To not want daughter going to a wood by herself?

[Vellia]

Dd is 16. We live in a town with lots of countryside/footpaths at close proximity. About a 15 minute walk away from our house, you get to the edge of some farmers’ fields. If you walk down the side of one of these you find yourself in a lovely small wood. At the moment the bluebells are out and it’s absolutely magical.

Over Easter, dd and I have gone for a walk in this wood most mornings before she starts revising (I work in a school so have school holidays off). But in a few weeks’ time she’ll be off school on pre-GCSE study leave while I’ll be working.

She’s said in passing that she’s going to go for a walk in the woods at the start of each day to get herself in the right frame of mind for revision.

I feel rather uncomfortable about this as the wood is a significant distance away from the road & any houses. Definitely out of ear-shot. And the wood is never very busy - we rarely bump into more than one or two people, mostly dog walkers; often it’s entirely empty apart from us.

AIBU to think it would be unwise for dd to go walking there by herself? Would I be unreasonable to tell her she can’t?

Tatiana, I was indeed agreeing with you on that point.

I left home at 17 so therefore done everything on my own, you cannot live your life in fear. If your area on the whole is safe it's not suddenly going to be teeming with rapists just because your DD is going for a walk.

Are there as many wanky/ creepy men in your neck of the woods? I've been followed/ wanked at in parks /commons /Country parks and the Common Land round here BUT it sounds like there are less people where you are.

I think you need to judge on Knowledge of area.

I've had a chat with DD about what to do if she is approached / men shout stuff at her, waking home from school. She's just started secondary. I don't think it's putting fear of god into her, it's practical advice and forewarned is forearmed etc.

chocolatelog
The 'tone' of your post is bordering on offensive.

Women are demanding at least equality if not superiority but it seems some are 'stunted' by the thought of something 'bad' happening.
Maybe consider a convent, although they are not always that safe.

I wouldn't let my teens do this. My auntie has always loved walking her dog through some woods near us. Last year she was raped and there was nobody around for miles to help her. It's a sad sad world but I wouldn't feel happy if it was my child.

Listen to your intuition. There was something that is making feel uneasy about it if you both went together and now the idea of her going alone doesn’t feel right. Sorry to be a negative Nancy but there are crazies everywhere. And if she starts a routine it only takes someone to spot her twice in the same place at the same time to know her routine.

I was all over London using night bus, walking around drunk 2am on own, going back with friends to blokes houses etc from 16

Agree should not be ruled by fear

Things that have happened to me from strangers are when I should have been safe eg Park middle of day, tube early afternoon etc. Not the things people generally worry about.

Also men in pubs when lots of people around and boys I knew

The supposed higher risk stuff was fine!

Problem is its unpredictable so might as well do your thing

Having said that, I will feel worried for my DDs. And I will try to forearm them as best I can.

I would be concerned but wouldn’t want her to lose out on the health and wellbeing benefits of walking in a lovely environment because of tiny risks.

I would advise her not to be on her phone / headphones while walking, as is sensible anywhere at all, even more so in urban environments!

A very good book I read in my early 20s - wish had read it earlier - was Gift of Fear by Gavin De Becker. About various threats from known people, eg ex’s, friend’s boyfriends, flatmates, and strangers, trusting instincts and advice, eg not worrying about being rude! Empowering IME - recommended.

Everything has risks, eg cycling on roads: heard a cardiac surgeon discussing this on the radio, arguing that even in London where there have been an unacceptable number of cyclists killed, the risk of injury or death cycling is tiny relative to the risks of not exercising.

This thread is funny though

We all know that when anything happens the woman /girl is invariably blamed which is part of the issue. What was she doing there / at that time /on her own /etc etc

Yeah, I and many of my friends experienced sexual assault in crowded pubs.

@LimeKiwi I can't stop them. What I'm saying is I wouldn't give permission for them to do it.

But if I found out they'd done it I'd going fucking ape shit and ground them and make sure they didn't do it again!

Countrylivingcityworking “intuition” can be that, or it can just be anxiety.

OP is experiencing the latter.

I wouldn't go for a walk in near deserted woodland so I sure as hell wouldn't let my 16 year old DS go. Can you go with her? The dog idea is a good one too.

DD

It's fine to walk through the woods alone but I would take precautions such as varying my routine and route but I may be extra paranoid because I had a stalker learn my route to work.

I live next to farmland and woodland and often go walking alone. I'd hate to deprive myself of that pleasure but I am on alert when doing so, not constantly tense but aware.

I do remember one episode of crime watch where a rapist/murderer was hiding in the undergrowth in woodland or a park waiting for women and that scared the hell out of me for a while, but there are risks everywhere.

Usually I'd say YABU but I started walking in the woods when on maternity leave. It was the middle of a summers day and very peaceful. Until one time a man came up to me, identified himself as undercover police and said some criminals had just dumped their car and run in for cover so if I saw one/them to not engage and call 999 immediately as they're dangerous and to not be alarmed when I saw the police helicopter. Sure enough five minutes later the helicopter went over. It makes you think.

We live in a small market town and there's a well known woods here, there's a flasher up there that stalks women/girls. A young girl has been raped there and another raped 300 years from my house on a cycle track that runs through a housing estate.

It's simply not safe for anyone to be walking alone in a woods and if you think it is then your a fool.

For heaven's sake, your post contradicts itself -- there was a rape in these 'well known' woods and one in a housing estate. Are you suggesting no one should go anywhere near housing estates? Or is this a 'well known' housing estate, known for its sexual assaults?

The more people post, the more I despair of a lack of critical thinking and intelligent assessment of risk.

The woods I most often walk in are a good mile and a half from the nearest road, and that would be a single-lane farm track, and further from the nearest hamlet. I walk there about three miles from my village, which is the nearest settlement of any size. There is no mobile coverage. Yes, if I were to meet an armed lunatic or a rapist, that would be unfortunate, but the fact is that he would have to have considerable local knowledge/ordnance survey maps to know that this wood even exists, would have to walk there, as there's no vehicle access or even bridle path anywhere near, and would have to coincide with my irregular visits, which can be literally at any time of day or night.

Because yes, I do walk out on fieldpaths at 2 am sometimes, in the full moon, if I can't sleep. I have never encountered another single person in these woods or their vicinity -- the dogwalkers tend to stay closer to the village - other than once a rather lost Duke of Edinburgh hiking group. Crime is close to zero in the area. It is an incredibly gossippy village, and I have never heard a mention of any safety concerns. The closest to harm I have ever come in my seven years of daily walking here is a bunch of larky bullocks getting overexcited in a field I was passing through.

This represents an acceptable risk for me.

I wouldn't, for the same reason I NEVER run in secluded locations, and I'm nearly 40.

I would walk with her as an afternoon break after work, rather than her walk on her own in the morning. I found somewhere on my run yesterday which was beautiful, but it's in open fields so I'd be happy for her to do this. Just not in tree lined woods.

We should be able to walk alone in beautiful places, but the reality is the risk is there.

I NEVER run in secluded locations

Neither do I, but that's because the chance of spraining your ankle in a rabbit hole in an area with no mobile coverage (and which is nowhere near a road so no one can come and get you anyway) is fairly high. Nothing to do with imaginary sex attackers hiding behind trees.

I spent the entirety of the winter before last having to walk DDog after dark on weekdays on Hampstead Heath - alone. For those who don't know, it's a mixture of open grassland and woods that has a bit of a reputation for unsavoury activities.

DDog is small and rarely considered a threat to anything other than squirrels. I'm a petite female in my 20s.

Literally nothing happened. I'm not saying I'd recommend it, and it wasn't through choice, but the risks were frankly far higher than the situation the OP describes and I'm still here to tell the tale.

The ability of humans to rationally assess risk is notoriously poor - we tend to overestimate it substantially, particularly in situations we consider abnormal.

And for all those saying I walked home alone at 2am drunk ect ect..you was one of the lucky ones. did you not see that video of the drunk girl being followed and raped in a alleyway and beaten to a pulp?

I've done stupid ridiculous things as a young girl and I cringe every time I think about it. But when you grow up and realise the dangers it's your job to put a bit of fear into your kids so the aren't naive to the dangers that are out there.

Personally I would be more concerned about her twisting an ankle or breaking a leg than being attacked. As long as there is good phone reception I don't see a problem.

Ghanagirl, the statsitical average is that women are far more at risk from a partners

Entirely depends on the crime. Women are more likely to be murdered by someone known to them.

They are more likely to raped by someone known to them, but it may not be a partner.

The Met’s Sex Offences Index indicates intimate rape reports (ie within relationships) are less common than acquaintance and stranger rape. (And as an aside - generally occurs within the context of domestic abuse).

For crimes such as sexual assault, harassment, flashing - they’re much less likely to be a partner. And they’re more common.

So a thousand rapes, murders or assaults could happen in a built up area, with hundreds of people within a close radius, but if a dozen occur within the same timeframe in a secluded place, it's the latter that's the more dangerous place to be..?

That doesn't remotely make sense. And OP's DD waiting til her mum comes home to go out for walks together defeats the object of her purpose, ie, she wants the mindfulness and benefits of her activity to help her with her periods of revision. So she can't go when she feels like it, when it would be most beneficial, but she must wait til she has a chaperone?