Active discussions

Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Parenting

For free parenting resources please check out the Early Years Alliance's Family Corner.

Original poster

So when do you leave them alone in a hotel room?

264 replies

meditrina · 17/04/2011 09:36

with the holiday season coming up, I was wondering what is the MN consensus on when children can be left alone to sleep in a hotel room, say in these scenarios:

a) you are staying in a hotel with a "secure" perimeter (everyone has to pass reception to go in or out, fire doors cannot be opened from outside and are alarmed), you aren't leaving the hotel and there is continuous monitoring eg baby alarm?

b) same, but it's occasional phone monitoring, or the child has to ring down to reception for attention?

c) same, but perimeter not secure

d) you want to leave the immediate premises, even if it your destination is nearby?

OP posts:
Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
Set a reminder
IngridBergman · 21/04/2011 19:27

'Oblomov Thu 21-Apr-11 16:01:15
Agreed Cory.
Hopefully most parents don't need to know the 'guidelines'. Hopefully , they are using, now, whats it called again, oh yes, that's it. common sense. God forbid.
Bet most MN'ers would have phoned SS by now !!
Many parents at our school let their children walk to school, in the last year of primary. School encourages this. Seems fine to me.
Bet most MN'ers would be horrified at that !!'

I see nothing but a dismissal of the majority view on mumsnet in that post, and I'm offended by it because I don't consider either of those examples worthy of note. You could have said 'some' mumsnetters without it being offensive but to say 'most' implies that, well, most of us think that way which is just rubbish.

I've rarely seen a thread where calling SS was 'not warranted' after the event. We normally don't hear the outcomes of those threads.

If you think we're all so stupid why do you read this website?

Oblomov · 21/04/2011 19:44

who said anyhting about 'stupid'. why are you making this so personal ?

IngridBergman · 21/04/2011 19:46

I jsut found the post offensive because it talks about us all as if we're dim and overprotective.

Maybe you didn't include me in 'most mNers' but as a MNer it felt like a rude post. That's all.

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about these subjects:

Families General parenting
Oblomov · 21/04/2011 20:00

I do find most mn'ers overprotective. If not most, then a large %. I think I am allowed that opinion.

IngridBergman · 21/04/2011 20:03

It doesn't apply to me. I'm not overprotective so I don't appreciate being lumped in with your perceived 'majority'.

We'll never agree on this, perhaps your tone wasn't intended to sound mocking, or maybe you did intend it. I don't pretend to understand. But you're welcome to your opinion, it's just probably inaccurate.

Oblomov · 21/04/2011 20:25

I don't understand how you can make such a claim, i.e that it is 'inaccurate'. How can you say that, what evidence do you have that my , or anyone elses view, is inaccurate. I don't underatnd how anyone can say that.

hmc · 21/04/2011 20:27

..I think you are getting this waaaaaay out of proportion Ingrid [ducks and runs for cover]. Oblomov wasn't singling out anyone in particular!

IngridBergman · 21/04/2011 20:41

It just doesn't make sense, to me, and yes perhaps I am a loon, perhaps not. But to claim that MOST MNers would call SS about a child walking to school in y6 is silly. It's just silly. What are you trying to prove? If it was a humorous remark just say so but it sounded like you meant it.

This thread, the thread we are on, has been pretty balanced in the main so what's the point of making spurious claims about the overprotectiveness of other threads from the past, when there's no evidence of that on this one?

There've been a few 'never's on this one, that's true, but there have been FAR more normal, balanced and considered replies and to dismiss all of them with a 'all mumsnetters are overprotective', well, whatever. Doesn't make sense to me.

To quote you Oblomov, ' I don't underatnd how anyone can say that.'

Oblomov · 21/04/2011 20:43

Best let this go.

IngridBergman · 21/04/2011 20:44

Yes it's pointless.

exoticfruits · 21/04/2011 22:00

I don't think that you can have read many threads-MN -on the whole (and it doesn't single anyone out) are overprotective.
The majority
won't let a 6yr old boy go to the gents
won't even let a 9yr old boy get changed in the swimming pool men's changing room.
won't let a 10yr old girl go to the pictures with 2 friends and sit without an adult, despite being delivered and picked up.
won't leave a 10yr old at home for half an hour, despite being sensible, having a contact number and neighbours who are in.
won't let a 5 yr old go to tea with a school friend unless the mother is a personal friend

I could go on and on.........

exoticfruits · 21/04/2011 22:03

And they want guidelines-instead of their own common sense.
I have never had the SS contact me, I don't expect them to and they would get short shrift if they did.

hmc · 22/04/2011 00:46

I'm guilty of number 1 only, i.e. "won't let a 6yr old boy go to the gents" - but mostly because he is useless and will sit there contemplating a stain on the wall for half an hour unless I am outside the cubicle yelling at him to hurry up

seeker · 22/04/2011 00:52

exoticfruits - you forgot the school trip issues!

exoticfruits · 22/04/2011 07:38

Sorry seeker

You are not a good mother unless you cry buckets as you see them off and you must get very angry that the school don't allow mobile phones for a nightly debrief!
You can't do foreign exchanges because they are going to a normal family and they haven't CRB checks (and you wouldn't trust them if they had).
You can't allow Brownie camp because you don't know the leader well enough (the fact that she has all the relevant training and has been doing the camps for 15yrs is neither here nor there).

People are also under the assumption that a school will never leave a teenager alone in a hotel room and that they will always stay in secure units with sole occupation.

Abr1de · 22/04/2011 07:43

Have done it in small, secure, family hotel from babyhood. And it's untrue to say I wouldn't have been allowed upstairs in a fire. I can't see the kindly family managers insisting that my baby and toddler burned somehow.

IngridBergman · 22/04/2011 07:55

Exoticfruits, I've read plenty - I've been here for many years. I don't agree with you. And so what, anyway - does it make you feel great to be so different to the perceived majority?

maybe, conversely, everyone here (apart from seeker and Oblomov) would think you are massively underprotective.

I wouldn't know and if I did, I wouldn't seek to try and mock you for your attitude. But by all means list the ways in which most of us are inferior to you, if it makes you feel better. I just don't understand what you're trying to prove...as I said, this thread, yes, the one we are on, seems pretty balanced but somehow you'd rather talk about the apparently zillion other ones you've read that back up your point.

I give up.

exoticfruits · 22/04/2011 08:11

You only have to read the present thread about university students to see where it all leads! Parenting is about letting go gradually. When you get threads where people genuinely think that a 5 yr old (with no special needs)should have help wiping their bottom at school I give up too!

IngridBergman · 22/04/2011 08:14

But what's wrong with reading THIS thread? Where hardly anyone is being overprotective? Is this just a strange aberration on the face of Mumsnet?

'Parenting is about letting go gradually.' Really? Please, give us some credit for independant thought. Smile

exoticfruits · 22/04/2011 08:18

This thread is full of people saying they would never leave their DC alone in a hotel room. Maybe I misunderstand and never means 10yrs or 13yrs. I am taking it at face value.

gorionine · 22/04/2011 08:47

Exotic, yes, in my mind "child" means up to about 13 when they become teenagers. That would be the age I would start considering living my Dcs on their own in an unfamiliar place. DD1 is 12 and she is perfectly fine at home on her own but would worry a lot on her own in the evening in a place she does not know to well. At the end of the day, I think each and every one of us has answered the OP's question with our own children in mind and our own personal experiences of having or not been left alone young. It makes it more interesting (to me anyway) to hear about other parents experiences than jusy a "every child is different , do what you want" type of thread. I enjoy reading other people view on things and then I do exactly what I wantSmile

gorionine · 22/04/2011 08:48

Should be "DD1 is 12 and she is perfectly fine at home on her own and has done for the past 2 years."

exoticfruits · 22/04/2011 08:49

I enjoy reading other people view on things and then I do exactly what I want

As do we all Grin

exoticfruits · 22/04/2011 08:50

I like to give people pause for thought-even though I know they are not going to pay any attention!

Abip · 22/04/2011 12:44

I agree with some posters. I am divorced from my childrens father and I go on holiday with my partner whilst they are at their dads.

The holiday I have with them is a family holiday based around what they want to do. (Hence the couple holiday comes after!)

I would not leave them on their own. I probably would have left them in their rooms if alseep to have dinner with a baby call service (they are 7 and 9) , but since the mccann little girl incident I would not.

We do self catering holiday homes so that they have their own room and I can relax with a glass of vino in front of the telly in the living area.