Young Teenagers in the evening

[srbob]

Hi all after some perspective and some ideas of what your families do.

I have 3 young teens pre teen 11, 13, 14 and have found recently they seem to spend most of the evening upsatirs in thier rooms and i really miss them.

Is this normal?

ds (13) stays downstairs til 9pm then we kick him upstairs to settle down/read before bed. However, the ONLY reason why he does this is because we dont allow internet access in his room. If we did I can guarantee he would be up there. We don't actually communicate with him while he's down though as he's plugged in to his phone pertty much the whole time . However, we did agree he could spend the time after h/w etc as he wished so we can't force him to interact with us.

Do you think this is why yours stay upstairs?

DS (15) spends most of his evenings downstairs - but not with us. We have a separate sitting room in which the main computer, his tv and PS3 are set up, so he usually stays in there. On the occasions he is banned from using PS3/computer for poor behaviour, he usually migrates to his bedroom where he plays on his phone or reads a book.
The only time he graces us with his company is when we've got chocolates/popcorn/crisps in our living room!!!!

I think you'll find it's perfectly normal teen behaviour.

Yes normal teenage behaviour. I have 3 DDs now aged 25,22 and 20 and they all did this during their teen years. The only rule we made was they had to eat their evening meal at the table with us. We also let them know that we were always available if they wanted to speak to us.

Normal.
Up to aged 14 they had no computer or tv in their room so would be in the family study on computers or in the living room.
As GCSEs approached I relented and they got computer/ tv in their room and so they are up there a lot.
Like mumeee , I insist on evening meal at the table, plus most nights we find something we can all watch together. (Amazing how two teenage boys are glued to the Great British Bake Off!)

When they are in, normal teen behaviour, but mine all have things they go to, at least a couple of evenings a week, so it's not all they do.

Mine are the opposite. DDs 13 and 11 tend to gravitate to where ever I am. They spend very little time in their rooms (no computers or TVs in bedrooms)

I don't mind much, I spend a lot of time taxiing them about and we tend to chat then.

It's normal. It's why I spend so much time here!

Mine have no tv's, computers or games consoles in their bedrooms.

They can get wifi on their ipods, but the signal isn't great.

And now with the winter setting in, it's pretty cold up there so they migrate back to the sitting room [evil]

I have a 13 and 12 year old. They spend most of the time in our living room with us, probably because most of the entertainment options are in here. ds sometimes reads in his room but otherwise rarely goes there. dd only really goes into her room when she's been told off and is sulking or has been ordered to tidy it! Sometimes she slopes off with her ipod - we recently replaced her old one not realising that you can use it like a phone.

Absolutely normal, believe me. We insist on a family meal around table in the evening (just so that we still recognise them), because after that you never see a ruddy teen unless they want a) money or b) a lift somewhere.

Don't be sad - think of it as an opportunity for freedom; to do your own thing, watch your own tv, snog your dh without teenagers making vomit noises.

at sowornout