If you've had a teen and it wasn't plain sailing, please come this way. How would you punish this?

[TeenagePITA]

Just say you had a 14 year old who's generally a lovely, funny, intelligent kid. Doing well at school, apart from the occasional minor offence that warrants the odd 10 minutes at break time.

Has keen healthy hobbies.

But you get a call at 4am, he's down the police station with his best friend. Caught in a supermarket carpark being a dick with trollies. Clearly both had snuck out.

Police hand phone straight to parent -I.e he didn't get the chance to delete anything, phone is regularly checked by parent.

Due to not having the chance to delete anything, it transpires he's been smoking weed. Drinking the odd beer AND climbed on top of a school roof during an escapade.

AND this is the the first time.

So hypothetically speaking and asking for a friend 🙄

How long would you ground for? How long would he lose his phone for? Etc etc

Best friend is known to always get very very minimal punishments.

So that skews this child's parents way of thinking, example him being grounded until he's 36 suddenly seems too extreme.

Please parents of teens who have been through similar.
I really don't want judgement from parents of 2 year olds who have no idea.
I had no idea when he was 2.

Just to clarify, this is the first time he's done anything like this and it all happened on the same night?

How did he get out at 4am?

I've got a 22 year old. He recently told me what he really got up to after school when I thought he was walking home to do his homework and have a snack. Climbing on roofs features.

I am still

It's a good question - what would I have done if I'd found out at the time? I guess a combination of grounding and taking his phone away for a while. And I'd have cried. He hates it when I cry.

AND this is the the first time.

Is this a typo, @TeenagePITA, and you mean NOT the first time?

Sneaking out at night isn’t safe, so that isn’t so much a punishable offence, IMO, as something to be discussed and a bottom line rule in place that you just DONT sneak out. It’s a no. Because unsafe. People don’t sneak out on each other!
The weed and beer stuff seems age appropriate, I would say just be sensible, dude, walk the line of moderation.

No phone, no internet, and I would be tempted to make contact with the parents of the best friend to see what their views are. If they are reasonable normal people they too will be concerned and I found it was always best to get the adults involved. They might be in complete ignorance about their son's behaviour or they might be at their wit's end.

Either way, teenagers are lying little shits so if the parents are all in-the-know then the teenagers might think twice about pulling a stunt like that again.

I have 3 teens 18, 15 and 13.

I think there are 2 things I would do

1. consequences
2. discussion about behaviour.

The second one is more important. Teens do push limits, they do want to try alcohol and they will end up trying smoking weed at some point. But the goal is to push all of those things as late as possible, (16+) and to give them the skills to make wise choices while they experiment.

So a really good, non angry conversation.
A good deal of sympathy helps too, ie, I know how tough lockdown has been, I may be an old foggie but I get how much teens want to be with friends etc. Then throw it back to him - why do you think I am so cross about this?
Make him outline what he has done and why it is stupid.
Don't accept any brush off. Ask him to think through why you are unhappy (note - not why it was wrong - he may not think it is wrong, but why YOU are unhappy)

This is a great way to make them think through their actions.

You may need a couple of conversations. If it gets heated, let it go, come back in a couple of hours.
I usually start these conversation with food by the way, and not when he has just woken up, I find that over a shared bacon sandwich I will get a much more constructive conversation.

So, once he has worked out why you are cross (tip, make sure you can sum it up in 2-3 sentences, so you can be clear for yourself and him what it is you are cross about)
Then be clear, this behaviour requires a consequence. Throw it back to him - agree? Fair? behave this way you need a consequence?

Then you can tell him what the consequence is.
You need to think through what he uses his phone for, does he need it for school?
If you are in UK, then he should be in lockdown, so grounding is irrelevant at the moment.
I would remove phone (as long as he doesn't need it for school)
And get him to do some kind of 'community service' for the family, ie, chores round the house etc.
If he has an x-box, remove it.
So zero screens for a week (I rarely do longer than that, a week is an enternity in a teens life) apart form school.
Promise that no sneaking out, at all under any circumstances.

Hope that helps.

bloody hard isn't it?

@Taoneusa

Sneaking out at night isn’t safe, so that isn’t so much a punishable offence, IMO, as something to be discussed and a bottom line rule in place that you just DONT sneak out. It’s a no. Because unsafe. People don’t sneak out on each other! The weed and beer stuff seems age appropriate, I would say just be sensible, dude, walk the line of moderation.

Weed and beer at 14 seems age appropriate?! I am so out of touch, because not in my book it's not. Granted I've only a 5 year old so won't comment on the original post in terms of how to deal with the punishment but this statement just seems wrong to me.

Full disclosure, I am not quite the parent of a teen. I don’t think it is the end of the world. I’d pull some studies on drug use to show that cannabis is a gateway drug and the long term impacts on memory. I’d ignore the beer and maybe consider letting him have a couple of supervised shandies on a weekend when I had a glass of wine. I’d take the phone for a couple of weeks but allow supervised access (assuming you are in lockdown as this is the only way for keeping up with friendship groups). In short I’d probably not push too hard - it’s not his first time but it is his first time getting caught. I’d be clear zero tolerance for a second offence.
I have a sibling a bit like this (not the police part), they grew out of it, it’s letting off steam. He sounds a good kid overall, have some faith in him.

I am a Head of Year in a secondary school (but not the parent of a teen) so what I will say is that experimenting with alcohol/drugs certainly isn’t uncommon. Even with the most diligent of students. If he is normally a model child then maybe a conversation about peer pressure and healthy friendships needs to happen as well as a conversation about the impact of drugs/alcohol on young brains (I wonder if the alcohol/weed is linked to the roof escapade?)

I’ll leave advise on punishment to more knowledgeable people but I personally wouldn’t come down like a ton of bricks if this is a first ‘offence’.

Depends on how you normally parent

Are you a strict parent who uses punishments?

Personally, that’s not how I parent my teens, but action is certainly required here. Can you talk to him? Can you talk with him in an honest way?

Does he mind if you’re upset with him?

The police lifted him for carrying on with trolleys? I assume you live in a low crime area 🙄
He sounds very typical of his age, a few harsh words about sneaking out and grounded for the week.
MN will have him a crack addict my easter though.

Relevant and appropriate - cut his funds so he can't buy weed and beer (time limited?) Removal of devices for a week as punishment for being out at 4am with a mate. Discussion about what the worst case scenarios are for kids out at 4am/owing money to dealers etc.

No phone, no games console, laptop for school work only for a few days, extra chores ideally hard graft kind eg digging over garden is a good one - exercise, tired muscles but also should get a sense of satisfaction when done eg let him help design a bit of the garden. Help elderly neighbours perhaps is another option. But I would not recommend going over the top because it's hard for them and they are simply doing what teens do, push boundaries and break rules. Talk on dangers of smoking and drugs, reminded that alcohol is illegal to buy under 18 (plus whatever your family policy is, mine was only allowed one drink with special meals eg glass of wine). Strongly advise pointing him and friend towards something beneficial to society or a goal eg going running to reach a target possibly?

I was mainly going to say what @steppemum said.

Also teenagers aren't very good about thinking through the consequences of their behaviour. (a friend's son set off the fire extinguisher at school, he couldn't see beyond it being a harmless prank - but firebrigade charged so the school would have to pay - but what really hammered the stupidity home to him was being told that while fire engines were at school for no fire, they couldn't attend other fires eg his family home, grandparents care home etc.

People dismiss weed as harmless but overuse in adolescence can lead to longer term mental health issues. I only know this because it has destroyed my friend's son's life. Easy to google for articles for him to read on that.

Unfortunately they don't always want to hear what you say but he does need to understand the potential outcomes off his behaviour - people fall off/through roofs, especially if alcohol/drugs involved.

Good luck OP it's a minefield!

(And to the poster who asked how a 14 year old got out at 4am - really?? They aren't babies and I for one am sound asleep at that time.)

That said, we have a chime on the door when it opens which was more for when they were little - came back to haunt us when they were coming home at 4am as young adults. Might be worth considering OP.

Mine are between 25 and 19

To be fair, it sounds like he had a lot of fun. A tiny bit of perspective: he was mucking around with trollies, not breaking into houses. I would be more concerned about the friendship and how they are getting weed and beer. Can you cut off his income supply for a while?

I would ground indefinitely, without setting a time limit and let him know he can go back out when he has regained your trust. In reality, I would ground for about two weeks. This will seem like forever to a teen.

Good luck!

Ps I only discovered what my dd was doing at 15 4 years later, less crime more boy related, sneaking out is a teen speciality

I have a 14 year old old and it doesn’t seem age- appropriate to me- but I think basically being home for a large part of the last year and slowed some growing-up.

I don’t know what is do in this situation. I would be most upset about the sneaking out I think and would need to punish that. I’d talk a lot about the consequences of behaviour and where it can lead

My kids are thankfully out of their teenage years.

If it were me, I'd have a conversation about the natural consequences of their behaviour ie their safety, the fact police were involved, their friendships and peer pressure.

I'd tell them how upset and disappointed I was and I'd ask them what they think should happen......just to get an idea of their thinking.....and if they show any remorse.

You do not need to make a decision today regarding consequences. Tell them you're grounding them and removing phone privileges whilst you (and DH?) decide on consequences. That will give you some breathing room and stop a knee jerk reaction.

Good luck x

Maybe tell him that he was probably on CCTV and if a passer by put an incident like that on social media it might make a difference to his work prospects?

The sneaking out would upset me the most as it’s showing a complete lack of respect for rules/safety etc.

I’m not the strictest of parents, but for me this would be about a months worth of no screens, additional chores and no going out.

One of mine is a similar age. The odd bit of alcohol is fairly standard. I would address the weed smoking from the perspective of it being a gateway drug which can lead to harder drugs etc.

The trolley thing sounds like fooling around if no people or property were harmed.

Only the weed would worry me. I'd come down on that like a tonne of bricks and treat the other things as what they are - minor. Crowd sourcing a punishment isn't going to work because it depends on the kid's personality and what they care about, but I'd do everything in my power to get him off weed. It destroyed my best friend as a teen.

Well first I'd want to know how sorry he was and how much he had learned by asking him what the punishment should be. Then go from there.

The sneaking out is dangerous and idiotic but teens are idiotic.

I'd be getting the drug and alcohol services involved, you can get their details via the school.

Punishment would largely depend on him though. Ask him what the punishment should be. His arse would be grounded and no phone though. How long is up to him.

Don't remove his phone and internet, he's more likely to sneak out to try and see his mates. Let him have access to them but only when supervised for now.

Ask him what he thinks is a reasonable consequence?