To let DD vape?

[ByBoldLeader]

DD (16) vapes. I’ve tried to stop her from vaping but I can’t, nothing works and she just keeps on vaping. She has a part time job and pays for the vapes with her own money. I’ve given now up trying to stop her from vaping and have just decided to let her vape now but other mums are saying I’m a bad mum for taking that approach and that I should still be trying to stop her from vaping. Has anyone else just given up and let their teen vape? AIBU to just let DD vape? Am I a bad mum?

The law is controlling... having respect for where you live is controlling... ok then. Bet you were a really 'cool' teen...

You removed her phone, lifts to places like work and out with friends, non essential purchases for her... For "months"?

How long has she been vaping?

Why did you give those things back?

What have you actually tried, for how long etc.

What happened when your child had no phone for "months" for example. How was she getting to work?

Well, your parents clearly failed you at some point, because you started smoking at 12! How the fuck did you get hold of them? Who were you friends with to get them for you? And then you moved out at 16? Jeez.

I can remember my mum accepting I smoked and all that did was allow me to do it more. I will never accept my kid vapes (if they ever start). I would do everything in my power to make it stop, to keep it outside of the house and to make sure I didn’t partially fund it.

Ithink you meant to quote me, not @youalright

My parents never 'let' me smoke, I just did it anyway. Smokers were everywhere back then and it was not difficult to cadge a fag off someone. Later I used to spend my dinner money on a pack of 10. Trading standards was virtually non-existent in those days and we all knew which shops would sell to us, even in school uniform.

Yes, I moved out at 16 and was successfully independent from then on. And?

When did you quit?

My 17 year old vapes and wont stop, although I suspect he has cut down. He knows that I will go ballistic if he does it in the house and I can smell if he does, he also knows that I wont allow it in the garden either. He knows that I mean it when I say I will cut off everything I do for him so he respects that.
I also dont have a go at him and leave him to it, he vapes with his mates but it seems to very much just be a social thing now rather than all the time like it was before

I switched to vaping when I was about 45. I still vape, I'm still addicted, but my health has improved hugely and I am at least relapse-proof as far as smoking is concerned.

I am absolutely not recommending vaping for young people or for anyone who has never smoked. Addiction is shit.

One thing OP should perhaps bear in mind is that even after the massive explosion in teen vaping caused by disposables, only 2% of young people who vape regularly have never smoked. There is a very high chance that OP's DD is vaping for the same reason that adults do - she got addicted to smoking and switched to vapes because they are much, much safer than smoking.

When i was 16 smoking was legal

That's a "tritology" 😂

Definitely don't let her do this in the house or garden. And if she's had so much spare money from her part-time work then start charging her for things like wifi and bills and food!!!

🙄

You’ve really proved the point that inactivity by parents in this area leads to a lifelong nicotine addiction which is detrimental to health. Are your teeth and gums okay? Honestly just focusing on oral health would be enough for my kids to not take it up. There’s no way they’d wreck their teeth for that shit.

When I was 16 dinosaurs walked the earth - doesn't have a bearing on the current situation.

"she will blame you"

Hi Nostradamus, I never blamed my parents for my decades long smoking addiction. They resigned themselves to it in the 80s.

No, my teeth and gums are fucked from decades of smoking but at least have now stopped getting worse.

My parents weren't inactive, they tried very hard to get me to stop smoking. I just learnt to hide it better.

I don’t understand why you are defending the daughters position here. You’ve admittedly damaged your health. I assume if you could time travel back you would never have started spending your dinner money on cigarettes? Give the OP some useful advice based on your life experience.

I also don't blame my parents. That would be immature.

She didn't say they started by vaping (not in that post anyway). She was responding to a pp stating that it's rare to see younger people smoking cigarettes.

Do you pay for any other stuff for her? Clothes? Phone?

If so, stop. Tell her she can prioritise what she spends her money on.

But did you eventually cave in and go back to paying for stuff?

I'm not defending the daughter's position, I'm saying pick your battles.

I posted some useful links here:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5394270-to-let-dd-vape?page=4&reply=146509607

you should be speaking to the GP, school and local council support

I'm genuinely interested in how this would be handled by those agencies. I find it hard to believe that they would actually offer anything if a parent approached them about their DC vaping.

What do you know about it that I haven't heard of?

Let’s normalise parenting our kids. As a Gen Xer it was normal for our parents to be hands off. Most of the stuff that happened in my childhood would be subject to a CPS investigation now. Latch key kid, whole days outside of the home without supervision, access to alcohol young. my kids think all the memes about our generation are hilarious, I don’t want the same for them though. They understand my thoughts on having sex too young, vaping and cigarettes, alcohol. They understand how to use the internet safely, county lines, grooming. We’ve had to (age appropriately) talk about all of it. They are supervised. Listened to. Have hobbies that we attend. We are involved, we listen. Their brains won’t fully develop until they are 25. Like hell would I roll over on something as detrimental as vaping at 16. Don’t take on the war unless you are prepared to win. This one I would take on as I think it’s insidious.