To ask, at what age your children stopped having a babysitter?

[sawseesaw]

I'm out late (past midnight) tonight. DD is outraged and says she'd rather be alone and she's too old to have a babysitter.
I'll say how old she is in a bit. Want to see your responses first.

It depends for how long, what time of day and how far away I am.

My DC would come home from school alone at 10 sometimes for a couple of hours.

For sibling groups it also gets complicated!

A14yo is old enough to babysit younger siblings.

If it was late at night and a car drive away I'd say 13. Overnight probably 14. But it depends on the child and how they feel.

By that age we've sent them for a sleepover rather than getting a babysitter.

It's not leaving a15yo alone at 9pm that's the issue, it's

a) leaving a 15yo in charge of their 13yo DSis that is very resentful that her big sister is in charge 'because we're practically the same age' 🙄and
b) leaving a 15yo in charge of a 10yo who has a well controlled but chronic and potentially life threatening health condition (not fair to expect her to deal with that) and
C) thinking about a worst case scenario where the house goes on fire or something. In that case I wouldn't want the 15yo to feel guilty if something happened to her siblings (particularly her primary aged DB) and I'd also not want to be investigated for neglect which would happen in that situation.

So it's more about the combination of ages, the age of the youngest, the additional complication because of his health. So yes, I'd rather wait till my eldest was old enough to live independently and my youngest was secondary school age before I asked her to babysit her siblings.

14 too. My DD has babysat for other children since she was 13 so it made sense she was okay to look after herself.

11

12-13

Mine were probably about 14 when I left them alone in the evening.
I was 12 when my parents left me for the first time in the evening, my older brother was around as well but not looking after me.
The police turned up to arrest him! No mobiles phones back then. It was a very long time before they left me alone again.

I'd say you're on dodgy ground leaving an 11 year old OP, what if something had happened?
I view this slightly differently as we had a house fire, caused by faulty electrical wiring (ie not teenagers making toast!)
We had already gone to bed and the only reason my children got out is because we woke them, both slept through the fire alarms (apparently common with children).
It isn't always just about how sensible the child is, does she know the best exits in case of fire? Would she be able to find the keys if the house was full of smoke?
Would panic take over and cause her to make rash decisions.
It's not nice to think about but at the end of the day I am so glad we were home on the night the unthinkable happened to us.
I would definitely not be leaving her alone for another few years at least.

12 I think.
But DS is pretty sensible and we were never far away ( 10 min taxi drive at most) and he knows all the neighbours.

13 and 10, usually until 11. She babysits for neighbours too. I can’t see me ever leaving them overnight as I’ve seen houses after teenage parties….

They don’t go to bed though, they stay up watching rubbish so no danger of sleeping through a fire.

@Thelondonone until the day they are tired and doze off🤷‍♀️
It doesn't matter to me who leaves their children or at what age (although I do still think 11 is too young and wouldn't have left mine at that age for a night out)
My point is, it doesn't necessarily matter how sensible the child is, sometimes things happen that are out of anyone's control and it is worth thinking about how the child would deal with the situation (for example, even if she was awake and a fire started, could she find the keys and get herself out of the property?)
I had the misfortune of going through it, maybe I am over zealous about it now but I would at least hope people think about things like this before leaving their kids alone.

I think last year was the last time an official babysitter came, so age 14. But if it's for several hours or is late at night I'll ask my brother who lives nearby to call in or at least be available to pop round if they have an issue. They know they can call him, or a mum friend who also lives nearby. Overnight definitely not though.