Leaving kids home alone for 5 days?

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Dh and I have never been away with out kids not even for a night. I want to suggest a 4 night city break to him but before I do just wondering if you would leave dc of these ages home alone? Grandparents live a couple of miles away and would pop in everyday and happily run my youngest to activities.
DD 19 (holidays so back from uni)
DS 16
DD 13

I am honestly God smacked at the "check the legality" comment. At 19 I had a baby and a house that I lived in by myself with no support. Tough, but I managed.
This is a 20 year old being at home with a 16 and 13 year old for 4 nights.
They will have takeaway money and grandparents available. Presumably they all have phones and are contactable immediately.
I am baffled as to why people think this is too much for a 20 year old.
We are raising a generation of anxiety riddled, dependant young adults because they aren't allowed to find their own feet.
It's like the definition of adult has changed dramatically in the last ten to fifteen years.
If your child is 20 and has no sen and couldn't cope with this I think you need to seriously reflect on why

Maybe this is for another thread but I really think our generation wilk bear the responsibility for this. We have collectively infantilised young adults and it is so odd to think we have created a whole generation of immature, unprepared, dependent adults who are not ready to live independently.

No wonder they will then not feel ready for chuldren at 30. It's scary. I am very guilty of this too in my own way but we should collectively reflect on this as a society.

Absolutely as long as sensible

Oh I so agree with this. What you read on here sometimes is shocking. It wasn’t like this when we were
growing up!

You still need to ensure someone has written authority to consent to medical treatment.

And you need to consider, what if something happened that meant the 13 year old had to go to hospital on the first night? Would they be ok to wait another 3 days if you can't get back? That's not infantilising them, it's recognising they're still a child and might need their mother.

For me I'd go in the UK with a car but I still wouldn't go abroad for another few years.

Also interesting I think what a difference there seems in leaving a 20 yo in charge than a 19 yo. What a difference a day makes!

What happened yo the world?
If they are normal young people it shouldn't be a question.

I am sure that if the 13 year old needed emergency hospital treatment, the mother would be returning to the UK. This would also happen when on a school trip/if the mother is away with work/etc...

Grandparents would step up untill parents arrives at hospital.
Or it's the agreement then we have left 3rd child with 1st and 2nd child (1st and 2nd both +18 yo).

Oh dear god and all that is holy - some comments on here have blown my mind.

There are young people in the UK dealing with far bigger things than a dropped jar of mayonnaise and I tell you what, if your young people are thrown by things like that then you haven't raised them with the resilience required to face the world. You've done them a disservice.

People referring to the 19 year old feeling irritated by her younger siblings - you are describing the 'ughhhh you are so annoyinggggg' dynamic that you normally see between younger children and it's scary that you are infantilising an ALMOST 20 YEAR OLD to that extent. Adults regularly feel a little irritated by each other, it doesn't make us incapable of functioning.

Why on earth does the 19 year old need to 'parent' anyone for 5 days? What is this big responsibility that you think they are taking on? I ran a house at 19. My Gran was married with a baby at 19. Ordering a takeaway and spending 5 days time together is not a responsibility.

Yes I ‘m wondering this too. I was married with a child at 19, she’s an adult and perfectly able to look after a 13 almost 14yr old.

I think if you can’t do this you haven’t bought your children up very well. They should be perfectly capable of being left in charge of the house at 16 let alone 19, providing of course that they have no relevant additional needs.

Grandparents don't hold PR. They can't step up for signing consent forms for medical treatment unless formally authorised.

I'm absolutely sure the mother would try to get back in those circumstances. Trying isn't necessarily the same as being able to.

I wouldn't for another couple of years. Only the OP knows her child.

If it's an emergency, the won't wait for a parent to sign consent forms.
If it isn't an emergency, well, it isn't an emergency and something can be sorted.

Or nothing will happen at all which is much more likely.

A 13, nearly 14 yo, might be considered competent to consent to their own medical treatment. A 16 yo certainly would be, assuming no SN.

Really confused as to why anybody thinks the 19yo should take on any of this responsibility.

Can a 19yo look after 2 younger siblings? Sure, but why the hell should they. It’s not their kids, they’re now an adult with a life of their own.

People banging on about how the 19yo needs to learn independence. If this was my parents at 19 I’d assert my independence and leave home because I sure as hell wouldn’t want saddled with this so my parents could go on a dirty weekend.

eldest daughters are not your babysitters and while we’re at it they’re not your default nursemaid when you’re old for wiping your arse either.

If it really was an emergency the hospital would assume implied consent and treat the child. They would also try to contact the parent. Consent can be done by phone in these circumstances. Do you think the doctor is just going to do nothing because the parent isn't in the room?

Crikey. All I was doing was suggesting they sort something formally rather than heading off all Pollyanna that everything will be fine. Yep it probably will. What if it isn't? Literally a letter signed and the grandparents can act and it's all much much simpler. It's not a formal deed signed in triplicate or a court case. It's 2 mins writing a letter.

Not every hospital admission and treatment is so emergency they would take over without your consent or take phone consent. There are many situations where they would try to make the child as comfortable as possible whist they wait for your return but the child would still be suffering.
A little bit of paper. That's all.

I read it that many of these 18 and 19 year olds are at uni already, so they are already living independently.

I guess babysitting your younger siblings isn't such a big ask, especially if your parents are supporting you at uni and still very much helping you all round. It's nice for some of them being able to give something back.

Having said that, they of course can say no.

@MumCanIHaveASnackPlease "Really confused as to why anybody thinks the 19yo should take on any of this responsibility.

Can a 19yo look after 2 younger siblings? Sure, but why the hell should they. It’s not their kids, they’re now an adult with a life of their own."

Because they're a family. Because it's no big deal. Because it'll make it possible for the parents to go away for a couple of days. Because that's how normal people interact.

I was 15 in charge of my 12 year old brother for a fortnight while my mother went abroad, I had no grandparents. We were just fine. I even had a party in the middle weekend so I had plenty of time to clean up after

13 is a bit young. I don't think I will live well.

Yes, you were fine. But I really don't think that leaving a 15 and 12 year old alone for a fortnight is OK. And if something went wrong I'm pretty sure the parents would be in trouble in that case. 19 year old completely different.

I wasn’t suggesting it was a good idea.
The party was the clue.
It’s never good to leave young teens alone.

Actually things did go wrong. The party was a mistake. We were fine. The house was not. Cigarette burns in the carpets throughout the house, spilled drinks, vomit in beds, and some gatecrashers ate the Christmas cake that had been maturing for 10 months, a month before Christmas..didn’t even use a knife, but just bit into it. Pigs lol. That’s why I needed a week to clean up..though the burns and cake could not be avoided. She was surprisingly accepting but then, she did leave us .

You literally said "We were just fine"! It sounded like you were saying it would be fine to leave them.

I meant, we were fine..we weren’t murdered in our beds, we didn’t starve, we were clean, in laundered clothes, got to school and home again every school day. I could run a house..after all, I did it when mother was home, too. She liked to avoid chores by giving them to me. I’d been taking my brother to doctors and dentists etc since I was 8. The cleaning, ironing, laundry, garden, baking, washing windows also my responsibilities. So we were fine.
That doesn’t mean it’s a great idea.