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

[meditrina]

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?

'Would you do that, then, expat, by insisting that they stay in the same hotel room as you when they are fourteen?'

I don't know, pixie, because my eldest is not NT and now, she is only 7.

And don't try and dictate how I post, Pixie, because I've been here since the thread started.

In fact, if you're going to get arsey, I'd as soon as leave it because I'm really not in the mood.

I can see why that might worry you, especially when you have had such terrible experiences yourself

But it seems a shame that they can't have more freedom now , given they live somewhere so safe

I'm n ot trying to pick a fight btw, just trying to understand

Nor did I, triton. I don't get personal on threads unless addressed as such.

Seems like some are spoiling for a fight, though.

Fuck that.

Ok I said never earlier in the thread. I'm going to change my answer now after reading others opinions/experiences
I'd say I'd leave 12-14yo on there own provided they can tell me what they would do in an emergency fire etc but only in an English speaking country or if they can speak that country's language very well.

I think walking to school is different I would allow this from about 9yo but I live in a very small village with no main road between house and school, again this would be different if I lived in a big city.

Re: leaving them at home on their own I think also about 9 but they know all the neighbours in surrounding houses, have phone numbers to call etc and I'd never leave them for more than an hour.

I will start teaching DS fire safety v.young though after reading this thread it's not something you think about often but should be IYSWIM

Bollocks, pixie.

Go for it, I'm off.

I won't leave young children in a hotel room alone.

I'll decide when I leave them.

Leaving young children alone in a hotel is lazy and stupid, IMO.

BFD.

Anyway I was making reference to the teenage aspect. Whether you would leave young children with a monitor is a personal choice and I can uderstand why some wouldn't

But not leaving older teenagers? At all? Good luck with that one

Actually when mine are teenagers I would love to know where they are every minute. At least a toddler is in a cot or with me. But I don't see how any 16/17 year old can be monitored so closely

spoiling for a fight - er you called me lazy and stupid

Did you ever think that would not anger someone?

I'm not sure what it was all about, I thought we were talking about holiday hotels-if we were in some known, rough trouble spot I'm sure that we would all act differently-although I don't know why we would choose to holiday there!
DS went off on holiday abroad with his girlfriend when he was 18yrs-quite how he would have managed this if I hadn't left him in a hotel room alone when almost 17yrs I don't know!!

When I was 8 and my sister was 6 we stayed in a hotel in Paris in a room next door to my parents room - it never crossed our minds that this was unusual (on self catering holidays or camping we had our own room(s)/tent) but we loved having our own room at the hotel with breakfast delivered to it each morning - it made us feel very special!

We're going to Italy on Sunday and though it's unlikely that we'll leave our LO in the room whilst we're elsewhere it may happen if she's asleep in the cot when it's mealtime, but they are providing us with a baby monitor so obviously if she wakes up once we're eating we'll just go and get her. She's 7.5 months old.

We're going on holiday to the Alps this summer, to a large chalet hotel where all the parents have an evening meal together while the children (having had their high tea) sleep in their rooms with hard-wired baby monitors and a dedicated nanny patrolling each floor (with key access to the room).

My boy is 3. I'm happy with this, but I sense that many parents on this thread would not be.

Could I just lope back in to say that when I started this thread, I was aware that McCanns might figure in people's reasoning (as indeed might the Dickinsons when it turned briefly to school parties), but it was absolutely not my intention to start a McCann thread "in disguise" or explicitly (and I said so further up). Many thanks to all posters who have kept it away from this.

Expat: if you read this, I'm sorry that you misinterpreted it that way. I would be interested in when you would leave your children - that was exactly the question I was hoping posters would answer.

The consensus (to me at least), seems to be that small children should not be left - even when monitored in a hotel with a secure perimeter, but that teens can be.

But it's less clear what people think about children aged about 7-12 (singly, probably tending to no, but not many relies on sibling groups this age.

I have to say I really couldn't give a stuff what other parents do or how they feel about it, and can only base my feelings on my experiences both growing up and what my parents did with us, and with my children now. Ds1 is 7. Maybe I am overprotective, doing the cotton wool thing, but as I said earlier the thought of being separated from my babies in the event of fire really terrifies me. I also wouldn't leave a 7yo in charge of a 17mo, which is what would be happeing if we left them alone in the room.

Completely immaterial for me anyway, because we don't have the £££ for hotel visits/holidays atm!

Ds1 is doing an overnight school trip in a couple of weeks. I can't tell you why I feel differently about it, because I've no idea why I do! I know they'll be well drilled in fire safety procedures because they've been there for day trips before and it's a place the school have used happily for many many years. Have been assured that a dormful of 6/7yos will not be left to their own devices for the entire night, but I guess I don't/won't really know that that's the case. He won't be alone in the room though, I think that's what reassures me.
Overnighting on this trip is entirely optional btw (I was 10 and so was my sis before we did overnight school trips), but from the moment it was mentioned ds1 was desperate to do it, so I've supported him in that. He knows nothing of my fears wrt leaving him in a hotel room either.

As for leaving him alone at home, I wouldn't yet. Can't think of a reason why I'd need to. Maybe in the next couple of years. He'll walk/cycle to school on his own at some point in the future I don't doubt, and will be bussing it to secondary school from 11. I still can't imagine a point where I would leave him with his wee brother in a hotel room though. Nuts huh?

I guess it stems from my belief that family holidays are just that, time for us to be a family together. I don't really recall hotel holidays when I was a child either, certainly not past the age of 11 or so. We always camped or self-catered. I'm going to have to ask mum and dad what the reasons were now aren't I?!

Im thinking back to my PRIMARY school trips.

in years 3 / 4 we did a 4 night (mon - fri) trip to isle of wight. (I was in year 3) Our school had a mini complex of chalets. Most chalets had a teacher in one of the rooms but ours didnt, i dont think, at least not on my floor (can still remember all my friends on that floor )
It was great fun

years 5/6 had a 5 night trip to France and we stayed in a hotel. The hotel if i remember rightly had some out buildings and we had a girls and boys one, both with a couple of floors. Every room had 2 or 3 friends and a little en suite shower room. (other guests in the main building)
There was a teacher on every floor in their own room.
The teacher responsible for my floor, he (yes male) was LOVELY so kind, and everyone really liked him.... well a few years laster accusations were made against him, and he went to JAIL for being a peadofile (sp?). (his wife was a teacher at the school, one of my favourite teachers)
Just to add that while we were away he did NOTHING at all inappropriate, to me (or my friends) and was very respectful of our privacy. I find it difficult myself to believe the accusations, but the court did and he was jailed as a result. (and it was children a couple of years below me from my school who made allegations, i can only imagine it must have been on one of these residential school trips)

Both of these trips were great fun, and i have great memories, even if i wasnt meters away from an adult 24 / 7, and sleeping in the next room to a later to be convicted peadofile!

I'm not surprised the expatinscotland feels the way she does, given her experiences.

However, in her estimation I would be one of the 'stupid and lazy' parents. I left my 18 month old and 3.10 yr old sleeping in the hotel room with a baby monitor to have dinner in the hotel. Got a babysitter if we went out of the hotel, obviously. Small alpine hotel, exit past reception and the staff all knew us.

When I was a kid I used to go camping on an island on a lake with my best friend at primary age (we'd row across), went on holiday with 3 of my friends at age 16, and was finding my own way round Berlin on hols at age 17.

i'm really jealous of all your school trips, the first time i was even offered an overnight trip with school i was 15yo and even then my mum couldn't afford it.
my primary school trips consisted of either cinema, theme park (scottish one not louden castle or anything) or an afternoon at a farm.
in 1st and 2nd yr at high school cinema/museum type trips continued, in 3rd year it was a 2 week italy/germany trip but was c. £700 (in the 1990s +spending money) so most couldn't afford it.

I think I may modify my reply slightly, re-reading the thread and the OP. I would let teenagers sleep in a different room for the night in a hotel. I had read it as leaving them while you go off for dinner which just seemed pointless since they obviously need to eat too. Of course I would trust teenagers to be able to go to bed and sleep (or watch tv) on their own. I wouldn't let them go out on their own in a place they don't know, don't know where is safe to go etc., before the age of 17/18 (even then only if in a group). At home they would be familiar with their surroundings and would know other people around, where and who to avoid, how to get home etc. so to me it's a completely different kettle of fish.

It's all rather irrelevant to me though tbh as we've never done hotel holidays (just the odd night here and there) and I rarely did growing up. When I grew up it was camping holidays and then apartments. For us now with our kids we do holiday cottages or apartments for the very reason that we can put the kids to bed then sit in the lounge/on the balcony or whatever and enjoy a glass of wine together without having to worry about leaving the kids.

Sorry that I mentioned Madeleine McCann, and that the thread got a bit derailed.

Actually the point I was trying to make was that I thought it was a bit OTT to not leave your children in a hotel room with a monitor until ds1 did a bunk.

As Skinknittingfluffybunnybonnets (blooming easter names, I think that's roughly right!) suggested, children think in such convoluted ways you can never quite predict what they will do...

Sorry have only skim read (and I'm tired) but I can't think of any reason to leave my dc alone in a hotel room. It would be way too stressful for me and what could possibly be so urgent/necessary that I had to do it anyway?

For me a holiday is for all of us and we tend to (and enjoy) spending it together - whatever the children's ages.

Now that's just my opinion and I am not condemning anyone else!

The Never posts remind me of a conversation related to me by one of the other girls on the Spanish language course I attended one summer. We were all staying in Spanish families, and her senora was ever so envious of all these people who could travel and see the world- she would so like to do that but of course she couldn't leave the children. My friend enquired after the children: it turned out the youngest was 35 and a dentist

I can't see myself leaving my 14yo and 10yo in a hotel room to go off and have dinner, but that's simply because they would feel hard done by if dh and I were stuffing our faces on our own; besides, we all enjoy eating together. I really can't see any other problems.

I stayed alone in a hotel in a foreign country for several days when I was 16; my parents thought I could be trusted and they were right. Just as well as I left home at 18.