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Teenagers

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

Original poster

How to deal with this? 15 year old DD ...

13 replies

PiperChapman · 30/12/2013 19:12

Can't quite decide how to deal with this one so I'd love some input - maybe the hive mind will throw some ing up that I've not considered yet.

My DD is doing well at school, in year 10. Never been in trouble and predicted 12 A grades. She's kind, pleasant ( on the whole! ) and never given me any trouble at all really. She's getting on my nerves at the moment however !

It started about 7 weeks ago. She read a book that she loved which focused on two girls having a pen pal friendship. She really wanted to have a pen pal and looked up a site on the net. She ran it past me, I checked out the site and all looked fine to me. She set her profile to only accept messages from boys and girls between 14 and 16. I was satisfied it was above board.

Its become a bit of a nightmare though. She exchanged a few letters with a 16 year old boy who I shall call Ali. I read a letter ( she offered it to me ) and it was utterly harmless. They then moved on to text - again , I checked a few - harmless. I thought no more about it until I got a call from the student manager at the school asking me to pop in.

I arranged an appointment and immediately asked my DD what was going on - the student manager wouldn't be drawn. She broke down in tears , saying I never listened to her, didn't understand her problems, just said ' motherly ' things like ' you need an early night ' etc etc . She then insisted that she didn't know what was wrong and that she just felt sad and down a lot. Obviously I wanted to know WHY and it then came out that she was self harming. I made her show me where and had to look at least five times to make out the merest hint of a scratch on her hip. I'm confident that she's not self harming and that this is some form of attention seeking ( can't think of a better way to put that )

So we chatted. I went to the appointment. After a day or so of talking etc i was satisfied that this is just usual teenage angst and relatively normal ( she has no home life issues and isn't being bullied etc )

Fast forward to a fortnight ago. I discover god knows how many scribbled letters to Ali - I read one or two and got the general gist. They're very needy and love struck and begging him to get in touch / text her as ' it's been twenty minutes and I'm so worried about you. ' I popped them away ( I'd been binning rubbish in her room and they were on the floor ) and I won't mention it to her. It explains the morose behaviour thou

She then starts talking via face time to a boy in America. Mt via this site. I've seen him, it's harmless, I've listened to her chatting to him ... And it's literally all she does. Hours on end - 6 or so a day. So she's transferred all of this from Ali to this lad in the states. And she is becoming rude and back chatting to me.

I've said I want some boundaries set in place. I've said I want her off this pen pal site. She's chatted to this boy for 6 hours today - Christ - what is acceptable ? Do I bring out the big guns and ban it ? Or let it run its course ? Wwyd?

OP posts:
Original poster
PiperChapman · 30/12/2013 19:17

Sorry that was garbled!

OP posts:
nomorecrumbs · 30/12/2013 19:22

Oh, I was just like this at 15 >.< sorry that's not much help...

Encourage her in the nicest way to get out more? That's what my own DM did, and I got over being strange eventually.

Earlybird · 30/12/2013 19:23

Does she have hobbies/interests?

Does she have local friends?
Has this become a problem over Christmas break when she's out of school, or was it a problem before (wondering if it has escalated when she has too much time on her hands)?

Mitzi50 · 30/12/2013 19:24

I would ban it (or maybe the Internet could conveniently "crash" for a couple of days). I would also try and talk to her again and maybe arrange some counselling. Her behaviour is quite extreme and she is obviously making herself very vulnerable. Could you insist that she only uses the computer downstairs?

Palika · 30/12/2013 19:26

Oh dear, that sounds difficult. I think you should sit her down and put some boundaries down about time. I have a son and it's all about time on computer games. The main thing is to negotiate and not decree - get her to see reason by discussing it at length. Then agree on reasonable times and put it in writing.

I don't think you can stop the falling-in-love-thing, though.

Original poster
PiperChapman · 30/12/2013 19:28

We live rurally and 5 miles from her friends with no buses so no, she can't just pop out. I run her into town and she has her best friend stay over ( she's here now ) but is not like being in town. We are moving in the spring though so that'll sort that one

No hobbies as such. Reading is a big passion of hers

OP posts:
Original poster
PiperChapman · 30/12/2013 19:31

I agree she is vulnerable but I'm not daft and like to think that I'm on the ball with what she's up to. Ish. I'm not all seeing however so was a little taken aback by the daft swoony letters. And I'm at a loss re the face timing. I'm going to say that when she is back at school she must focus on homework when she comes in and once that is done she can ace time fr an hour

This will not be acceptable to her I feel !

OP posts:
Original poster
PiperChapman · 30/12/2013 19:31

Apologies for typos.

OP posts:
nomorecrumbs · 30/12/2013 19:45

Daft swoony letters are so typical of a 15 year old's crush. I was worse. The facetime can become so very addictive - it would be great if you could find some way of encouraging/distracting her from it.

Earlybird · 30/12/2013 21:06

Maybe it would help if you came up with a 'plan' for each day of the holidays - household project, invite a friend over, go to the cinema together, etc. That way, she won't be lounging around with hours to fill each day - which will hopefully keep her off the computer.

minniemousey · 30/12/2013 21:17

I was v v similar as a teenager. would recommend drastically reducing Internet time...I was drawn into a whole other life/world through the Internet and neglected everything in real life as a result. It difficult to face unhappiness/problems in real life when you can escape for 6 hours a day. For me, my life didn't improve until I was banned from the Internet. I felt like I got emotional withdrawal symptoms from it and I screamed and shouted and hated my parents etc...but eventually I did start to reconnect with real life and the people around me. If you're the kind of person prone to disappearing into the world of a book or film to lose yourself then the Internet can be another way to do that- only books end, films end. The Internet is always there, day and night for hours at a time and it's very easy to get lost in it.

Rosencrantz · 30/12/2013 22:19

Real life friends are the only way to go here!

Buy some cinema tickets, or a day at a theme park?

nomorecrumbs · 30/12/2013 22:57

Exactly, minniemousey. Wow, I've never made the connection between the world of books and the world of the Internet before - what you said is very true.

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