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Teenagers

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

Original poster

Are all 15 year olds taking booze to parties?

111 replies

Kbear · 11/04/2014 18:14

apparently my DD is the only one whose parents don't buy her alcohol to take to parties...

I am remembering being 15 and drinking cider and hiding my drunk friends from my parents

I am remembering DH being the same and worse - so we have no room to talk about underage drinking but of course we don't want our DD doing it! haha

I'm not in AIBU but you're all going to tell me I am, right?....

advise please and sympathetic hugs about parenting teenagers :) and boundaries and letting go and other difficult stuff!

OP posts:
LynetteScavo · 11/04/2014 19:37

I definitely don't give ds alcohol and he and his friends aren't interested in drinking anyway.... Sue that'll change over the next year or two, but I won't be supplying them.

TheZeeTeam · 11/04/2014 19:39

No but the drinking age is 21 here so I wouldn't want to get arrested! Nearly all the parties my sons' friends have seem to end up at our house and none of them have ever brought alcohol or drugs. They're 17.

Although I think a legal drinking age of 21 is a little crazy IMO, I do like that his liver isn't getting a regular thrashing before its ready.

holmessweetholmes · 11/04/2014 19:48

Didn't 15 year-olds always do this? I'm always a bit Grin that loads of people drank underage themselves but are quite convinced that their own dc wouldn't dream of doing so!

Original poster
Kbear · 11/04/2014 20:14

the fact that we did it is precisely the reason we are worried sick lol

OP posts:
MrsDmitriTippensKrushnic · 11/04/2014 20:23

DS1 is 16. I'm happy for him to have a beer or two at family gatherings (he's 6'3 and built - I don't think it has any impact on him whatsoever) however, like a couple of people have already said, I don't and won't buy him alcohol to take to parties (not that he goes to many!)

I'll admit I was drinking fairly regularly at that age. DH (then just BF) is older than me and we were boring old farts who sat in grubby pubs for our exciting nights out, but my parents wouldn't be providing me with drink. I looked old enough to buy my own...

Looiloo79 · 11/04/2014 20:24

I buy my 16 yr old dd drinks to take to parties! Does that make me a bad mum? I buy her it so she doesn't drink something she shouldn't and she's happy with what she gets! I'd rather it be that way than doing what I did when I was a teenager and drank anything in sight without my parents knowing!

kaumana · 11/04/2014 20:27

holmes I have stated that my peer group, at the age of 15, were drinking alcohol.

However, my prior life/ DS's current peer group/online media friends has lead to full and frank discussions from an early age.

TBH the idea that alcohol is a norm is really worrying to me and I say that with a glass of Pinot in hand.

PortofinoRevisited · 11/04/2014 20:30

I was in the pub drinking tequila sunrises purchased by Royal Marines at 15.. Blush I turned out OK. I would be happy with the softer end of the alcohol scale - beer/cider etc. I would not recommend my grandad's peapod wine that I stole as it made us all sick as pigs.

PortofinoRevisited · 11/04/2014 20:31

I am locking up my PFB of course.

kaumana · 11/04/2014 20:39

porto Peapod wine?!

PortofinoRevisited · 11/04/2014 21:11

Jeez it was bad.

SirChenjin · 11/04/2014 21:16

I bought DS 2 small bottles of low alcohol cider when he was 15 - he was going to a party at his friend's house, someone we've known for ages.

I would much rather that I knew he was drinking and where, and the rule here is that if he comes home drunk he doesn't go to the next party (they are not a regular occurence). So far, he's behaved himself.

TheAwfulDaughter · 11/04/2014 21:16

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

kaumana · 11/04/2014 21:29

porto Grin That made me LOL!

TheZeeTeam · 12/04/2014 00:10

Tbh, I think the whole "well, I did it and it didn't do me any harm" mantra is probably quite responsible for the fact there are record amounts of under 40's suffering from liver disease in the UK.

This is not 1994. The pressures on our teens are totally different from the pressures we had. So, encouraging them to make the same, dumb mistakes just because we did is, quite frankly, a little bit stupid. Not least, because their drunken mistakes may end up staying with them for a lifetime if put in the wrong hands.

MillyMollyMully · 12/04/2014 00:22

It's a bit like people who advocate smacking children because they themselves were smacked a lot and it didn't do them any harm.

Clearly it didn't do them any harm.

I agree with TheZeeTeam.

SirChenjin · 12/04/2014 18:12

Yes, that's absolutely right - providing my son with 2 small bottles of cider for the occasional party is absolutely the same as advocating smacking.

Hmm
PortofinoRevisited · 12/04/2014 19:08

It is much better to let them have small quantities and talk about it than complete banning and no discussion in mho. I can remember my dad and sm talking about parties in the 60s. Drugs, alcohol, sex etc. Tales went from teen pregancies, people getting their eyebrows shaved off, to someone overdosing on heroin. Some of the stories were funny, some were so not. It made me very careful and gave me confidence to turn stuff down. And I lived through the ecstacy generation without even being tempted. I wish they had extended it to smoking though....

LaurieFairyCake · 12/04/2014 19:13

I know that my DC wouldn't do it because I know where they are at all times, they're not allowed in pubs, wandering about aimlessly or to house parties.

Much different than when I was young and I was very poorly parented - allowed out at all times to go to nightclubs and pubs, no curfew, given alcohol.

There are many things I don't do that my parents did.

LaurieFairyCake · 12/04/2014 19:14

And I was regularly given money for cigarettes - everyone smoked when I was young, my parents smoked 40 a day each - fags were a pound a packet.

Claybury · 12/04/2014 19:31

My DD15 and DS16 will not touch alcohol. ( weirdly ) I have offered them a small drink at home and they will not try it. At family gatherings relations try to get them to drink , like it's a treat, which really annoys me as DD has had on occasions to pretend to like it to be polite - I have said to DD15 that lots of people don't drink these days and it is perfect acceptable to say ' I don't drink ' . Society seems to put pressure on people to drink which is pretty unhelpful.
Before anyone tells me how lucky I am I should DS is much happier smoking weed, and had has tried other drugs, the only consolation being he doesn't mix them with booze.

IHaveAFifthSense · 12/04/2014 19:36

It hasn't been all that long since I was 15, and I was drinking at parties then but my mum wasn't buying it for me. She did buy me a bottle of Lambrini (because I'm classy) to drink in the house on my 16th birthday though.

BackforGood · 12/04/2014 19:39

Not here.
I have a 17 yr old ds and a 15 yr old dd.
It seemed to start happening once they got into the 6th form, so dd has another 18months before we'd consider it.

chocoluvva · 12/04/2014 20:06

DD didn't start taking drink to parties until she was 17. Once aged 15 she took some alcohol-free beer with her to look as if she was drinking. She denied all knowledge that it was hers!

Her BF used his brother's ID to buy drink when he was 16.

The 'cool' thing is to have shots apparently. Some parents provide their DC with beer or cider in the hope that they'll drink it instead of other alcohol.

MrsRuffdiamond · 12/04/2014 22:04

Just out of interest, Laurie, how old are your dc?

In my experience once their dc have reached 16, very few parents would go as far as not to allow them to go to house parties and 'gatherings', which seem to be the most common form of socialising between the ages of 15 -17!

I'm not saying parents shouldn't be able to say no in particular circumstances, but wouldn't a blanket ban on parties leave their dc completely out on a limb in relation to their peers?

Under age teens would rarely go to pubs and clubs, anyway, as ID is fairly rigorously checked nowadays from what I hear.