To rethink daughter moving out for uni

[Ledad]

She is 18 years old so an adult, she is planning to move out for uni and will be 19 by then. She is legally obliged to make her own decisions but today, she saw a video on facebook if you put your phone in the microwave it will charge up to 100 percent, she actually thought it was real and tried it. Luckily her brother ran in and stopped her or she would have burned the house down, if she was in uni accomdation now she could have done it. I would be funding some uni stuff so if i wanted i can just change my mind, Im having thoughts of that after seeing this tbh.

Well you can if you would be funding her.

Unless there is a lot of back-story and context, YABU to stop her moving out for university based on one momentof idiocy. Presumably you are expecting her to be able to live independently as an adult eventually? University is a good stepping stone.

All of these replies and THAT is what you choose to reply ?!

No real help but some of these stories are just wonderful 😊 just the giggle I needed.

I did boil eggs in a microwave myself once. Just once. I didn't know they needed to be pricked. It was not pretty.

I think it's fair to say that many teenagers make stupid mistakes or do something 'without thinking'. And what your dd was about to do was definitely a stupid thing to do! But not a reason in its self to stop her moving out!!

I'm assuming she's otherwise a fairly independent, functioning 18 year old?

Having to think for herself and stop being gullible is just what she needs.

"she would have burned the house down"
Don't panic - no she wouldn't.

Part of living away at uni is learning how to be more independent and survive on your own. I wouldn't be worried, everyone makes mistakes. Living in halls is like a first step - you don't have to deal with bills (as it's included with rent) etc and it's a bit more supported. Then you tend to move into a house/flat share and learn things together. People mature massively in the first 2-3 months of living away from home. Don't stop your daughter having that experience because of one mistake - she has to move out at some point. And if she had microwaved her phone and there had been a fire, she might have coped really well at rectifying that by unplugging / putting the fire out / or in the super worst case scenario calling the fire brigade.

My flat mate at university half hardboiled an egg. By accident in case you are wondering. he was trying to soft boil it. Same flatmate also thought if you put something on double the temperature it cooked in half the time.
Another flatmate asked me how to cook rice. I said "don't forget to peel it first", then follow the instructions on the packet, went out of the room. 5 minutes later they appeared asking me if there was a trick to peeling rice...
They've all got good degrees and are things like practicing lawyers now... and cook cook far better at the end of the year than the beginning.
Although I don't think any of them has attempted to mend a bike puncture since the complete disaster in our kitchen which ended in injuries and a broken spanner.

But she was home when she did that. So what difference does it make where she is if she does daft things without thinking? You are surely not going to be supervising her 24-7 if she lives at home.

Surely sending her away to university where she'll be other people's problem is the far safer option for the family home?

Definitely not!

that is a bIt bizarre

My 18 year old wouldn't have done that.
Hes grown up knowing what can and can't be put in a microwave. He will also question something that sounds dubious.
She will no longer be at home.

I work as an accountant in the City. A few years back the microwaves were removed from all the kitchen areas on just a single floor in our building because the workers on that floor kept setting off the fire alarms re-heating burgers in flammable packaging. It was the trading floor.

I started a fire in a microwave in my second year at university. I had never used a microwave before so there was a certain amount of guesswork involved.
I attempted to cook a Christmas pudding. I knew that they needed hours and hours of cooking time, and that microwaves were ‘a bit quicker’ than conventional cooking methods, so I set the timer for 2 hours.

I’m now the most boring sensible person you’d ever meet.

Ah fresher days when at least twice a week in halls the fire alarm would go off because some idiot didn't know how to do the basics. YABU. If she hasn’t learned the basics in your household then it will be useful for her to live out, so she learns how to look after herself.

I couldn’t believe the nonsense I saw at Uni. People cutting themselves, burning themselves, burning, pasta, or soup, not knowing how to work a washing machine or do washing. I felt like I spent so much time having to help people I might as well have run a home ec module.

Has she actually been accepted to uni? Maybe something vocational might be better for her.

Maybe some life skills between now and then would be a good idea.

What DOES happen if you microwave your phone?

If your daughter has got to 18 and doesnt know NOT to put a phone in a microwave oven and switch it on... then what the hell HAVE you been teaching her?
I think you should own some reaponsibility for this too!!!

I have to confess I tried the pricking a hole in the egg shell to microwave a boiled egg thing. When I went to take the top off, hot egg exploded everywhere. I even had to clean it off the ceiling and it wasn't a low modern ceiling either. I was really lucky it didn't explode in my face. Don't do this. Buy a proper microwave egg boiler - they're a very handy gadget, can have a boiled egg at work for lunch.

Honestly they probably knew but just didn't give a shit. Traders are like that, according to them they keep the entire place afloat so they have a god complex.

OP if this single example makes you question things she can't be that bad, can she?

I don't want to play ND bingo but it's different from, say an autistic kid who has poor life skills and executive functioning. this just sounds like typical silly teen mistake.

It'll blow up

At probably about 18 years old I microwaved a boiled egg that wasn’t quite done enough. After it reacted violently to being poked with a spoon I never made the same mistake twice!

Also yes as PP said she did this silly thing at home and it was her brother who stopped her. So you can’t protect her every second of the day and there will be people at uni who will stop her doing silly things