My 15 year old son is lovely, but ......

[ComeOnComeOnComeOnGetThroughIt]

He's kind, thoughtful, clever and handsome, but he has the personal hygiene standards of...well...someone with very low standards. I still have to tell him to have a shower, remind him to put deodorant on, and even to clean his teeth. He just wouldn't do it if I didn't prompt him. AIBU to hope that tell it will suddenly all click into place soon?

My 15 year old gets in the shower and just stands there, expecting the magic water to cleanse him without any actual, you know, soap or shampoo or anything. Literally comes out a wetter version of when he went in.

Don't any of thes people have pocket money that can be stopped, or things they want that they have to behave to get?

My youngest is 12, he needs prompting, a lot. He actually asked me recently why he needed new pants every day. (Not envy). He has ASD and I thought it was down to that.,.apparently not.

My eldest (also a boy) is very soon to be 15 and discovered skin and hair care last year...now I can't get in the bathroom!

You can't win.

My ex told me he was absolutely scratty as a teen - sounded vile. He used to purposely not shower or clean himself at all, didn't wash his clothes etc.
Now he's super clean and would have a fit if he thought he might whiff a bit. He has the best hygiene by a mile of any guy I've ever met.

Fingers crossed your son turns out like this! Maybe it will change when he finds a serious girlfriend - unless she does a runner when she can smell him coming, haha

My 15 yr old sweats so much through his blazer that he leaves white,salty deposits and it has to be washed fortnightly at a minimum. We 've had some success with trying to get him to use a triple x deodorant which you apply at night time. He's a great big lad with a little boys mentality and you jyst yave to encourage as much as you can.

Same with my nearly 12 year, doesn't always smell so still trying to get him to incorporate deo into day routine but still have to remind him to brush teeth and wash hands - too eager to get back to Fortnite or YouTube! Doesn't help that his dad never bothers with his teeth so forget to tell him when son stays at his. My nephews are nearly 16 and rarely wash faces or shower!

Ds1 takes great care and interest.
Ds2 nightmare. Needs constantly reminding. Drives me nuts.

I just asked my 12 year old if he thought he’d wash or brush his teeth at all if I wasn’t always telling him to and he said ‘no’ I said aren’t you bothered about being stinky though and he just went 🤷🏻‍♂️. I just think hopefully he’ll grow out of it 🤞🏼

It will pass and pretty soon you won’t be able to get him out of the shower.

15 year old DD is the same. It’s just laziness.

Drives me crazy.

Wow! I'm really surprised. I have twin 17 yo DS they take ages in the bathroom showering, using products, teeth cleaning, flossing... it never stops (luckily one has an en suite). But they are always hogging our bathroom (the only bathroom with an actual bath). I guess I should not be complaining though having read some of the responses on here.

I have one like that too!

He thinks I am totally unreasonable for telling him to put a clean t-shirt on after he's worn one for 2 days. He grimaces and groans about having a shower. Has to be constantly prompted to use deodorant. And clean his teeth.

I have a 12 year old step daughter. Only baths (her ladyship refuses to shower) one a week at her mums. By the time she gets to ours on a Friday she’s smelly and her hair is greasy. Doesn’t seem to care.... which is hilarious as she spends most of the evening pouting in front of a phone camera taking selfies.

She’s now ‘forced’ to bath as frankly the smell is pungent and I don’t want to be changing the bedsheets all the time.

Hoping some peer pressure will kick in soon.

Oh and she also can’t brush her teeth unless remained a few times. Ah......

Oh and my 13 year old DD isn't much better. She hates having a shower - totally wasted time that she could be using facetiming her friends. She is mortally offended when I point out her greasy, lank hair. Problem is that she - despite constant instruction - insists on plopping a huge blob of conditioner on the top of her head rather than the ends of her hair and then not washing it out.

So it's greasy and manky 2 minutes after it's dry. Only thing which changed her ways was a threat that if she couldn't wash her hair properly then I'd have to put her in the bath and do it for her.

My DS kind of smells sinisterly 'musty' .....I think that is stale sweat. Eww! Oddly though - his head smells quite nice when I kiss him goodnight...perhaps that's a mum thing though. It's just the bod that pongs - neck down. Teeth are nice! 😁

Teenage boys are gross lol, my 17 yr old has a girlfriend, shes beautiful, sweet, and too kind, because I will happily say to my lad 'Man you pong!' (he's a cleaner at his old school and comes back stinking of sweat and disinfectant) and she will hug him and say 'Noooo, he smells lovely!'

But see I reckon making teens sweaty n 'orrible is to help us mums get over the fact that they will soon be moving on, I mean, if our kids stayed smelling as sweet and powdery as when they were babies (remember that gorgeous forehead smell!!) then we would want them to stay, their stinky sweat is natures way of saying 'They stink now, you don't mind them buggering off soon do you...not really!'

By the way, don't try to hide by the front door and attack them with deoderant...they don't really like it much! :-/

It's a boy thing....
Speaking as a mother of 4 boys.
It disappears around age 17/18.

My 13 yr old is like this, but 15yr old insists on a bath and washing his hair every day, although he does spray on deodorant before getting in to bed, which is a bit weird!

Crikey @Streamside, poor kid....that's on another level surely?!

Pretty gross but even as a baby he was really sweaty. Just going to try and entice him to have a shower now.

Having only had daughters, I never experienced this.
Would it be awful to leave him to sort his own hygiene out and go to school stinking. Maybe when others wrinkle their nose at him , then he will understand why we shower and clean our teeth daily.

My DS was also pretty good with the water and soap from 14 but DD was grotty. Awful to get to brush her teeth and shower regularly, used to just get wet but not wash. Hair was always greasy and her underwear stank to high heaven when I emptied the laundry basket.

She didn’t start washing until she went to uni and I think that was embarrassment as she was sharing a flat and everyone else showered every day. She was crap at brushing her teeth too until her gums started bleeding, the dentist bollocked her and she dreamed her teeth were falling out.

18-19 was the year that it finally clicked, I nagged her constantly for years to get to that stage.

Fortunately she is clean and fresh now with shiny teeth that have survived.

You have my sympathy.

Having a proper chortle at this. I could have written the OP myself. I have a 20y DS and a 13y DS with ASD and both have significantly better hygiene standards than the 15y DS. He really stinks

I even have to give specific instructions: "wash your hair USING SHAMPOO " for example. I'm hopeful from some of the responses that it will all happen at 17/18. Gives me hope!

Soon enough he’ll discover girls. Or boys. And then your house will stink of Lynx Africa!