step son hiding in his room

[Kevintheelf80]

My dss (17) is spending much of the day (when he is not at college) just sleeping. He resigned from his part time job about 3 months ago and now spend most of his time in his bedroom. He goes to college, comes home and stays in his room until tea then goes back to his room and goes to sleep, sometimes as early as half past 7. We don't see him at any other time as he is permanently in his room. We have tried to talk to him to see if there's anything wrong etc and he says he is fine and makes excuses for his tiredness etc. AIBU to think he may be depressed or have something else wrong to make him so tired and uninvolved? Does anyone else have a teenager who is the same? Should we be expecting more from him in terms of involvement in family life or should we just leave him be?

Pretty normal for teens to spend the time they are at home, in their rooms.
Pretty normal for them to have different body clocks from their parents.
When you say he sometimes goes to sleep at 7.30 - do you mean he is then asleep through the night, or is it possible he is awake then later, and on-line with his mates at that point ?

If he's falling asleep around 7pm which is quite early for a late teen then take him to see a GP. It's best to rule out a medical reason or get it treated ASAP. The two medical conditions that springs to mind are diabetes & low iron levels. Get some blood tests done & good luck with trying to persuade him!

Wanting to be in his room most of the time is normal and I'd leave him to that but sleeping so much would worry me. Does he have friends or hobbies? Other than quitting his job has anything else changed about his behaviour recently? Did he always sleep alot?