Teenager finds it very hard to hear no

[Creesla]

We have four kids, our oldest is 17. In general, she is a great, responsible kid. She is in school, due to do her Leaving Cert (Irish A Levels) next year. So we are relaxed outside school term about her socialising but during school term, she is welcome to have friends over anytime, we have a separate part of house which is their space -she can call out to friends, but no pubs/house parties. Halloween, Xmas, New Years, mid term, Easter, she can head to house party/pub.

This is mainly as we don't want her social life planned solely around the pub at 17. But also we are both hard workers, who have a strong work ethics and always just say the few months in school are for buckling down. Don't care about results but want to raise kids who put in effort and graft.

Anyway, we have kept our part of the deal and made sure she got her nights out during school breaks. She hasnt given school work much attention - her grades dropped over year, and teachers told her to buckle down. She has a brilliant summer planned ahead, nights out and festivals and we are sending her to Irish college which she absolutely loves for 3 weeks.

Our issue seems minor but it is head wrecking. She continuously begs to go events during school term, despite us being very clear and not budging. It feels like a never ending loop. The latest is she wants to go to a work party tomorrow on a Monday night the week before her summer tests. She has easily asked about ten times and it is beyond frustrating to have to keep repeating ourselves. This is same pattern on anything she ever gets a no to, big or small. She also gets a lot, is privileged in so many ways. I felt sorry for her dad who has been up at 5am this week for work, working late, and when he went to collect her from work at 11pm last night, he was instantly met with nagging about going out despite this being discussed endless times.

There is absolutely no way we can ever give into her as if she ever thought nagging would work, it would never stop!!

And yes I know it is normal & very tame teenage behaviour but just looking for solutions as we start to dread the repeat discussion with her, which almost makes us avoid her. We are also tired parents of four kids so any solutions/advice/perspective welcome.

What consequences does she get for the nagging? If mine do this they get told they've already been told no and if they ask again they'll lose the x box etc etc.

If they have nothing to lose there's no reason for then to stop asking

She's 17,of course she wants to go out. My dc didn't really ask permission at that age, but if lifts were needed it would depend on whether I was working or not. They were self motivated work wise though, all of them got good exam results

I can understand the Monday night thing but what about Friday nights. Surely some balance is needed. At 17 you are trying to teach her to manage her time effectively and there needs to be a balance between hard work and reward as well as learning to be responsible. I sometimes go out to gigs or social gatherings on work nights for example but I won't drink on those nights and manage workload and sleep around it.

Honestly at 17, I think you're being too controlling.

The nagging is annoying and I would say to her it's been discussed so don't say another word.

If you're going to be so strict, then you can tell her to stop nagging!

She is 17, she has to learn to manage herself and her time and you aren't allowing her to do that. She needs to learn that if she goes out on a Monday she will be extremely tired on a Tuesday at school. You aren't giving her the chance to figure this out and regulate her own actions and time.

You are going to have to budge as she won’t be 17 for long. At 18 you have no right to say no.

I think your rule is a good one, but every rule must have exceptions. I don’t see the issue with a work party on a Monday night when you obviously have her working that job until 11pm some nights. Work parties are often expected social events that have career or job consequences if you don’t go….

If her grades are dropping, it is more likely because you are insisting she hold down a job as well as do her FT job of being a student. How can she put time into studying when she’s working until 11pm?

Why isn’t she allowed out at all at weekends? That seems harsh. You could easily say she can go out Friday or Saturday night, after homework has been done, and with a set time to be home.
Might make the school night ban easier for her to stick to.

I can't see why she can't go out on a Friday night with friends at her age. You're being too rigid. Monday night is out of course fair enough but only letting her go out on holidays is controlling.

From your title I was expecting a PDA profile and horrendous behaviour.
Your daughter sounds like she is juggling school, revision and a job too. I appreciate that you have rules but surely they could be guidelines with some exceptions.
It’s a shame the work party is on a Monday but I can see why she’d want to go. At 17 it would be embarrassing for her to say her parents said no.
If she goes on to further study she needs to learn to manage her own time re revision, nights out etc.
Can’t see her doing much revision knowing that her work friends are on a night out.

By the title I thought it was a 13 year old not 17.
Sorry I don't get this at all. I expect if she was alowed to do what she wanted she probably wouldn't go out all the time. What makes you think she would. It's only because you restrict her so much in what she can do.
Maybe her grades have dropped because she is unhappy feeling she is missing out doing all the things her friends are doing which is normal at that age.

So she isn’t allowed to socialise outside the house at all During term time? Sorry if I’ve misunderstood. If I’ve understood correctly I think you need to change your rule to her being allowed a weekend night out per week. I think being this restrictive you are inviting her to go absolutely berserk the minute she leaves home and can plan her social life herself

She's 17, not 7.

In less than a year, she'll likely be out of the house and off to Uni or holding down a job. It seems you are not preparing her to manager her own schedule and time for that but rather expecting it all to magically happen when she turns 18.

I do think you’re being too controlling, considering she’s 17 - that’s why she’s nagging, she likely feels unheard in her own life. Monday nights I understand, but not being allowed at at weekends in term time seems very harsh. I think you need to find a compromise.

You don’t allow your 17 year old to socialise at weekends? This is too controlling.

You’ve banned your 17yo from going out in term time? It’s no wonder she’s nagging because that’s absolutely ludicrous. Untie the apron strings and let her go fgs.

So she is in 5th year then. This is the year that you can be a little lax . With a warning that going out next year will be strictly curtailed. And you won't be the only parents doing so . I always said that provided their grades were good they could balance. But she is not keeping her end up. You can't really back down on the work do unless you word it as a test of her responsibility 😏 .
And I said the same about college . You can't supervise them then but if they attend lectures, pass exams then everything else is OK . We pay too much money for them to waste their opportunity.

She’s 17 with a job and you think you can stop her going to her work’s do? What the fuck? Can’t believe she’s even asking you like a toddler asking for a snack. That’s absolutely mental. At 16 and 17 with my own money made from working part time I went out to gigs whenever I bloody well pleased. I can’t relate to this at all OP. She’s 17.

It's not her, it's you

She's 5th year at the moment. I think you need to make some time for a proper, cards-on-the-table, discussion with her about your and her expectations.

She's got school, a social life and a job. That means that she's motivated and capable of juggling all three with your support. So far you've said that she can socialise during non-school time and not during term time.

She seems to be fairly adult in her approach to work and social life but reverts to whiney toddler when not allowed out.

I think you need to break it down into two scenarios, the immediate Monday night event and the long term plan for getting through next year and the Leaving Cert.

For Monday night - You could ask her how she plans on getting home from the night out? Will you or her dad have to pick her up? Given that you said your husband has to get up early for work, I would be clear that expecting a lift home is not fair on him and she will have to get a taxi home out of her own money. If she has to pay for her night out maybe it will be less attractive.

Make sure she is aware of the natural consequences of her actions - if you go out, you pay for getting yourself home and you can't expect others to exist on no sleep. You have to be quiet and not wake up everyone in the house if you come in late.

I would let her out - she still has the rest of the week to study.

On the grades - it's only 5th year. It's a good time to learn that if you don't put in the study, you wont get the results. You can ask her if she's satisfied with her results this year
Would she be happy with the same grades in the Leaving? You can make the point that this is for her future, not yours. You've been there done that. Her results are on her.

The long term - Are you still supporting her socialising by lifts and money? Does she have to budget for her life or do you pay for everything? It's a good age to get used to paying for your own stuff rather than the bank of mum and dad. I know you said your paying for Irish College and festivals.

I get the impression that you feel that you're putting a lot into her and she's not keeping her side of the bargain because her grades are slipping. That feels like a kick in the teeth to you because of the support you're giving her and then she ends up pestering and negative. This is where the sit down chat has to happen. You need to point out the support you're giving her, money, time etc. Yes, this is part of parenting but now you're trying to get her to independence and she needs to understand that you're human too and that she need to understand that the support will not always be there.

There's a good article in The Atlantic that might feel appropriate. The wrong way to motivate your kid.

She should be able to go out on Friday and Saturday nights.

This is ludicrous OP, and you aren’t teaching her any life skills - ie how to balance work and play - by keeping her cooped up like a chicken.

Find some dignified way of climbing down - maybe make it related to getting her grades up. Teens need a strong peer group, it’s a development phase.

She will be nagging as she will be the exception to the freedom her peers have which will make her feel that you are excessively controlling. I would say that she needs the skills to self regulate her social life and academic study - if she is doing this for the first time at uni there are much bigger consequences to when that balance is wrong and potentially in terms of putting herself at risk.

Very gently, I think you need to relax a bit. In a year you’ll have no control & your DD will be able to do as she pleases.

Sit her down and talk. Give a curfew for the party if dad is picking her up and explain that she will be going into school on Tuesday no matter what. Then talk to her about what she considers a reasonable amount of socialising and go from there.

As PP have said, refusing to allow her to socialise at the weekend will only lead to problems.

With our DD, we said that as long as her grades kept to the level needed for her chosen career path, she could socialise / have her hobbies / part time job - but on school nights curfew was 10pm, no exceptions. She soon learned how to balance things and is well on the way to her career. We saw a couple of her friends who were in the same situation as your DD crash out of courses though as once they had freedom, they went wild and didn’t know how to manage their time.

It is difficult but I took up a hobby to distract myself from the worry which certainly helped. Good luck.

All you are teaching her is how controlling you are, if my parents were like this i would have gone to uni and lost touch with them

I was ni wild child and was quite boring but this living like in the army thing is what my friends had and they went very low contact with their parents as adults

I think you're being way too harsh.

Thanks for the responses. So just to clarify - she is 100% allowed to socialise at the weekend - just not in pub or at house parties during school term. Loads of other ways to socialise - a lot of her friends are in the same boat - some families say you can go out X times in school term etc - but it rounds off to the same for our daughter. Have offered her same but she picked the option we went with! Our local town is known for rough nightlife & think a lot of families seem like us, don't want their social lives to hinge on the pubs there entirely.

She chooses to work herself, not expected from us. We live rurally so we drive her to and from work collecting her late one weekend night. No late night taxi access to our house so if she is out every weekend, that is our two nights gone on ferrying her around which with small kids up at 6am means we are never off the clock.

We sound super strict but actually don't feel we are - we have a brilliant relationship otherwise, plenty of other ways for her to socialise with her friends and she does - shopping, cinema, dinners out, coffees, sports, days out etc

I've just paid for her festival tickets and a weekend away with her friends in summer and it will be easier to be a taxi driver then too when the smaller kids are off. It is probably a combination of us feeling permanently exhausted and at the end of our rope energy wise and wanting her not to get stuck into small town drinking as her only social outlet. I appreciate all the guidance & advice!