How do cut the apron strings? Dd18

[Blueybingomum]

Dd is 18 next month.

she’s quite an innocent nearly 18 year old, doesn’t drink, doesn’t really go out and has lived abit of a sheltered life although she works full time at a nursery.

it doesn’t help that DH is autistic and probably over protective. It drives us all insane.

She has gone out with some friends tonight, her friend is driving as she doesn’t drink either.

they have gone to a few country pubs.

dh was in a foul mood all evening and has been at work in a mood regarding it. We’ve had big arguments.

how do you relax? Iv been on edge all night lol I can’t sleep, no idea what time she will be home. Luckily I have the life 360 app so can track when she’s in the car etc.

i had her at 17 so i think im maybe projecting abit. I’m fully aware :(

do you give a curfew?

This is a gradual process that takes years rather than an overnight thing because she’s 18. Doing it your way was always going to be more difficult for you and your h and it sounds like it was easy to predict his reaction.

You are keeping you dd “young” and anxious with stuff like the tracking. Not encouraging street smarts and independence is going to make her more vulnerable- is she off to uni next year? What’s your plan when she decides to do stuff like get into bed at 2am. You are feeding your anxiety by tracking her too. It’s cruel to be so controlling and not offer her the confidence that comes with independence.

What on earth for? Surely an 18 year old has better things to do with her time?

Maybe she is young for her age and doesn’t go out much because you have made her in to a person who is worried about ordinary life. Going out doesn’t have to mean drinking cider in bus stops or nightclubbing. Not all young people are party animals but they still should be encouraged to be participating in fun activities with people their own age.

I went to a friends last night for a board game night. We have five older children between us.

21 year old - walked to pub to meet old school friends from secondary school
21 year old - got bus into town to meet friends and have a meal.
19 year old - stayed in at home (we were out) and had three friends over for a sleepover’.
18 year old - went to 1920’s themed murder mystery house party with friends from her sport hobby. She drove.
16 year year old - went to friends house to make pizzas and watch a film. Got bus there, parents collected.

Those are all things that I want my adult children to be doing. They all have friends who are good people because they are encouraged to do things and meet people and make decisions for themselves.

@Blueybingomum

must admit I thought this. It never would have occurred to me at that age to be tracking my mums whereabouts, I had other things on my mind

Yes, she could have survived without him financially. She earned well more than him. She has some weird co-dependence thing going on though. It doesn't matter why anyway, she failed to protect her children. How often do you think kids implore (that's the right word) their mother to leave their father? My only regret is that I didn't go to the teachers and tell them what was going on and get some intervention.

All this talk of tracking 17-18 year olds is so bloody depressing.

I’m so glad trackers weren’t around when I was young and living at home.

You can’t protect her from everything and you, your husband and your daughter all need to stop thinking you can. Whilst you’re being overprotective she isn’t learning coping skills.

You start cutting the apron strings by you logging out of the tracker. She needs to not be checking you’re where she expects you to be either.

Someone up the thread mentioned failure to launch. IME over protective parent has the opposite effect. I am 59 only child. My mother is still salty that I left home to live independently at 25. I was so stifled I could not wait to get out. I worked and saved very hard to for a deposit and buy my own flat.

So much on mumsnet about 18 thier an adult blah blah blah.... but the night before thier 18th birthday thier personalities don't just change. They are still kids, your kids and you can't just stop worrying. Our boy was 18 in August and has finished a shift working at our local pub. I still waited for him to get home.

As a parent you are always concerned and maybe worry, depending on what is going on for them. The thing is to keep it in perspective and check yourself if you're crossing a line. Mine are older than that and I still feel happier when I know they are home safely at night after an outing. That's natural. Not going through the process of letting them get to independence over the years isn't.

You can't give a curfew to an 18year old.
Your daughter sounds sensible and balanced, you should be happy that she isn't into going out and getting wasted and trust her judgment.

And even if that were to happen, how is tracking her every move going to prevent it from happening?

You sound extremely controlling - not with malicious intent, I understand you're concerned about her safety, but you can't control that. You can teach your children about safety and give them the tools to cope in life, but they can never learn to do that adequately for themselves with mummy and daddy shadowing them. You are stifling her.

I'd also suggest that you have anxiety that needs dealing with. This is no way for you young adult to live.

Well of course their personalities don’t change on their eighteenth birthday but you put the groundwork in before they are eighteen. Same as how you get them to walk to school in year six to prepare for secondary school.

I don’t think anyone is suggesting that tracking your adult children to work is because you don’t live them any more.

oh sweet Jesus christ is this what life is like now 😩😬 no one needs to be tracked whatsoever unless they are on house arrest or similar. how are the next generation suppose to survive?

Are you afraid of history repeating itself - teenage pregnancy?

Ditto to get rid of the tracker. It will only fuel your anxiety.

You're missing the point, yes giving teenagers independence starts before they’re 18, so they can gradually grow into functioning adults.

Of course it’s not about someone waking up at 18 with a new personality, it’s about not treating them like a toddler until that point and giving them the opportunities to become independent adults as they grow up.

It’s unhealthy to be this enmeshed. You all need to find some independence and grow up a little. You had her at 17, which means I bet you still need to grow and find out who you are besides her mum.

It’s not normal to assume someone could be in a ditch any time you don’t know if they’ve arrived safely somewhere they go every day. You’re demonstrating some serious attachment issues. Unless you hear otherwise you should assume she is at work quite fine. Tracking her and her tracking you is again, serious enmeshment and attachment issues that aren’t helping either of you.

Cutting this is the first step to cutting those apron strings. Let her go and make her own mistakes.

Our DC have L360 tracker as do I. They can turn it off if they wanted. There would be no repercussions. DH doesn't and won't ( which bugs me as I never know when he's going to get home and it could be any time between 3.30 and 7pm). He doesn't communicate what time his ETA is so if his tea is cold so be it. It would also be useful as I've very little idea where he is working and if something did happen to him I'd struggle to know where to start looking! But he's a grown up.

One DC is nearly 19 and at university. From being out in the sticks to a large city.

When DC first left home it was hard not to track continually. Now i just do it occasionally - eg if I want to ring DC but don't want to disturb a night out, lecture etc. or if I'm concerned they might not have left their accommodation for a day or two

Other DC is 18, not a drinker and is a driver. Remote small town with very few amenities. When DC comes in they are as quiet as a church mouse so if I wake up I will check on 360 to see if the are back.

My DH bugs me because he will ask me for tracker info, but I just say no I'm not looking. When I have in the past said where they are he will at the first available opportunity tell them ' your mother says you were at xyz for 20 minutes. What where you doing?' which then makes me out to be the stalker when I'm not. DC would add them if he asked. And probably remove him pretty quickly as well as he would interrogate them.

I do have conversations with them though about their day especially if I see that they've been some where dodgy or been driving round the county half the night. Just usually a ' how was your night?' . And use that as some sort of opening for discussion, for eg if they'd been driving round aimlessly I'd ask how that sat with their Green Party membership or if I was going to read about their antics on the local Facebook moan page, or how they felt when some was sick in their car.

No curfew. They are trusted and largely sensible young adults with great diverse friendships. And we have (I hope!) open non judgy communication.

If they needed help/ rescue then we do have a coded sentance that they can message that looks innocuous but means help/ rescue me/ ring me/ come and get me.

It is difficult but does get easier the more they do it. You must not project parental anxiety on to them.

I understand I've probably been quite lucky with mine as to they generally aren't risk takers.

When I was young there were no trackers but we had a curfew and a father who would drive round the local teenage haunts looking for us if we were 30 seconds late and make a huge scene when he found us (and we were never put off breaking the curfew). With the tracker I can see where they are and have no need to take action. In my head at least that's less restrictive/ embarrassing than what my DPs did.

You lock your daughter out of her home at midnight, instead of asking her to come in quietly and put the chain on when she’s last in? Why?

Because I have an autistic child who can escape. If I don’t have the locks on he could be gone. She knows that. She knows be home before midnight otherwise I potentially can’t keep my son safe.

Does she not have a key?
Can you lock from inside and put the key where your autistic child can't get at it?

There is a level of enmeshment in your relationship that is not healthy and L360 is fuelling your anxiety.

If she genuinely is tracking you when you are driving, that is weird. Driving places for a job is a normal every day activity. It's not something that needs to be monitored.
If you are visiting customers/service users at home alone or something then tracking may be sensible but it should be your colleagues monitoring you during work hours or if you are self-employed, your husband. Not your 18 year old child. Her anxiety is being fed by you because you are modelling that an adult woman should be being monitored and tracked at all times which is weird and not how most women live their lives.

If she or you crashes the car, then it tracking isn't going to save a life or prevent serious injury.

If she is hiking a long distance trail alone, it may be sensible to track. If she is going to her friend's house or the local pub, it is not.

Keeping her "innocent" is not a desirable outcome for an adult. It makes her vulnerable to manipulation by others, particularly boyfriends. A controlling boyfriend might offer to track her every where on L360 and she would not see this as the massive red flag that it is.

A cure for this would be a plane ticket to New Zealand and a three month bus pass for NZ. No tracking unless she is off hiking alone.

Agreed. It’s one thing to track your 12 year old going to school but it’s another to track an adult that much.

So give your older child a key

She's an adult and it sounds like she's doing fine.

The issue here is how your dh manages his desire to restrict the lives of female family members by punishing them with his bad moods.