Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Teenagers

Parenting teenagers has its ups and downs. Get advice from Mumsnetters here.

How do I deal with this?!

6 replies

needsomesunshine · 21/07/2012 10:38

My ds1 is 11 going on 15! He has become more and more stroppy and it is ruining the atmosphere in the house. This morning he woke up in a good mood! BUT it's because he's arranged to go out with his friends to the cinema & told them we will pay for it! He's told us its about 10 kids. I'm really surprised at him & now he's in tears because I said no we cant afford it. I'm so surprised at his behaviour & I cant take this stroppiness the whole summer. I just want my little boy back : (

OP posts:
hellhasnofurylikeahungrywoman · 21/07/2012 10:43

Does he do anything to earn money around the house? I think sometimes, kids have no appreciation of the value of money so earning something and learning to budget can help them. From about that age we started to hand over some of the responsibility for buying the things they wanted to them, they would do extra chores for money then that money was for them to spend on the extras they wanted. For example we would pay £5 a month for their mobile phones, if they spent all that on the first day it was tough or they could use some of their wages to buy more top ups or we would set a budget for their out-of-school clothing and if they wanted jeans/trainers that were more than we had budgeted for they topped up the money to get what they wanted.

Hang on in there. they do eventually become lovely again.

needsomesunshine · 21/07/2012 10:50

Good idea has no fury. He is the eldest of 4ds' soon to be 5 so paying all of them might be an issue but I will have a chat with him about it when he's calmed down.

OP posts:
amillionyears · 21/07/2012 10:53

I'm afraid your "little boy" is not coming back.
Not sure how he thought you would pay for 10 kids to go to the cinema,unless it was his birthday.
Mine had some pocket money,then if they wanted extra,had to do extra chores to normal ones.

schoolchauffeur · 21/07/2012 11:06

Hang in there OP- it really does get better! My DS was a nightmare at 11-12- making arrangements to do things with friends which just weren't possible, saying we would go and pick up friends from places which were miles away etc, inviting people over for and sleepovers on weekends when we weren't free and then having a major melt down when we had to ring all the parents and explain it wasn't happening!

It is just the first sign of him trying to be independent and strike out to organise things on his own and he will have no real idea about how much money is involved. With my DS I tried to show him things in terms he could relate to and see why things were so much money eg if I spent 10 lots of £5 plus popcorn etc taking people to the cinema thats going to be about £100- more than it costs for a whole weeks food shopping for the whole family. Or at the time that was like 5 months of his pocket money!

If he doesn't already have pocket money start to give him some and let him have the responsibility of spending it- he will make some mistakes ie wish he hadn't spent it all on day 1, buy things that are poor value etc but that is how he will learn.

Focus on some of the positives- tell him how impressed you are he has 10 friends who all want to do something with him and that it is good that he really wants to organise some things with his friends and suggest ways in which it might work eg he can take 3 friends if its clear everyone is paying for their tickets, but you will give them the lift there and maybe buy the popcorn.

If it helps, I made a whole load of mistakes along the way, but now he is 14.5 he has really turned a corner, always checks out arrangements first and the number of strops has decreased to hardly any, they are short lived and he is just starting to see them for what they are and comes and says sorry afterwards.
Good luck!

needsomesunshine · 21/07/2012 14:06

Thankyou school chauffeur that is really reassuring. Smile I will sit down & talk to him abut it. He does get pocket money but I need to explain costs to him properly

OP posts:
schoolchauffeur · 22/07/2012 21:58

Good luck OP- and one other thing. Was talking to DS yesterday about something I said he couldn't do, but reached a compromise on it. I thought he was still annoyed with me, but today he said to me that it was good when I talked to him like he was an adult and explained what an adult would do in the situation. For some reason that struck a chord with him. Just thought I would mention it.

New posts on this thread. Refresh page