To take my 12 year old daughter's phone away at bedtime

[AlltheGs123]

I am battling with my 12 yo who is demanding to keep her phone in her bedroom overnight. I am saying that she needs to hand over the phone at 9.30 and it'll go on to charge until morning. All hell is breaking loose - apparently none of her friends parents do this and she sees it as controlling behaviour (!). Am I eroding her trust or am I doing the right thing?

Same here, but I also don’t allow phone in bedroom overnight

Because kids are clever and can figure out ways around controls… and once one kid figures it out, they all know!

Phones including mine are charged in the kitchen overnight. Not negotiable and I also abide by this rule. If they didn't abide by it then I told them I'd stop paying for the contract and block them on WiFi

my children are 12 and 14

all screens are completely banned from upstairs all the time.

Its my house and my rules, and I pay the phone bill so I consider their phones to be mine too.

It's not negotiable

Take away any ambiguity or nightly argument. Lock it via Google link. 9pm for my dd.

I truly don’t get the parents who say they are ‘battling’ over stuff like this - why are battling with a child! Draw a line in the sand and have some with it. Parent for christ sakes. We aren’t our kids best friends, we’re they’re parents and perhaps one day that will evolve into something more like friendship when they’re adults, but when they’re children they need boundaries guidance, rules alongside the unconditional love.
Unconditional love is not about letting kids follow their every whim.

Alot of controls only work on the WiFi
kids circumnavigate by going into their data

Yep, no phones in bedrooms over night here. When he hit 18 we told eldest it was their choice - after a few weeks they started putting it downstairs again as they were spending too much time doom scrolling before sleep!

Don’t go questioning yourself because a 12 year old called you controlling!

It’s just getting started. All the young teens want total freedom. It’s our job to introduce those freedoms slowly.

One of my older boys was just laughing remembering how furious he was that we didn’t let him stay out until last bus when he was 13. He now acknowledges that would have been ridiculous.

Holding loving boundaries is the job.

No tech should ever be in rooms and less so overnight - ideally turned off and handed in an hour before bedtime. Phones in rooms esp at night is very dangerous - bad for sleep, more chance of drama and a recipe for risky behaviour