Husband left kids alone at home

[OhDamnYourEyes]

I just came back home after a night out with friends, which was arranged a week ago. Husband was going to be home with the kids (8 & 11), put them to bed etc.

Yesterday he asked what time I was likely to be back, as a friend had asked him to go out for a drink. I said that I wasn’t sure, but not until fairly late. As a joke I said ‘you won’t just go out and leave them, will you’ and he laughted and said ‘of course not’.

Fast forward to tonight, I come home at 23:45, kids asleep, he’s not here. When I call him, he’s at his friends house (ca. 15 mins away) for a drink.

We had recently discussed starting to leave them home alone for short periods every now and then, and once went out together to a birthday nearby from 8-10.30pm (we couldn’t get a babysitter and gave them a phone to call us if they needed to). I did however say that I feel they are actually a bit to young for this, and that while I think it’s ok to go to the shops for an hour in the daytime and leave them, I don’t feel comfortable doing so at night.

I had a massive go at him over the phone, told him that he’s irresponsible and that I don’t want to see him. What would you do?

Yes! She arranged it a week prior, Dh should have stayed home. Why are pp having a go at the op?

It's not just leaving them alone but why they are being left.

How so? People are talking about what could happen when you're out and how children can cope. This does not change depending on why you are out, whether it's day drinking or bible study.

You clearly don’t feel comfortable leaving them alone so make sure you don’t bow to any pressure from your partner to do it again. We all make errors of judgement as parents, and what seems ok to some will seem negligent to others. Some kids will be more confident at being left them others- needs to be considered. Learn from this, have a serious talk with your partner about the potential (albeit grossly exaggerated in some people’s minds!) risks of them being alone and move on.

https://www.gov.uk/law-on-leaving-your-child-home-alone

Although there is surprisingly no legal age limit for leaving children alone, nspcc says under 12s are rarely mature enough.

Don't do it again

There is no way on gods earth I would leave my kids for that long, they are much too young. Your DH is extremely irresponsible and I’d worry about trusting them after this. But you were just as bad. What was your/ his plan if one of them woke up, was ill, someone knocked at the door, or god forbid a fire broke out. A lot can happen in 20 mins- is it really worth it to go out on the piss? Just book a babysitter or don’t bloody well go FFS.

They're too young to be left at all. It was dangerous the first time you did it but at least you've thought on it and decided not to do it again. His behaviour is absolutely reprehensible.

I agree with PPs that this was normal in the past but really, anything CAN happen. I was the most sensible, steady kid but even I had my off moments and got myself into bother. When I was about 10, I was left home for a couple of hours looking after my younger sister and a friend and her little sister and we were playing ready steady cook. Parents probably thought we'd just mix ingredients into foul concoctions but we had grander plans. I'd just learnt how to make sauté potatoes so thought I'd do that and started a chip pan fire. I don't know what possessed me but my point is, even steady kids can do stupid things.

Luckily I'd been taught how to put a chip pan fire out when the fire brigade did some kind of visit to school or guides or something. I managed to put the fire out and get the younger children and pets outside, but it could have been terrible. My dad came home to find our elderly labrador sitting outside looking depressed with a bunch of kids and a strong smell of smoke on the air. The wall around the hob was all blackened.

So although fires etc are a relatively small risk, they can happen!

They're far too young. But also your husband lied to you. I would be livid.

Ff

say Whatever you want to say
both times it was the party and/or drinking!
they both agreed it is ok to leave them alone for sometimes- so why wouldn’t he leave them sleeping because it is Ok to leave them as they’ve agreed! They agreed that oh they are too young to be left alone for longer period of times but ok to left for shorter period of times and was it nights or day- no ground rules!
5 minutes- by what? On foot or by car? It is not ok to leave a phone with 11 yo to be in charge of 8yo when you couldn’t get a babysitter but going to a party was much more than important to you- you stay at home even if the birthday party is your sister or mother to take the damn children you decided to have with you!

Sorry what were they doing both times?
working? Tending to an emergency?! Ffs!

I’ve said what psychologists say. Emotions come from thoughts that come from sensory informations received into the brain. Emotions are processed in parts of the brain, like the Amygdala and 2 other key areas.. Have a read up on it .
how good we are at controlling our emotions, and how strong our emotions are as a result of experiences, is dependent on a huge number of factors. Experience, fear, genes, sleep etc etc. but we can learn to control unhelpful,or irrational emotions, or, use Medication to help control very distressing or disturbing emotions.

but irrational fear or perceived threat of being simply “ alone” is fixable. Unless it comes out of previous trauma- but even that is also often fixable with EMDR techniques etc

I do not see a grown woman being afraid of being on her own without their DH as remotely justified. it’s terrible. It’s a state of immaturity and dependency and any number of other unhealthy things. To get to that point as an adult does smack of NEGLECT from that women’s parents in perpetuating high levels of perceived threats while growing up.

And mental illness is not a result of the level of control we have over emotions. Or even caused by anything to do with emotions. Jeez, if it was that easy to fix we’d have been curing bipolar, schizophrenia, for decades by now. Unmanageable emotions are a symptom of mental illness not a cause . Don’t confuse correlation with cause.

You’re both supremely irresponsible

Yes, this is terrifying.

I think it would be fine to leave a 12 year old for a couple of hours in the day and don’t really see what difference it makes whether you are going somewhere for fun or the supermarket (unless distance from home related).

Why couldn't the friend come to YOUR house?

Still too long for an 8 year old and too late for both. Two hours and home before 10pm would have been my hard limit.

Which law? I think it was far too late and not on with them being asleep, but there isn't a law as far as I'm aware.

There's no cut off point but it's illegal to leave a child alone if they're at risk. I'd say a whole evening alone is putting them at risk. I appreciate the OP has said she won't do it again but the husband clearly hasn't taken this seriously.

Don't know how old you are, but I'm late 60s and it didn't happen in my world at those ages

Which law is that?

I really don't think you read my post or the OPs posts.

I'm pretty lax with things like this and happy for my girls to quite a lot unsupervised that would shock many oh here. But even I think this is completely unreasonable!!!!

Forgetting all the extreme things that probably would never happen, fires/break ins etc, just the thought of them waking up for some reason and finding no mum or dad, not knowing where you were. That would be really upsetting! Before when you left them watching a movie they knew what was going on, that you were phoning at least. But just finding themselves alone :(

I work in a school. If I found out about this situation from either of your children I’d have to report it.
It would then get escalated to our safeguarding leads.

I don't think social services would be remotely bothered about this.

My brother used to collect me from school when he was in yr 7 and I was in yr 5, we'd walk home, make tea, walk the dogs and start on homework until my parents got home around 6/6.30pm. This wasn't unusual or rare at all, it was very normal behaviour.

Leaving kids at night to go drinking is a bit much though, at least my parents were doing it during the day time and to earn money.