To expect parents to collect their child from my house

[Kanoe2]

DD friends use our house as a hang out in the evening after school. They are early teens. They don't have dinner with us but do have snacks and will leave between 6-8pm.

One of the friends has an expectation I will give her lift home every night. Her parents have never picked her up. She will only walk home if my DD escorts her. With the evenings drawing in I don't want my DD walking in the dark alone once she has dropped her home.

I have told this child that she needs to arrange getting home with her parents if she wants to come over. I am told by the child parents will collect her. Then on the evening, it will be an excuse why they can't collect her and I have to drive her home.

I have told DD if this child can not get home then she will no longer be able to come over everyday. This has caused tension between the girls.

AIBU?

So he is SEN but won’t take responsibility for how he gets home? You think your friend’s mum is not put out? Maybe she is just being polite and scared to tell you to pick him up yourself! But I know exactly what I would think of a parent who refused to come and pick up her son when he phoned pleading for her to do so and then it would be left to me to drop him off!! You refused to pick him up after a pleading phone call but think it’s ok for another parent to make sure he gets home!

Also you say he continuously goes round to his friend’s place so he’s not really learning any lesson then really if he still continues to carry on doing it!

On the occasion I refused to pick my son up, she wasn’t put out, no. Read my subsequent posts.

He was asked 90mins previously to make sure he had planned how he would get home (I.e. making sure he could get a bus). He chose not to.

As I said - my son learns through natural consequences. We weren’t available to pick him up. He had to walk home.

He hasn’t done it again since meaning his friends mother isn’t put out.

How on earth did the walking her home scenario start? It’s ridiculous that your child has to walk back alone so that this child is not walking alone! Stand your ground AND make sure your child under no circumstances walks her home. If her parents don’t allow her to go home alone surely she and they can understand how ridiculous it is that your child is walking alone?

I don’t think you are being unreasonable. I think the other child’s parents should pick her up and your child certainly shouldn’t have to walk her home.
However I can’t help but think that at least the girls are safe at your house after school. And if this other girls parents are that difficult, what if they end up not coming to your safe house, hanging out in the park instead, or your daughter is marginalised. Teenager girls can be horrible. Just a thought.

I've had similar and have asked the girl to leave at 7pm when she has no excuse but to walk home alone. Repeat until the message gets through both to the girl and your DD.

Are you even on the correct thread? Please read the thread properly before commenting further!

Wtf are you on about??? Have you actually quoted the right person before calling me a bitch?????? Cos I haven’t got a clue what you are on about sorry!!!

@littlebopeepp234 she’s talking to someone else and @‘d you by mistake methinks

Yanbu

I’ve had a gutful of this in my time.

So many parents seriously take the piss. They basically don’t care if or how their children get home safe and sound.

You can guarantee they work on the basis that the person’s house they are at will cave-in and take them home.

My DS had a party on Saturday night and 3 lads (age 15) all from the same village couldn’t get a parent to collect them.

I know this because I was with one of the poor lads who was desperate to get home.

I stuck to my guns that they couldn’t stay here and I couldn’t take them home (45 min round trip), and I meant it. They would have had to walk/stay outside.

Haypresto - a lift was organised !

But the haggling (between this poor lad and shit mum went on for 2+ hours - because I refused point blank to get involved).

Stick to your guns and stop these her parents taking the piss out of you!!

@Chenford
The moment to introduce natural consequences into your DS's life is the one when you become aware that he has arrived at his friend's house and has no idea how he'll get home.

That is the moment when you get into your car and haul him home.

This will impress upon him the idea that he can't have his cake and eat it too, which he is currently doing because the friend's mother is a responsible adult.

FFS. THE FRIEND’S MOTHER DID NOT BRING HIM HOME

It’s not a natural consequence if he goes to his friends house and gets a chauffeur service home again whenever he chooses to call home.

I agree with so much of this. This situation sets off so many red flags.
May be projecting my own childhood here, but. Have the friend’s family got a car on the road? Are they skint? Is there food in their house?
The rude reaction from the friend feels like shame.
Not at all suggesting that this is OP’s issue to fix, but if possible, assert those boundaries, but gently. In my experience, people taking advantage/ overstepping are more often in a mess than mindfully being cheeky.
x

Your child has developmental trauma and SEN and you feel this was an appropriate way to address his needs?

This seriously beggars belief.

I’m starting to feel pretty attacked on this thread (and honestly didn’t mean to derail), but - if you genuinely want to learn rather than just attack - I will spend a few minutes explaining why I took this approach?

You already have. That he has to suffer consequences to learn. I still believe there must be other ways to help this process. It must have been frightening for him, and the other parent was in a difficult position too. That’s just my view. It does come across as heartless and tbf you called yourself a ‘total b*’

Couldn't they have walked home if you live in a village?

He really wasn’t frightened. He had to walk home rather than be given a lift.
He hasn’t done it again since.
I don’t think he has to ‘suffer’ consequences - I do know - from years’ worth of experience - he has to experience them to learn.
The other parent wasn’t in a difficult position on this particular occasion - he didn’t ask her to give him a lift home and she didn’t give him a lift home.
I said I looked like a total bitch - not that I was one. Opinions may vary.
I’m trying to teach my son to be self sufficient. I really want him to spend time with his friends. But DH and I, for various reasons (including DD with special needs too), can’t be on hand to pick him up at he drop of a hat when we’re given no notice.
I just need him to think about how to get home before going to his friends.
One option would be to simply check in with us before he goes to see if we can pick him up.
I honestly don’t think that’s unreasonable at 16 years old - even with the SEN that he has and that we’ve all been living with for years

I’m going to bow out of this thread now.

@pinkyredrose
No the 3 lads all live in the same village, which is a 45 minute round trip from my village.

You need to try and make contact with the parents. It sounds as if the child has just said "X's mum drops me home" and the parents haven't questioned it. Maybe if you told them you feelings they would come to an arrangement you drop her home some days and they pick her up some?" Although honestly, I would also want to see if I could fathom what home life was like. To just let a 12/13 year old go to a stranger's house every night and even let them ride in the stranger's car without questioning who the person was were or whether they wanted her in their home does not sound right. Sounds like they don't much care where their daughter is, which suggest either uncaring, cruel parents, or loving parent(s) who are ill, mentally unstable, not coping?!

Why should she drop her some nights and the girls own parents only have to do some nights-where’s the reciprocal arrangement there given the other parents will not host ever?

I can’t believe how accommodating you are even putting up with kids hanging out in your house every day. Don’t they have homes to go to?? Or homework to do .

You will quite simply tell her she will not be accompanied or dropped off and ask to have her parents number/ or for her to call them and have them tell you she will be picked up .

Maybe her parents are not the kind who can or care ? maybe worth finding out what kind of people they are anyway and who your child hands out with .

I would never let my child hang daily at someone’s house. looks like you are being taken for a ride!

you are being totally reasonable and stick to your guns

I totally agree with the view of themm N poster who said they’d love for their house to be the hub house It’s an absolute blessing and it’s not forever, things change really quickly at this age including friendships. I’ve been the hub house and then not the hub house and I definitely wish I could go back to being the hub house. So be careful what you wish for OP xx

@Kanoe2 - did the girl arrive back at your house yesterday after school and how did it go?

I have a teen and our place is occasionally the hub house as we're near sports field, gym etc. I would absolutely welcome being the hub house more regularly, BUT WITHIN LIMITS:

1. That the other kids leave at an agreed hour before we have dinner - 7pm would be reasonable for 12-yea-olds on a school night
2. That I'm not left with the responsibility of getting them home safely. They either need to make their own way home on foot/by bus, or arrange for a parent to collect. Unless I just happen to be driving out in the direction of their home. But a lift cannot be assumed.

I also know all the parents and would pick up the phone to them if I have convcerns about how Johnny's getting home.

That's how it currently works here.