore the only times that are neither am nor pm.

And I come across people who don't seem to know what "noon" means, so I use 12 midday now....

Lizzie48 · 13/08/2018 13:11

I don't agree that those posters who don't see the OP's behaviour towards his DD as creepy and controlling are necessarily saying that because that behaviour has been normalised. It would have been true of me before the scales came off my eyes regarding my childhood.

I've seen frequently on Mumsnet that posters who have come from loving families often have a lot of difficulty understanding the dynamics in controlling and abusive relationships. You often get the line 'But she's your mum/he's your dad.'

The OP's DH is demonstrating clearly controlling behaviours, especially when he says that it's more his roof than hers because she didn't work when the DC were small. Hmm

That's the sort of thing my F used to say (he's dead now, thankfully). He used to say that our bedrooms were his because the house was his. Same with presents, they were his so he could take them away from us. I can easily imagine him saying what the OP's DH said about the car.

zippey · 13/08/2018 13:34

Get him to watch the Black Mirror episode of the woman who was tracked as a child and then onto her teens and then adulthood by her parent. It’s a cautionary tale and it did not end well for anyone.

AynRandTheObjectivist · 13/08/2018 13:42

Get him to watch the Black Mirror episode of the woman who was tracked as a child and then onto her teens and then adulthood by her parent. It’s a cautionary tale and it did not end well for anyone.

Yeah, I mentioned this earlier. In this episode, the mother who was tracking and controlling her child was doing it out of genuine love and care (as opposed to OP's husband, who obviously just has issues with women), but the end result was the same.

NellMangel · 13/08/2018 14:08

Horribly intrusive and a terrible blueprint for her future male relationships.

RockinHippy · 13/08/2018 14:13

Just got to add. I read this to DH who tbh can be a bit overprotective of our own DD, though she's still 15, so a bit more acceptable. He's not very techy, or I could see him doing this too if I didn't pull him into line.

He's absolutely horrified of the idea of tracking an 18 yo adult woman. He too thinks it's way over the top & creepy

ciderhouserules · 13/08/2018 14:21

We all know where each other are on these apps. It’s not controlling unless you use it to control. - But he is using it to control.

IF you have the apps and agree to be tracked on it at all times, fair enough. IF you have the apps and DO NOT agree (as in this case) it is not OK. I don't care how loving and caring you are as a parent, or how precious your child is to you. This person is an adult, and should be treated as one.

My sister went off the rails as a teen - car crashes (through the windscreen in one, broken shoulder in the other) and ran away from home at 15. Having an app on a mobile (not invented in those days!) would not have stopped this.

Kingkiller · 13/08/2018 14:24

I don’t understand all this ‘she is 18 and an adult’ comments. She may be able to vote and buy alcohol but really if she is living at home she is part of the family.

Why on earth does 'living with you = being part of the family' mean that you need to be tracked?! Living with your family does not make you a child. Why would anyone track adults? If they have a phone, they can call/text you to let you know where they are or when they are going to be home if they want to.

AngelsSins · 13/08/2018 14:43

I bet he’s the sort of man who’s is obsessed with his daughters sex life/virginity too

LemonysSnicket · 13/08/2018 14:46

Take his phone from him and disconnect her from his find my friends. Tell him he's being abusive and move on.

Would he be happy if a boyfriend was tracking her 24/7? I'd be giving the car back and not speaking to him for a long time if I were her.

Sweetsongbird1 · 13/08/2018 14:55

angel oh I’d bet money on it.

WomanWithAltitude · 13/08/2018 15:08

I'm utterly aghast.... I had no idea that tracking your family had become so normalised. Unless you're talking about young children, there is no need to know where they are at every moment of the day.

If my parents had done this I would just have got better at hiding things and keeping secrets. Teenagers need to be given freedom to spread their wings and learn about the world, and adults should have the freedom to go where they please without interrogation.

I left home at 16, and have been financially and socially independent from my parents since then. If either of them attempted to track me or monitor my movement as an adult I'd go NC, because it's controlling in the extreme.

This man is clearly controlling - that much is obvious from his threats to remove the car and from the way he has spoken to the OP (incidentally OP, it is far from 'obvious that he would say that about 'his roof'.... most men would never say that.)

Your daughter may not be strong enough to stand up to this bully, but you need to fight her corner. If you don't, when she leaves home she won't want much to do with either of you.

WomanWithAltitude · 13/08/2018 15:10

(In case it isn't obvious from my post above, DH and I do not track each other. We use something call 'communication' instead. That and trust.)

WomanWithAltitude · 13/08/2018 15:18

Also, while I would hesitate to call anyone a 'weirdo', it is absolutely not normal for an adult woman with children of her own to be tracked by her mother.

It is also not true that tracking your children makes you a good parent. Quite the opposite in my view.

Looking back to my teen years, the parents knew most about what their children were up to were the ones who allowed an appropriate degree of freedom and didn't fly off the handle whenever their child did something wrong. Parents who attempted to control their child's every movement had children who lied to them, and who learned to be sneaky and secretive.

Wouldn't you rather your child felt able to come to you if something was bothering them? Isn't that the mark of a good parent rather than one who insists on the illusion of control (it's only ever an illusion because kids will work out ways around the control, a second phone is cheap to buy)?

Haffiana · 13/08/2018 15:33

It is really simple. His need/desire to track her does not trump her right to privacy. That is all.

If he kicks off then tell him you will let all your friends and family know about his behaviour.

Swipe left for the next trending thread