Should I have been informed?

[HereForTeaAndCake]

DS10 was invited to a friend's house for the day but it turns out the children spent most of their time wandering the street unsupervised, calling on friends etc. I was not consulted and DS has no phone and has only recently been ready for playdates without me. I only learned of how little time he spent at said friend's house when he was picked up. AIBU to think that I should have been given the choice?

At 10 years old being allowed to play out I think is reasonable but then I live in a nice area. I have always encouraged my DC to play out, it gave them confidence and helped build a good circle of friends.

OP - your son will be starting senior school soon so you need to thinking about how you will handle this.

Standards of care? Why are you implying that parents who allow more freedom and independence are somehow lesser parents?

Also, I think you need to drop the term Play Date. He is 10 not 5.

As someone who despairs at how.little freedom and independence children get these days, and who has actively encouraged ds to be out and about, I nonetheless accept that other families are far more precious and have not been actively encouraging their children to be independent in the same way. So at age 10, I would have checked with the pare t before allowing the boys out with no limits. I might havr rolled my eyes when the other parent wanted x or y but I would have respected it.

Incidentally, that's something else I try to teach my children - everyone has different boundaries and expectations and learning to adapt to that is part of growing up. Whether that's super strict table manners at Grandpa's House, certain games that aren't allowed at aunty's House or under what conditions they can go to the park alone.

Maybe the other child has been playing out and wandering around the locality for a while so it never occurred to the mum to mention it. It's absolutely the norm in my village for older Primary school children to walk to the park and the village shop (1/4 mile away and involves crossing a road) at 10 with younger siblings in tow.

And from experience it is amazing how some children are able to do things with their friends that they are too anxious to do with parents.

Maybe you should consider getting your DS a basic phone so he can contact you if needed and gain a little more independence.

Of course if you live in an area which is renowned for drugs and stabbings then yanbu.

I'd bet my bottom dollar you would gaslight your child into believing they are fine if they show signs of anxiety.
DC's psychotherapist wouldn't agree with your statement - unless you think your better qualified to suggest that.

I think at ages 10-14 there is a lot of variability in what parents allow or are happy with, so you have to give your own child boundaries and the ability to say no.

I'd start with a phone so he can contact you.

Then be clear to other parents when dropping off or having them over. 'I'm happy for them to go to the park, but not to the shops', 'I don't mind 12 films but draw the line at 15s'. 'Do you have parental controls on your internet?' etc.

I really appreciate this point of view. It's not that I don't encourage him, or talk to him about it. It just came as a bit of a surprise.
I hadn't realised that some 10 year olds spent so much unsupervised time, further away than I had expected nowadays.
My child does do some things independently and had the tables been turned I would check in with the parent to make sure the friend is ok with whatever it is.

But then I come from a background where I consider that not all children develop at the same rate and that not all neurodiversities are obvious.

I would not have been happy with this at this age. It should be obvious that it's an age where kids are on the cusp of independence. Some are walking home from school, others are being collected etc. At that age I think parents I knew would have been checking if it was okay for the kids to do stuff like walk to the shops together unsupervised, being left at home alone for a while etc. My kids were allowed a fair bit of independence (only once they had a phone though) but I definitely would have checked with other parents what they were comfortable with.

A kids position in the family makes a difference. Being an only or eldest child potentially means they might be treated "younger" than a youngest child. Eg my 12 year is the youngest of three and definitely does stuff that his four years older sister wouldn't have done at that age.

Definitely my plan going forwards.

My DS is 10 and I took his and his friend to the park the other day, if I had decided to let them go alone I would have asked the other parent first as you shouldn’t make decisions for other parents. You should have been asked.

If mine was invited "to come over to ours" I would expect them to be out and about and not to be kept inside. Maybe the onus was on you to ask the question?

Out of curiosity to the parents who say you should have asked- did your parents call the other parents when you were younger? My mum had almost zero contact with any other parents when I was younger. I don’t recall my mum being worried about this and she was a massive worrier. I just had to be back by the set time or I’d be in trouble. (This was early-mid 90s). I remember a group of us used to ride our bikes around the local roads with one friend who always had her 2 year old brother strapped on the back of her bike. I think we just grew up faster in those days as no ability to contact home. At 12 I was training in with a close friend into Oxford street on our own to go shopping. We had to use phone boxes to call home at lunchtime to say we’re ok.

It's an age where there quite a range in parental attitudes and worries about independence.

When my DD, was young, we agreed with her that when she was eight, she could walk to school by herself. She was super sensible and capable, and the route was safe, with lots of other parents and children walking it at the same time and no major roads to cross. She was really excited. It was almost like another birthday present from her perspective.

All went well until I started getting calls from her friends parents who were really annoyed with me. Her friends had seen that she was making the journey on her own and wanted to do the same and walk with her (their journeys pretty much identical, safety-wise as they lived in the same bit of our housing estate). Their parents thought they were too young, and resented the fact that my decision for my daughter had ended up putting them under pressure.
It hadn't occurred to me that I needed their 'permission'. My DD wasn't asking her friends to do it to (she actually liked doing the walk by herself). So I'm not sure what they expected of me. I was pleasant to them but unapologetic.

Gosh when I was 10 I was out playing in my local area, knocking on my friend's houses and us all wandering around the area going to the park. This was just before mobile phones too. Is it now not a thing for a 10 year old to be capable of doing this?? Are you not projecting your own anxiety onto him?

Also you mention neurodiversity.

I would expect that if a child I'd invited over was neurodiverse and that would affect how they would respond to typical situations for the parent, or the child if older, to mention it.

My eldest at ten wasn’t ready for that kind of experience. His younger brother is ten and it’s normal for him to go to a friends then they go to the park alone or for a bike ride and meet other friends and go hang out. I’ve started giving him a phone so I can track him down if needed.

I will be in future.

When kids come over to ours they can play in the nearby streets and the garden - they are not supervised as such but know where to find a safe adult.

Anxieties don’t come from nowhere. I’m always amazed how blind parents are to how their own anxieties run off on their child. A psychotherapist will not ever say “well it’s you” to a paying parent

I struggle to get my head round it, too, @Babdoc and I grew up in an outer London borough, nowhere rural. When I was still in primary school, we played in the street, in a park, I walked on my own for 20 minutes, including crossing 2 main roads (and the park), to my friend's house.

Sometimes, with another friend, we used to get a bus to the very edge of the borough to play on common land and in woods or to a large park where we'd paddle in a stream on warm days. Some of the things we used to do were worrying, in hindsight, like playing on building sites and in derelict houses.

And kids still do play out, unsupervised, where I live. There 2 families with young kids in my road, all still in primary. They skateboard and roller skate up and down the road, and are allowed to go and play in the nearest field, which is accessed from the next road. I think all this builds resilience and independence

My niece, now 21, was never allowed these freedoms. She was driven everywhere as a child. Now, she's scared to get a train on her own and if her parents go out for the evening and her boyfriend isn't there, she rings them at least a couple of times to ask something daft. Her mum is positive that she does it because she's anxious alone.

I agree with OP . Inviting to ours would mean for me that they would stay inside the house or out in the garden. Otherwise I would expect : Would Jack like to go the park/ playground/ cinema/ for pizza with Andrew after school?
At 14 they would have this conversation themselves but at 10 I would expect the clarification from an adult.
It might be the case of Andrew asking Jack, then I wouldn’t expect adult to supervise or even to know so I would always check with them first.

So they went out to play. Knocked on some other friends to see if they were coming out. Totally normal

"When kids come over to ours they can play in the nearby streets and the garden - they are not supervised as such but know where to find a safe adult."

I wonder whether ds's friend also knew where to find safe adults. He might have stuck to areas where he knows he can find family friends if he needs them. It might not have been quite as free range as you fear.

It doesn’t seem unreasonable for 10 year olds but I would have probably let the parents know they’d be say going to the park alone, assuming I’d issued the invite rather than the kids arranging it. I would say for eg, would the boys like to come over for the day. I’ll be working at home, they can go to the park down the road for footie and I’ll provide lunch. Or similar. For my DS’s friend who I am aware has adhd, I would check with his parents if he is ok to go to X alone.

I amazed by all these memories about how we played on the streets and survived. As it was mentioned on the other thread some time ago : those of us who didn’t survive can’t contribute to the discussion.