To be shocked at parents allowing teenage rule breaking

[chocolateforeverymeal]

We have been really diligent with the covid rules. I assumed the people I respect enough to be good friends with were doing the same.

Seems not. We all have teens. Mine is desperate to have friends round, and has done so in the garden. Turns out teenagers with boyfriends, in particular, but others too, can't be expected to follow rules. Some really good friends, at least three different families, have been allowing indoors visits for teens for weeks.

Really pisses me off-as if it's easy for the mugs who follow rules but they are exceptions. And these are people who are quite sniffy about other people's standards at times.

I've let my teens have friends around (mostly in the garden) for the last 2 weekends. I figured that I'm doubly vaccinated, there's no one vulnerable in the house and all the teens are at school together/doing LFTs twice a week.

They've had a shit time. Mine are doing A levels and GCSES, my eldest has missed all of sixth form. Her 18th birthday, her exams. She's not visited her university choices. Her anxiety levels are high. So yes, I broke the rules for the last 2 weeks.

In all other respects, including who I meet, I'm following the rules. I don't really know why you're shocked.

My 20 year old gave up his whole social life in lockdown 1 (and 2 as we live in a tier 4 area) so during the latest lockdown, we have let him have his girlfriend stay over whenever he wanted - his mental health was important and they've given up enough now IMO. Sorry if that offends but I guess I'm not the only one thinking like this now.

I value my DC's mental health and my own sanity!

I think having one or two selected friends over is ok. They hang out at school anyway - not strictly policed.
Forcing them to go out for walks in the rain (cold and dark a few weeks ago) is draconian.

@chocolateforeverymeal

We have been really diligent with the covid rules. I assumed the people I respect enough to be good friends with were doing the same.

Seems not. We all have teens. Mine is desperate to have friends round, and has done so in the garden. Turns out teenagers with boyfriends, in particular, but others too, can't be expected to follow rules. Some really good friends, at least three different families, have been allowing indoors visits for teens for weeks.

Really pisses me off-as if it's easy for the mugs who follow rules but they are exceptions. And these are people who are quite sniffy about other people's standards at times.

To some extent I think it can simply be impossible to control all teens, so parents don't try. Age is a factor, there is a big difference between a 13 yo and an 18 yo. Even in between, I have a friend whose teen, 16, has just up and left several times during this whole thing.

That being said, I'm generally a little agaog at the extent to which many parents of teens seem to take the view that teens will do what they want anyway, so the parents might as well go along with it so at least it's done in a safe environment.

Mine have understood and followed the rules. Education mixing is a big risk without adding to it. They know why the rules are in place and wouldn’t break any other law so just got on with it.

It’s not like they can’t see people outdoors or in the five days a week of education.

@chocolateforeverymeal

We have been really diligent with the covid rules. I assumed the people I respect enough to be good friends with were doing the same.

Seems not. We all have teens. Mine is desperate to have friends round, and has done so in the garden. Turns out teenagers with boyfriends, in particular, but others too, can't be expected to follow rules. Some really good friends, at least three different families, have been allowing indoors visits for teens for weeks.

Really pisses me off-as if it's easy for the mugs who follow rules but they are exceptions. And these are people who are quite sniffy about other people's standards at times.

How is it an issue? These teens mix indoors at school for several hours, the government have deemed that safe otherwise schools would still be closed. So how is it any different teens mixing indoors at houses.

Houses and schools are both buildings.
I would hazard a reasonably safe bet that houses are cleaned more thoroughly than schools.

Although I agree with others generally that after a year, totally not seeing anyone but family is probably not a reasonable approach either.

I make no apologies for it. My two are autistic. The fact that Ds has been able to see his girlfriend has done more for his mental health than CAMHS ever did.

The risk to him from his mental health far outweighed that of Covid.

Well I broke the rules way back last year when a friend of mine was desperate about her youngish child's mental health and I offered to help by having said child over.

Just kept it quiet but I feel it was the right thing to do.

DD is having two friends over tonight for pizza and Netflix. These are three girls who are in school together all day, every day, and who have been horrendously stressed with the whole nonsense "exams which are not exams" going on over the last few weeks.

Tomorrow DS is going to another friend's house for a "marathon D&D session".

I don't feel guilty in the slightest and could not give one solitary fuck that the OP is shocked.

My ds is having friends over this weekend to celebrate his birthday. They share a classroom and school bus all week, so really can't see the harm.
He's been isolated so much over the past 14 months, the rules are literally a day away from changing and as nobody declined the invite - I'm clearly not in a minority!!!

My 14yo DS is an only child. He's very sociable, loves his friends and is naturally drawn to them and away from us parents as he's growing up.

Lockdown one was brutal. We lived in an area that then never really unlocked. His mental health took a battering. My easygoing, relaxed, optimistic son became hollow, withdrawn, anxious and very confused and scared as he didn't understand what was happening to him.

I could tell he was struggling, but he couldn't open up. In January he hit a metaphorical wall, and things began to crumble. Thankfully we have got help, and the reopening of school and gradual easing of restrictions has helped.

The mental health team involved are sure that a lack of social contact was at the centre of his struggles. Since receiving this information I have allowed him to have a friend over who he sits with at school every single day.

It came to the point where I couldn't see him suffer any longer- lockdown has been brutal for teenagers.

The government has stripped away enough of DS's freedoms over the last year for me to give a shit about "the rules" now, quite frankly. It's fine for him to be in school all day; it's fine for me to be teaching in a different school all day - we are exposed to hundreds of people every day and then bring their germs home with us.

Anyone who thinks that DS having his girlfriend over every now and then makes any difference at all in that scenario is living in cloud cuckoo land.

I just have no idea how some people can sustain this level of obsessive intensity for so long and still stay sane. I wear a mask where I have to and I try to social distance where I can to be polite. I also make whatever decisions I want for the wellbeing of my child.

@Dontforgetyourbrolly

You must be easily shocked ! I thought this post was going to be about drug taking and underage sex

Such a disappointment isn’t it?

Be pissed off then, be shocked. I let mine live their lives. I don't give a fuck anymore. We've been having a great time whilst some are sat at home sucking lemons. More fool them.

I've let my daughter have her friend over to play and stay over etc and my daughter has gone to her friend's house. Seems absurd that they can sit next to each other at school all day but it's a SHOCKING BREACH OF THE RULES for them to do it in a house.

I can't bring myself to care any more, the rules (and logic) have become farcical.

Were you following the rules OP because having researched the government’s reasoning and the science behind all the decisions you wholeheartedly agreed with all of them? Or were you following them because you have absolute faith in every thing that comes out of Boris’ mouth? For example, do you think that if you hug a friend tomorrow it will have a different outcome/present a different level of risk to hugging them on Monday? How about if you hugged someone at 11pm tomorrow, would you rather wait until midnight when it is government mandated because then it will be ok?

On the whole I have been able to see and understand the logic of the majority of the decisions and restrictions put in place & have been willing to follow rules for the greater social good etc.

However, I personally think, with the exception of the vaccine rollout. the governments handling of the pandemic has been a fatally shameful clusterfuck - often too little too late, and riddled with corruption and some decisions were completely batshit and made no logical sense & some caused inexcusable and unnecessary deaths.

If anything I was already doing whatever it was that the government then decided we should all do before they announced it - shook my head in disbelief and horror as Boris proudly told the nation he was ‘shaking hands with Coronavirus patients’, I took the kids out of school ten days before the first lockdown because it felt like we were in the path of an oncoming train whilst the numbers went up exponentially by the day, I thought going ahead with Cheltenham was insane and dangerous (it was), I wore a mask before they became mandatory & I took every possible precaution along the way to make sure my elderly parents were safe, to the extent of disinfecting their shopping I delivered & not hugging them for a year.

In contrast, when it comes to teenagers I can’t see how, once they were back in school (& not for the one day in January where Boris dithered just long enough to increase the spread even more after the Christmas-mixing Corona roulette disaster..I mean from when they went back properly before Easter) ...there was any difference in the risk of transmission between sitting in a classroom directly next to a friend in an unventilated room with 30 other teenagers without masks to then being with the same friend a different room outside of school on the same day in a house. That is presumably the basis on which most parents have made a risk assessment and allowed the ‘rule break’ where they allow teens to if you could clarify though OP why the two are different perhaps it would be easier to understand?

*allow teens to mix indoors with friends from school

We have followed the guidelines the majority of last year and beginning of this year. But with them spending time at school and at work we’ve relaxed a bit for the kids. Oddily only for the kids we as adults haven’t had people over etc but we’ve allowed my eldest daughter closet friends to come inside. For her 18th we had 7 people in the garden as it felt harsh to exclude one friend (especially as they at school together) I contacted both neighbours apologising for any noise - the message I received from both was dont apologise it’s lovely hearing young people having fun finally!

It’s been tough for this age group (as others affected in different ways) missing important school years, driving lessons , generally being a teenager!! My eldest mental health has taking a battering but we can all finally see the light! Hopefully new variants won’t send us back :(

TBH, I was allowing my DD to see her friends inside from about mid-February. Because we're in Scotland and there was no prospect of them getting any time in school until after Easter.

So after a particularly shit day when DD had a full scale meltdown over a bad mark in a Maths assessment I picked up the phone to her best friend's mum (a NHS doctor) and asked how she would feel about sending "Jane" over to spend some time with "Mary" as I felt she needed to spend some time with her friends. And friend's mum agreed.

@chipsandgin hit the nail on the head. I have zero trust in the government apart from the vaccination rollout. We put our own restrictions in place 3 weeks before the government announced anything as could see what a mess they were making but currently the restrictions to me don’t make sense. My children can go to school, 4 different inside groups a week with different children but can’t go to their friends house. Equally we can’t go in my parents house despite them and us being fully vaccinated and them having the children after school. I’m making up my own rules and risk assessing each situation.

Who cares. It's so boring to hear all the whining all the time. You do what up think is right for your family and let others do the same

My DD has mental health issues which have got way WAY worse during lockdown. I've let her have friends stay over during this lockdown, it has saved her.

Tbh I think a lot of people have had enough now, a lot of people letting their teens break the rules were probably very diligent last year but can’t carry on like it

For a lot of people have very few fucks left when it comes to Covid