Help with 18 yr old DS respecting house rules

[anotherglass]

My DS (19) is home from University for the holidays. I feel at the end of my tether with some of his behaviours while home, which I don't feel are respectful. While home he can come and go as he pleases but all I ask is that if going out at night he lets us know a general idea of where he's going / who with, and what time he'll be back. I also ask that he keeps his phone charged. We live in a semi rural area which is relatively safe but it is dark at night.
For background, he is prone to impulsive / risky behaviour such as binge drinking and setting off on jaunts at the spur of the moment, with little planning or telling anyone. He has got himself into some bad states where he has been left vulnerable in clubs, and while on holiday. I have explained how this makes us feel and that we are concerned but he dismisses how I feel / or acknowledge the issue. Last night things came to a head when I could hear the front door opening at 8.30pm and him heading out. I asked where he was going and he got annoyed and slammed the door on me. It was minus 5 degrees and the roads are very slippery and treacherous. I am at the end of my tether and about to ask him to leave and go back to his uni hall. I suffer from general anxiety is not helped by the fact that DH does not back me and setting some ground rules in the house, leaving me isolated. Please help me deal with this in a constructive way that helps DS and protects my mental health. Thankyou

It’s basic manners and shows respect to let you know where he’s going and approx what time he’ll be back. He sounds very immature. I assume that you are funding him at uni? Giving him spends? What is he like generally at home, does he do chores, cook, participate in family life?

The fact is all those saying he’s an adult he can do what he wants are correct on his own time, in his own place on his own money. I’m like you OP I expect some adult to adult interaction and common courtesy. Stop his money in the holidays and make it clear that there are expectations on both sides.

It would be basic manners for him to let you know when he's leaving the house and whether he'll be eating at home later, but beyond that you are being unreasonable in your expectations. You sound anxious and overbearing. Time to loosen the apron strings. I have an adult DC who lives at home and it's none of my business where she goes, but she does usually WhatsApp me if she's going to be home after 1 am - no explanation of where or what she's doing, just it's going to be a late one.

Sorry but you need to back off - he’s a great big adult male not a 12 year old boy!

Same age Dd back from first term I like to know if she’s having dinner with us but otherwise we just leave her to it. Except if her and her mates wake us at 4.30am getting back from a club …

TBh the only things I insisted on with uni-age dds when home, was to let us know if they were going to be back late (after midnight) or would be staying at a friend’s house - otherwise I’d worry.

The other thing was, TAKE A KEY!!! One dd was terrible for this - we were always getting calls asking us to leave a key under the mat! She only finally learned a few years later - after unexpectedly arriving home mid afternoon and expecting me to be in (I was WFH) when she was desperate for a poo!

Withdrawing funding from your son or daughter at uni unless they tell you where they are going and what they will be doing and when they will be coming home, is a good way to push them away and a move towards estrangement. It's controlling behaviour.

YABU - you have referenced your GAD - this means YOU are calibrated hypersensitive and irrational. It’s up to you to work on coping strategies to widen your window of tolerance and not expect others to comply with your irrational thoughts and behaviours. I am glad your DH is not complicit and inadvertently enabling your condition to continue to negatively impact on your DS. Seems hes had a lifetime of it already. Focus your energy and efforts on improving your own mental health and not inflicting irritational negative stress on to others where it doesn’t belong. This will also improve and sustain your relationship with your DS.

You’ll drive him away op if you are there nagging on. As soon as he can afford not to come home he won’t. Who wants that hassle? You need to work on your issues yourself.

I’m sorry. I have anxiety as well and I know how overwhelming it can be. As others said, it’s common courtesy to say when you leave or around what time you think you’ll be back, it’s common courtesy to cook a meal and wash some dishes and help out as an adult in your parents’ home. It’s not common to give a rundown of your plans before going out and it’s really not common to have intense fears about headphones. I think your son is exhausted by it and pushing back hard and if you meet somewhere in the middle he won’t be so resistant .

I think you need to try to disconnect the ‘But I worry about x, y, z’ from ‘Therefore he needs to tell me….’ Gently, your worries are your issues to deal with and making them your DS’s issue is clearly irritating him to the point that he’s not even telling you the basics.

I’d sit down with him and say that you recognise he’s an adult who can plan his own life and take the risks he wishes to take (you can’t have any control over this now I’m afraid) and that you’re sorry for being over protective in the past. Tell him you trust him to make sensible choices (whether you do or not!) and won’t be asking any details of who he’s with etc. Also say that a general house rule is that if someone is going out, they let the rest of the household know (WhatsApp is fine) and a rough idea of when they’ll be
back, including whether they need an evening meal or not. That’s just general courtesy if you live with other people.

I really get the worrying - my DC have done the being at uni, home for the holidays thing and it is an adjustment when they’re back but you have to treat them like adults or it spoils your relationship with them. Sometimes they still make a stupid decision at 18/19 but you have to let them make it and learn from it.

I think your DS feels confined by your questioning and requirements for knowledge of his whereabouts and is therefore withholding all information from you. If you let go a bit and just request basic information that applies to all the other adults in the home, you will probably find that he relaxes a bit and you get to hear more anyway. But if he doesn’t, you will just have to live with it I’m afraid.

I lived with my mum for a couple of years as an adult after a break up - I always told her I was leaving the house and if I planned on being home the same day. I also updated her if that changed. She did the same. It's unreasonable to expect to know the where/who of what he's doing but perfectly reasonable to want to know whether to expect him back.

Actually, a housemate I had years before and I did the same. It just seems reasonable people should know who is in the house, and whether any late night noises are more likely to be someone returning or someone else breaking in 🤷🏼‍♀️

Thank you. I am fully supporting him while he is at Uni. I am encouraging him to get a job to be more independent but he has not done this. While at home it is like a hotel with full services. He gets meals cooked and washing done - so he is not really acting like an independent adult. I will pull back on this.

You’ve said you live rurally - cannot imagine there’s packs of hoodlums lurking behind every village oak tree…

you need to back off - telling you who he’s with? Keeping his phone charged? Where he’s going? I’d hope that I had a rough idea who the kids are out with and roughly where they were going but this would likely come out of conversation rather than parental rules and diktats.
i only ever asked them to let me know if they’d changed their minds about coming home and to text if they’d were not or if they brought a friend back to stay - so I wasn’t waking up to random pals in the house.

That's good for you but that approach would not work for me. It's too hands off.

It kind of has to be hands off. He's an adult man and doesn't have to tell you anything. All you can really do is tell him to leave if he isn't willing to.

Your anxiety is not his problem.

I have no intention of removing money. You don't seem to be engaging with the issues / concerns I have flagged around his risky / reckless behaviour. This is not about control but concern.

He is a young adult who has done some risky / reckless things. This is not about control it is about concern. Good for you if you can switch off and sleep at night, but that kind of advice does not work for everyone.

aw, OP, i totally get it.

But. This is where you have to say to yourself "he must look after himself" and stay strong on that. So he goes out at 8am and... you carry on with your day. And take what comes.

If you usually lock the door from the inside and he can't get in? then he gets to freeze on the doorstep or whatever (i am sure that somehow he will let you know he is there). If he gets stranded and can't get home? he gets to solve that - and you don't go and pick him up. It is REALLY hard for some people. But since he won't respect your rules, you have to just impose them anyway.

Good luck.

The young lad has done some risky / reckless things. For example, heading off to the Peak District on his own to go walking and getting lost at night. You wonder why I have anxiety?

I’m with you op. My DS is same age and I would be fuming if he went out without telling me where he was going or at least saying goodbye. At the end of the day they can go back to their uni accommodation if they don’t like it.

Thank you. I don't think the house should be treated like a hotel.

Probably why he drinks @anotherglass and I'd be very concerned. Looking back I was just like this and now I'm worried about my kids as they grew up. It took my a long time to realise there was nothing for me in town. Alcohol is a dead end. And when you drunk you think people who don't are boring. But once you don't it's the other way round.

I don't know what to tell you because it was only through my uncle, then my Wife, who were both witnesses and a mirror. And having kids, and covid, that I finally stopped.

Good luck! He needs social circles and activities that we rewarding that don't involve drink.

If he wants to be treated like an adult man he can start by being considerate, pitching in around the house and having some manners!
I worry about my similar age kids too OP but I’m pretty zero tolerance about rudeness.
It seems that the trend for parents of adult children these days is to provide them with all the home comforts, expect nothing from them and consent to be treated like servants.
I have had to battle to get mine to understand that with adulthood comes responsibility to others. It’s considerate to tell the people who care sbout you your rough plans - if im going out I tell them, so same goes.

I have come to this board to seek constructive ways to get to this middle ground. I want a better relationship with my DS, built on consideration and respect.

I think it is basic manners/decency to let your family (if you live with them) know when you are going out and if you are going to be late coming in. This is what normal adults do, I'm with you OP, your son is acting like a rebellious 14yr old and not as an adult. If he thinks his behaviour is that of an adult then tell him as an adult he can do his own washing, cooking and cleaning and pay his own way during the long holidays.

what reckless things has he done? it might help to know that, otherwise all we are working with is a lad out on his own walking through a park. Which, for a fit young lad doesn't feel that reckless to me.

(I live rurally so i know what it is like).

Would it help you to look up statistics for this park? to see what has happened there?

Telling him to keep his phone charged? come off it. I stopped telling mine that at about 14, which was the age i absolutely stopped picking them up from school if the bus was late. This is how they learn responsibility for themselves.

Washing and laundry? nope. I have always been happy to chuck stuff in to make up a full load, or whites or delicates or whatever, but not as a general service. Cooking? everyone staying here, temporarily or permanently, has to let us know within a reasonable timeframe (so generally before 4pm) if they are eating the evening meal with us. That is it. No confirmation, no dinner cooked for you.

Coming in late? we go to bed early ish. Coming back after that? you won't get in if you haven't told me not to bolt the door. That is a you problem. It is easier than it ever was when i was a teenager - what with family WhatsApps.

And our rule has always been: if you say no, or don't say, it is the same thing. That is a no.

ETA: cross posted with your explanation about walking in the Peak District.
Family meeting required to say why you worry as you do - not just with him so he doesn't feel picked on - and that basic courtesies are to be observed. Otherwise the "nagging" will continue.