Moaning teen on holiday

[lljkk]

This may not be about teens, may just be the way DS is. But teen-ness is an aspect.

Last 3x we went on hol with DS (age 10-12) he had huge enthusiasm about the hol when we booked until suddenly a week or so before departure he was dead set against. Then he moaned the whole holiday.

Next big hol I want to book will be when DS is 14.5yo & I expect him to be twice as enthusiastic when booking & twice as grumpy while there. No matter how carefully I try to plan the hol with his input to meet his interests & needs.

So I need to learn how to ignore moaning teen on holiday. I would leave him behind but not feasible and he will insist he wants to go until a week or 2 before, anyway. Any wisdom how to make the experience more bearable for ME?

Factor in 3 other moody DC (& possibly moaning DH).

I feel your pain - nothing is ever quite good enough is it? We have spoken about not going away at all due to the utter painfulness of the moaning and complaining. But then that would be cutting our noses off......So we try to ignore ignore ignore then have a bit of a blow up and repeat as necessary with lots of tropical alcohol to ease the pain . We have al;so reluctantly come to the conclusion that what we like on holiday (fresh air, walking, historical stuff) does not an amicable holiday maake with teens so we have accepted that if they are happy (pool, nice food, the odd day trip) then we will be too. Am making a list of "our" holidays to take when they leave home!!

We find that hot holidays in a nice hotel with pool, food, drinks and, ideally, watersports are very successful - this can be in any country!
I love this as I can lie and read all day long!

Also skiing holidays!

As you say, if the teens are happy, you have a much more relaxing time

Unfortunately hot lazy holidays by the pool are exactly the sort of holidays that would make the spend the whole time moaning.

No, thing is, I want to do a several-weeks trip go see family far away. Who do live on the beach (literally) & it won't be too hot, could even be cloudy. Disneyland is on the itinerary and I want to walk the Grand Canyon with any willing DC.

but DS1 will STILL MOAN.

lljkk - do you think there may be something underlying this - for example a fear of flying that he is reluctant to tell you about? I ask because I was like this from age about 10. Prior to that I loved holidays but as a teen worrier I really dreaded holidays that involved flying. The fact that it comes to a head a week before departure may indicate this - though, he could just be hard to please and a moany teenager!

Teenagers moan between about 14 and 17. Then they realise who is paying and how lovely it is to be able to eat and drink what you want FOR FREE and then they shut up.

Moaning is banned, that's that.

Not that my lot do moan on holiday much. DD2 gets huffy we all walk too fast as we are taller, but that's about it.

She prefers the pool to the beach and this year we stuck her in the top end kids club.

Normally we tell her to shut up, but hotel was right on the beach so we just left her.

Fortunately we all agree holidays should be hot and be spent swimming or on water shutes so moaning is minimal.

My family couldn't afford holidays so they are very special to me, moan tolerance is zero.

OK fairs fair, moaning is banned in this house most of the time.

Not today as DD2 has ear ache and Dr. has said it's a virus take pain killers. Today she is allowed to moan.

Actually she's quietly playing SIMs

How in the world do you ban moaning? Besides, is it healthy to ban? I mean, it's just how he feels. Maybe I should allow 10 minutes of moaning & then banned for the rest of the day.

I wonder if it's a kind of homesickness? That'd be hard to articulate. I'm sure that was problem when he was 10. He read 6.5 of the Harry Potter books in the space of 3 weeks.

11: Everything was "boring", IIRC.

12: he wanted to play Minecraft & Warhammer instead.

Loves flying & new situations, as a rule. I guess best I can do is make sure I've got 3-5 things for him to look forward to & distract.

Is there a big age gap with the 3 siblings?
My two love holidays but they are only 2 years apart and "hang out" together on holiday. I think it might be less fun for them if they were on their own. Could you take a friend for him?

You can't ban moaning when the moaner calls it "sharing my opinion" and bangs on about the right to give that opinion at length...

LOL @ Homebythesea.

Actually there are 4 siblings, and reasonably close in age, they might all moan, to be fair, but DS1 is the worst. Not feasible to take a friend for DS.

I was hoping there was some strategy besides Ignore. Some advanced CBT technique, maybe.

Take them camping in the rain in the Welsh mountains. Tell them that if they're going to moan anyway it might as well be somewhere cheap. And then book yourself a nice expensive weekend spa break and leave them behind.

It is more bearable if they moan when you haven't put the effort or money into trying to please them.

I have been training DD2 for a very long time.

She likes moaning, non of the rest of us can be bothered with it.

She used always to have something to moan about on the way home from school. We ended up with a say something positive or shut up rule.

Otherwise DD1 and I fell out with her before we got home.

We are perfectly happy to listen to genuine concerns, but not her general grump about nothing.

We have experimented with a "Say 4 positive things before each negative thing rule." A wily child can get around that quite easily by fake compliments, but it does slow down the rate of moan.

It is more bearable if they moan when you haven't put the effort or money into trying to please them.

Ah, well ,tis the crux of the matter. Going on any sort of holiday is a huge effort for me, and all the more so if we spend ££££ to go on airplanes many timezones away (what I'm planning). So it grates a LOT if they moan.

I am the only person I know who routinely loses weight on holiday with DC, I can't relax enough to eat properly.

I like the "say positive things first" strategy. Will ponder on workable variations of that. Thx.