Dropping and collecting 18 year old to part time work..a mile away.

[aldischristmas]

My 18 year old is still at school.We are in the ROI.She works most weekends for a few hours on Saturday and Sunday.Those hours can be morning or evening but she expects a lift to and from work and is quite nasty when i complain at having to stay up to collect her at unsociable hours.I felt completely justified in saying no when I am not free as I have other kids and am a single parent.She earns plenty so could easily afford a taxi and she also has her Dad closeby, who is pretty useless but she won't even ask him. I was talking to one of my closest friends who then told me that she was changing her entire wekend plans because her own 18 year old daughter needed to be dropped and collected to/from work. AIBU to think this is absolutley ridiculous that our lives are now revolving around our 18 year olds needing lifts to and from work.I am beginning to think that we are our own worst enemies.

Many decades ago a friend of mine got a weekend job washing up in a pub about a mile and a half from her home along a country lane. She used to ride her horse there and back, leaving him in a paddock next to the pub while she worked. Not a solution for everyone though 🙂

Tell her to buy herself a bike.

When I was 15 I used to bike to school, seven miles each way

I'd be much more concerned about drink drivers or exhausted lorry drivers nodding off at rhe wheel at that time of night, rather than a rogue rapist chasing her down 🙄

I voted YABU...And without sounding too harsh , YABU for putting up with your DD demands - tell her ' No'!
she can walk, cycle, learn to drive or get a taxi!!

What time does she finish work? What's the walk like (eg country footpaths or lit streets)?

Is she learning to drive?

A mile is nothing, I used to regularly walk a mile to and from the railway station when I worked. It was good for me. However the walk was along two well lit, busy roads.

The exception would be if it was a lonely walk, ie with nobody else around, that could be spooky or even dangerous.

Someone else suggested her getting a bike and that seems like a good idea.

If she is earning well, she can book a taxi.

Take her and pick her up only if convenient to you.

Depends, if it's a dodgy area and late at night, then I would probably prefer to give my DC a lift. When I was 18 I worked till 11pm in a restaurant and the short walk home had very little street light and wasn't the safest area.. But I had a car, so I just drove myself. Is she not interested in getting herself a car? Is that an option?

I used to work 1mile away when I was 20. Starting at 6am. I’d cycle (it was summer so better weather than now)

The OP is a single parent with younger children. What’s she supposed to do with them? Drag them out of their beds? The 18 yr old needs to get a cab.

The OP says other kids but does that mean a 3yo and 5yo or a 14yo and 16yo? Given there is an 18yo it’s more likely to be the latter than the former but granted not guaranteed. My answer depends on time. Would I prefer to disrupt young childrens sleep to collect an 18yo girl in the dark, late at night, absolutely. Lots of safety measures put forward such as getting them to text as they leave work, in a cab are only good for knowing they don’t arrive home and there is a problem and potentially assisting police to pinpoint the culprit after the fact, but no good at actually preventing abduction/murder etc. Sone disruption to everyone’s night is a small price.

Taxi, walk or ask your dad.... Is what I'd be saying. If you want to be treated like an adult then you act like one and take responsibility for getting yourself too and from work.

Completely depends on the hours but if it was say after 9pm or later, with a young girl, I wouldn't even want her taking a taxi I would be there every time to pick her up and see her safely home especially in the dark. I wouldn't feel safe walking a mile home in the dark. She'll drive soon enough. Maybe less of the attitude though!

I think it depends on the full info. How late at night is it? Is the route home on lit pavements? How easy is it to get a taxi? Would she wake you up coming in anyway or would you even go to sleep knowing she's not home?

I'm all for giving DCs independence but even I wait up to collect adult DS from the station if he's been out drinking. I wouldn't hesitate to let him walk the mile from the station when he's sober but it's a country road with no lights, no pavement, quite a few bends and not a cat in hells chance of getting a cab. I know for a fact that people drive back to our village on that route from the local pub - and some are definitely over the limit. Sadly in our county there's been 2 cases of hit and runs on country roads late at night at weekends - it's an inconvenience I'm prepared to put up with whilst DS is living at home.

I sooooo agree @HoppingPavlova
I don't allow my DD to travel solo to her job as a solicitor. She's only 41, anything might happen. So I wake her 5 year old DD & go & get her when she works late in her office. What's a little sleep disruption, compared with instilling young women with the perfectly viable notion that the world is not made for them, & they must live in constant fear?
It's the only sensible outlook.

I think parenting has seriously gone down the drain.

When I read posts like this I wonder where your backbone is. She is nasty to you so you are forced to give her rides, really? That just tells me you have spoilt her and always given in to her with no boundaries or rules.

I can understand you feeling the need to pick her up at the end of her shift at 11.00 because pup kicking out time can be lairy, but surely she is capable of getting herself to work four hours earlier. Does she never go out to meet up with her friends at that time?

All depends on what sort or roads and area op lives in. She hasn’t replied to that. Obviously if it’s on the M1 it would be a different thing unless there were proper cycle paths..

I agree with this. I personally wouldn't feel comfortable letting her walk home late at night and even a taxi can be dodgy.
But I wouldn't be driving her there!

One mile? That's what, 20 minutes? No way.

Absolutely this.

Nastiness would mean a COMPLETE end to all lifts.

How dare she.

I wouldn't tolerate it for a second.

I refuse completely to have my life turned into a lare night taxi for a minimum wage job.

No way.

On the advice of friends I was warned of this.

Any job requires them to get there and back.

In bad weather we have given lifts but generally they cycle to work.

This is the norm with their friends.

Several that took jobs that demanded late night collections weren't long ditching them.

These are all lovely parents.

I'm only mid 30s, but what has happened to independence these days?! I was commuting 90 mins to and from Central London from the age of 17 - including at night (got home around 10pm). Two tubes, a bus and a walk each way. It never occurred to me that I should be demanding lifts

Walk or taxi. Lift only if and when convenient for you.

YANBU for not wanting to drive your daughter to work. But YABU for judging your friend's choice. If your friend is less busy than you, or doesn't have young kids, or has a partner who can watch the kids while she drives her 18yo around, why shouldn't she?

I used to drive my young adult around quite a lot, because it wasn't a big inconvenience. But they knew I would say no if I didn't want to do it, they always asked very nicely, and accepted it if I said no.

This is reminding me of the Irish school teacher who used to tell us how we were too soft and he was running barefoot across several miles of bog to get to school from the age of 5, and got caned if he was late...

But she can expect away. Unless it's late at night she can travel under her own steam.

I would not be doing that. They can walk. I have a neighbour that takes there I'm assuming around the same age son to work. His work is a 5 minute walk away.

Didn't you post about this exact same scenario just a few weeks ago?

What's changed?