Drunk teenager- punishment or not?

[Stressedgiraffe]

Dd 18 last night went out to the cinema after college and ended up horrendous shit faced.
The plan was for dh to meet her off the bus and walk her home. We live in a village with hourly bus in evenings
She missed her stop and ended up in the next village.
Luckily there was a pub next to the busstop and they gave her water and security waited with her till the next bus back to us.
The bus driver refused to let her on.
So this resulted in a panic to get a taxi to collect her.
We don't drive so I ended up getting a £60 taxi to collect her. For a 5 min drive . As it needed to be paid from our city to our village to where she was and back.
Dh thinks she should be punished but I don't know. She doesn't have a job but has an interview next week.
I'm just glad she got home safely
What should we do?

If she does decide to learn to drive I really hope she doesn't think she can have a drink and then drive home - for everyone's sake

This.
Every teenager has done it. I would do the lecture on personal safety and that will be enough. For goodness sake don't punish the poor kid as well.

Some of the answers on here are brutal. Always the case on MN when it comes to teenagers.

We live in the back of beyond in a village with no bus service so parental lifts were essential until DC passed their driving tests at 17. Even then if they went out late DH or I would pick them up. If we couldn't do a lift we paid for a taxi.
If DS (26) comes home at Christmas and wants to meet friends we will still do the same. It's what kind families do.

5128gap
I think it is just bound to cost more as the OP lives in a village with poor public transport and no one in the family drives. This means that when someone misses a bus or in this case gets drunk there will be an expensive and tricky situation.

It depends what your husband means by 'punished'. Certainly speak sharply to your daughter and make your displeasure known, warn that there may be consequences if there is a 'next time'. However there may not be a next time, she might well have learned from this experience and in future only have a drink or two, paced.

Let's face it, most of us have done it. I can remember my parents being well disgusted with me as a teenager, far younger than your daughter (& I didn't live it down for years), yet as an adult I hardly ever have a drink, it really doesn't interest me and, when I have, I've known when to stop.

I am sorry you had such expense. However your girl is safe, she is not working yet so can hardly pay you back. I wish her all the best at her interview next week and maybe she will treat you out of her first salary payment. She is now entering the adult world.

Write it off, op. She knows she has disappointed you, also how much it cost. If you generally have a good relationship with her, I think forgiveness is in order.

Agree with all the PPs that the hangover is punishment enough. It’s not like she chose to go to the next village pub to continue getting pissed and leave dad at the bus stop, then changed her mind and asked you to pick her up- that would be a different story. But it was a mistake and these things happen.

Rather than deliberating on whether or not to punish her, have you or DH checked in with her? Why did she get so drunk? - is it a case of not knowing her limits yet, drinking on an empty stomach, or is there something else going on? The whole ordeal, missing her stop, being stranded in a village and then not being let on the next bus must have been scary; she’s young and drunk.

Being 18 is hard and we were all there once. I hope she’s ok.

She is legally allowed to drink so i dont understand what the punishment is for?

get her to pay the taxi money back when she has a job.

Have a chat with her about the dangers of excessive drinking as a female

And thats about all you can do

I got horrendously drunk when I was 17, thinking I was cool and could handle my drink. My parents were so calm and didn't kick up a fuss. They were no doubt disappointed in me, but probably recognised that I had got myself out of my depth. I was expecting anger, and have never forgotten that I wasn't given a humiliating 'dressing down.' If I'd repeated the behaviour, then yes, I deserved to be punished. However, I've never touched vodka again and never got myself into such a sorry state. So lesson learned.

In short, have a sensible, sympathetic discussion with your daughter. No punishment. If she's anything like me, she'll already be punishing herself.

Calling you etc is punishment enough. She can pay you back for the taxi.
She needs to know that you will ALWAYS be at the end of the phone when she needs you.
There was a young chap in NI who was drunk and too embarrassed to phone his parents for a lift, so he started to walk home. He never arrived and was found in a ditch. I will collect my children always.
One of you really should learn to drive if you live so rurally. Encourage your daughter to learn too as her prospective opportunities will otherwise be very limited.

I got absolutely blotto at 18 too. Ended up throwing up down the side of my dad's car. The next morning they told me what happened and that they were disappointed. I was mortified and cleaned the car with a hangover, which was grim.

Teens are dumb. I think a suitable punishment would be for her to pay you back the taxi fare. You also need to have a proper conversation about how dangerous a situation she put herself in. If you punish her too harshly, she might not call you in the future. When my DD is older, I will tell her she can always call me if she needs a safe way home, no matter how drunk she is. I will also explain the risks of getting into that state though, especially for girls.

Oh god this so much!

Her hang over may be punishment enough.

I probably spend over £60 a month driving my kids around and don't ask them for the money!

As you don't drive, a one-off £60 is no big deal.

Just tell her that if it happens again she'll have to contribute.

She's 18 and inexperienced, so she's underestimated the effect of booze and her father's first thought should be relief that she's safe, I would have thought. A serious conversation about alcohol and staying safe while out at night is better than 'punishment'. Tomorrow, she's probably mortified today.

Agree with this

Exactly. The sensible approach.

I wouldn't do anything. I'd be annoyed at the cost of the taxi, but most 18 year olds get like this on occasion and it's only become an issue for you because no one can drive and you live in a village.

Guessing your dh has never got drunk OP.
Agree with most on here, that hangover will be lesson enough

For the sake of a 5 minute drive I'd have got DH to walk to her. To be honest I'm surprised the bus wouldn't take her. She must have been really gone to be too drink for the bus.

Yoh just need to talk to her about looking after herself. If she is drinking she still needs to have capacity to get home or arrange to stay with a friend in the city? She's 18 soon she will move out and you won't be able to bail her out.

She's Misjudged limits with alcohol. We've all been there! She needs to learn.

she’s an adult now so punishment isn’t really on the cards.

maybe talk to her about ensuring she always has taxi fare if she is planning to drink- and that drinking is something she will have to fund.

you want to keep the status quo that she knows she can ring you if she gets in a mess.

The occasional £60 taxi is nothing to the cost of buying and running a car.
Perhaps your dd should start a taxi fund when she gets a job.

Are you convinced that she had too much to drink, I'm wondering if her drink could have been spiked 🤔

My parents made me help with painting with a hangover. Never hurt so much in my life and I never drank that much again (I had promised to help paint but still...)

Punishment at 18????
FFS!

She's 18. Don't be ridiculous. And we've all been there. It's a rite of passage. Inconvenient but way more important that if she does this again or otherwise gets into trouble on a night out she isn't scared to call you. This could have been a lot worse.

My mum always said to me that it didn't matter what time off night it is it where i was, if i was in trouble I was to call her. That was because as a teen a man drove her out into the middle of nowhere. She got away but then struggled to get home on her own, she could not call her parents to help her, they would have gone mental and abuse could have occurred. She didn't want that situation happening to me. I always said the same to my DS.

Let her put it down to experience and move on. I'd even let her off the taxi fare this time. She's home and safe- hopefully she'll learn from it.

To be honest, I couldn't get past "we live in a rural village with one bus an hour and we don't drive." Why do you make life so difficult for yourself and your children?