Would you let your 18 and older child go out with whoever they want, wherever they want and whenever they want even if still living at home? Why or why not? How would you go about it?

[HangryGreyBiscuit]

Complex topic in my view, and would like views from fellow parents.

18 is an adult. So i certainly did let my DC come and go as they pleased.

We do have manners though so we would always tell each other where we were going and what time expected home - I think that it's polite to keep other members of the household informed of whereabouts - for safety reasons, and to know how much to cook for dinner.

well my 18 year old doesn’t really have a curfew anymore, but due to her being at college/ working she is very rarely later then 11 .
I do expect to have a rough idea of where she is (ie gym , work , friends house) and Not to wake anyone when she comes in .

so long as she’s doing that I think it’s as good as it gets really!

I do have to say though, my mum (75) is horrified that I ‘let her out’ after dark

I have a 19yo dd, I would expect to have a rough idea of her plans as that is common courtesy and effects if I need to cook her dinner etc.

Its just good manners 🤷‍♀️

I don’t mind her going out but do like to have a rough idea of her plans.

Over 18 it’s their decision.
If still at home then you can decide who crosses the threshold

So far no issue with my adult children. If they dated someone who I didn’t like then it’s tough. But if the reason was for instance a drug addict I would say why I didn’t approve

I would like to think the way they were raised is enough to make good choices.

It’s their home not a hotel so they need to respect everyone living there. Everyone saying that they’re adults and you can’t stop them, does a switch flip on their 18th birthday so you don’t care anymore?
They can’t just bring randomers back to our home to stay over and if they’re going away then they don’t have to tell us what they’re doing but an indication of when to expect them to return is not unreasonable.

My rules are, let me know if not going to be home and an idea when they will get back. And how they are getting home (stay rurally). No permission required for actually going out - for me it's about them respecting that I don't want to cook if they aren't planning coming home and they know I worry if they aren't out later than expected.

This is why you gradually let them have more freedom so by the time they’re 18 they’re competent to make the decisions that any other adult can make.

Perfectly fine to have a rule about bringing people back / not making noise late at night / letting people know if they’ll be back. But those rules probably apply to everyone living there.

I have a teen but she is completely shy, sensitive, moral and a homebody. I don't think she will ever do that but if she does, I have to be happy about the fact she goes out as for now, she just goes out with us

You can’t stop an18 year old going out. You do have a say in who she brings home, and can expect her to avoid waking you up.

This hasn’t just come out of the blue at 18 though. How did you both manage things like this for the last few years?

Yes to all.
That is their right as legal adults.
I don’t see any complexity here.

They're adukts, the only thing i'd expect from an 18yo is to know of they need any tea cooking

Christ, as I was turning 17 I told my mum that after my birthday I'd be staying out overnight at my boyfriends a couple of times a week from then on.

That was some 40 years ago. I certainly wouldn't stop my 18 year old from doing anything but I might advise that they were being foolish or careless.

It’s normal and courteous to tell other adults you live with where you’re going, who with and what time/day you’ll be back.

My young adult children don’t just leave the house without saying goodbye or having a chat about what they’re doing. I like all their friends and haven’t ever needed to get involved in who they hang out with.

So, in summary not really an ‘allow’ but common courtesy.

If you’re asleep I guess your daughter doesn’t want to disturb you so leaves a note and presumably has a phone. That’s fine.

I have young adults living at home. I expect them to let me know if they're going to be home for dinner or if they're planning to stay over at friends/partners in the same way I would let them know if my plans changed. I would worry if they randomly didn't come home one night without letting me know - it would be completely out of character behaviour.

I don't expect them to share all the intimate details of their lives but we all talk about what's generally happening in terms of night's out/ trips/ work stuff etc because we're a chatty lot anyway. I think the idea that when children turn 18 parents should have no expectation of a normal reciprocal relationship really depressing. 18 is so arbitrary too - people mature at different rates and even if you do manage to be both emotionally and somewhat financially independent in your late teens, cutting loving parents (who have a good track record of care and support) out of your day to day life for no reason other than to demonstrate your newly acquired 'maturity' actually suggests the complete opposite. It's very pre/mid-teen behaviour - not very adult at all.

My DDs could come and go as they please. I did ask they let me kniw if they weren’t coming home and if they were late back they be quiet. We have a no cooking after ten pm rule.
They were good though and would tell me what they were up to.

Even at 17, DS goes out largely when he wants, where he wants. I know his friends, he says where he's going. He isn't on the streets, he goes out with purpose, and not on a college night. He often works late on Saturday nights and is very quiet when he gets in. I ask he texts when he's home in case I don't hear him. The foundations have long since been laid about communicating and he estimates when he will be home. There is a lot of trust between us.

I moved out at 16, so compared to me, DS is a dream 😂

of course - 18 is an adult

I think there should be some rules about waking others in the household up

Yes, as long as they had solid plans for getting home again, came in quietly on their own (no friends over at 3am), and were up for whatever they needed to do the next morning without needing me to function as an alarm clock for them.

Could she go without telling me 'people, place, etc'?

Yes.

If you and your child have got through 18 years together without you trusting her to have decent friends and not get into trouble when she leaves the house, you have a bigger problem than rudeness on your hands. Is your DD a tearaway or do you have an anxiety issue?

At 18, my DCs were a minimum of 2.5 hours away by car, at university. I had no idea where they were or who they were with on any given night. When they came home for the summer they often went out with friends in the evening.

Spot on😀

Yes of course, DD is 22 now but from being 18ish we’ve been pretty lax, she talks to us anyway so will say oh I’m off out with such and such, I’ll ask if she’s still going out with that prick wotsisface, DD will groan and say yessss, we’ll have a 20 minute chat about her mate and all the adjacents and then as DD leaves the house she’ll give me a kiss and and say I’ll let you know if I’m not coming home. Or if she’s out and about and I’ve not heard from her I’ll fire her a quick ‘what’s your craic’ message and I’ll usually get a response within the hour giving me a vague update of plans and a ‘I’ve got a key’ or ‘I’ve not got a key I’ll just stop at XYZ’s’.

If she goes out late at night unplanned after we’ve gone to bed she will send me a text and say she’s gone out (usually having taken a car) just so we’re not concerned if we wake up and see on the camera she has left or that the car has gone.

8pm is unusually early to go to bed and you absolutely should not be making your adult offspring feel bad if they want to go out spontaneously at that completely normal time of day, even my 15 year old will wander downstairs at half 8, announce he’s off to the gym and he’ll see us in an hour.

Personally once I passed my driving test, 2 months before I turned 18, I came and went as I pleased and didn’t ask permission for anything. As long as you’re respectful and don’t wake others up etc. I would have found it absolutely bizarre to ask my parents permission to go out. I’d always tell them I was going out though and who with. But 90% of these people they never met.

I absolutely “let” dd at this age. Though admittedly she was university age rather than sixth form age by the time she passed her driving test. She stayed home and went to a local uni so in my mind it was none of my business. If she’d moved away for uni i wouldn’t have had a clue. I asked her to try not to wake us up if she came in late and if she was going to stay out just to text so I wasn’t worried. Sometimes she did, sometimes she didn’t. To be honest I stopped lying awake worrying/listening for the door after a while.