My DP says I have no boundaries with my kids

[morekidsthanhands1]

so DP started criticising my parenting this eve. My eldest DS is 16 and just finished GCSEs and past 2 nights been at friends houses hanging out. He obvs doesn’t drive, there’s a train strike to public transport patchy, we live middle nowhere (would be 3 mile walk home from station on unlit roads with patches that have no footpath) and friends he went to last night and tonight also long walk from
nearest station. I know DS will have a couple of beers, I decide it’s first weekend post exams, but been out at all during exams except to kick a football around and PlayStation to let off steam. No parties. I offer to drive and drop and pick. Inevitably I get asked if I can give lifts to other friends, I say fine but can they get dropped at ours for me to take. Last night I pick him up and 2 friends were going to get train home but one little tipsy so I say I would be happy to drop off at home. Tonight party friend asked for lift so I agreed. Tho turns out his parents were waiting for him to call them to come collect. Anyway I don’t mind snd id rather see these kids home safely. If shoe on other foot I’d be vv grateful for anyone bringing my DS home. My DP tonight tells me I am bringing up my kids entitled and they are using me and I have no boundaries as I let DS go out 2 nights in row. I say it’s first weekend after exams so am letting him cut loose a little but dec don’t expect to be doing this all summer. Plus DS starts summer job next week so won’t be out all the time. He says I have no control. I def do have control but I also want my teens to be able to go out and enjoy themselves, when they’ve worked hard for exams. I can see his point a little but maybe I should be telling my DS to find his own way home. I picked him up tonight at 11 and last night 11:30.
my DP says I haven’t spent any time with him this weekend as been driving my own kids around.
new have 5 between us his kids teens but don’t ever got out or see friends when with us, spend whole time on their laptops in their room, even tho I’ve offered many times to have their friends over, DP doesn’t encourage it.
i am maybe going involved in kids lives? I should be tougher mum? Tell them get on with it and get yourself to and from places at night.
daytime we have bus service so they use that or walk but nighttime, I don’t know??? Maybe I should let them like my DP says I should

@Lola4321 you haven't explained anything, you just repeat the same thing over and over, based on your idea that 16 year olds are children.

They are not.

16 year olds can leave their parents' homes and live independently.
They can work and pay taxes.
They can join the military (though not in combat situations).
They can have sex.
They have a great deal of say into their medical treatment.

They are not children, they are adolescents on the cusp of adulthood. Treating them as if they are 'just' children is ineffective and counterproductive.

OP is managing that using real world parenting tactics. You are living in your own world where reality does not exist.

And lastly, prohibition has been shown not to work when addressing substance use. Harm reduction has been shown to be very effective.

Welcome to 21st century parenting.

So you prefer to talk about your childhood

rather than how you raise your own children and your own experience of parenting?

yep, sure.

@Lola4321 imagine you live next door to OP. Imagine you report her to Social Services because she allows her 16 year old DS the occasional beer. Imagine what the response would be.

@Lola4321

When we were kids, we were told we had legs, we didn't get ferried everywhere. We walked to school. It never entered our parents heads to drive us unless it was pouring/storming. These days kids are getting driven to school at age 14.

I'm n ot desperate to defend anything, I accept the limitations imposed by the world I live in and how they impact parents today. You appear unable to do this.

For the umpteenth time: Ideally, young people should not drink. Frankly, nor should anyone - if alcohol were discovered today, it would be a class A drug. I know this.

But the reality is that alcohol is legal and that young people drink, and operating from a purely pragmatic point of view, this has to be managed with the least harm. This is what OP is doing. Meanwhile you scream from inside your ivory tower and completely fail to address the issue, which is that OP's partner is behaving like a sulky twat because she ensures her DS' safety by providing lifts late at night, and you suggest late night biking along unsafe roads instead. Good job.

Why mention when you were a kid

unless this is literally the first and last experience that you have of children / teens… when you were one!

@Lola4321 so how would you manage this if you had a teenager?

He's talking nonsense. I drop all of my lot off and collect their friends and drop
Them home too.

I've even collected and dropped of my kids friends at things mine haven't even being going to as their parents either couldn't do it or refused which is completely ridiculous.

Keep doing what you're doing!

Huh? Yes I have 3 kids and a DP

How do you think she is encouraging it?

She picks them up from parties. She acknowledges that sometimes they may be a little bit tipsy after those parties. She enjoys the conversations that they have on the way home from parties. No big deal.

She isn't egging them on and encouraging them to drink. She isn't giving them alcohol. She isn't allowing them to get away with bad behaviour after drinking. They're just having a bit of a light hearted gossipy conversation on the way home.

If you have teenage dc of your own @Lola4321, I think you really need to lighten up.

@Lola4321 are you still of the opinion that OP's partner has a point about OP 'spoiling' her DS by providing lifts (for valid road safety reasons) and that (more importantly) he should have any say in how she parents children who are not his?

Sorry to wade into this derailment of your thread, OP, but having been in AA for over 15 years and knowing quite literally hundreds of active and recovering alcoholics over the years, I can honestly say that your approach is NOT going to lead your son down the slippery path of excess. Ok, I get where @Lola4321 is coming from but seriously, a controlled approach to the introduction of alcohol is far more likely to mean sensible, moderate behaviour around it into adulthood. There are no guarantees, of course there never are, but my parents were the sort who wouldn't have dreamt of acknowledging that any child of theirs might partake in anything stronger than cocoa.

Apparently she does have a teen

but prefer to talk about how she was raised by her parents rather than how she parents, which speaks volumes to me (although I would put money on no children)

Discussed this before - it’s not great to normalise and facilitate under age drinking - the “trying it at home in a controlled environment” has been proved to have led to more heavy drinking as adults than the those that weren’t encouraged or allowed to drink by their parents. Obviously Victorian parent absolute ban doesn’t work either.

We don’t allow or encourage drink at home for our 15 year old and remind Dd it’s illegal. If she drinks surreptitiously with friends that’s up to her and we won’t strongly police that but we won’t be giggling away offerIng her beers at home either. Some kids won’t want to drink and should be encouraged and supported by their parents in that.

I think you're over-reacting enormously.

He isn't falling-down drunk and he isn't doing it on weekly basis.

There's lots of things I'd rather teens didn't do, but the occasional drink isn't one of them.

I'm not so sure on the 'D' part of that tbh.

He needs to wind his neck in.

How does he normally get on with your children?

Dp = entitled. Ds not.

I did just what you are doing Op, with my kids as teens (also live fairly rurally). I was a taxi for about 6 years straight. I would ferry them to and from friends, parties, and as they got near 18, occasionally have to go and fetch the odd really drunk offspring (usually dd2) and or/ friends
Now they are all adults, none drink to excess, and we have a really good adult realationship with our kids.
Now dd2 has a lovely baby son, and if in 16 years he needs ferrying around when Mum is on nursing shifts, yep I'll be doing it for him too!

Your Dp however... :/

OP you are doing the right thing. My Dad always picked us up could be 2 or 3 in the morning (we were 5miles from town no taxi /bus) while we still in school & lived at home. We'll do same for ours. At that age i'd not sleep til they home anyway. Re drink we won't be encouraging it but am not stupid plenty of kids will be trying it here & there & I'd rather know than them sneaking around.

He’s not always like this. I suspect there is a deeper reason like other posters said about our time together. Yes he does have some issues. Def need to address those. Obvs I haven’t gone into every detail of his character prob painted a negative picture based on this event. Think that’s why I am so shocked because it felt unnecessary and also excessive on his part

You’re not going to prioritise your children and provide a home that is free of someone who sees them as an annoying nuisance, are you?

It reads as if you do a lot of running around for this man and his children, yet your children are an annoyance to him.

He allows his children to disrespect you by leaving your house in a mess.

He has issues, but so do you if you think this behaviour, his childrens behaviour, and his attitude to your children is acceptable.

This is not a man to have using you and your home, whilst thinking as he does about your children.

I think you should take some space and be honest about all you are doing for him and his children, that he would feel so entitled to critise your normal care for your childs safety.

This is not a man you want moving in IMO.

Your loyalty to your children should cause you to be furious at his interference in your parenting whilst he allows his children to walk out of YOUR home leaving a mess behind them.

He doesn't respect you or your home and has conveyed that to his children.

He thinks you are a skivvy.

This is not a good man.

Be very wary.