Rules about boyfriends in bedrooms?

[TheOtherGirl]

DD1 is 14 and a half, and she's got her very first boyfriend who is 15. He's seems genuinely lovely.

They're in her bedroom now watching a film on her laptop. I've popped in once to check he's okay with chili for tea and they were sprawled on her big bean bag (both been snogging by the looks of it ).

DH is getting a bit hot under the collar about DD + boy + bedroom and I'm wondering the best way to ensure everyone is comfortable with the situation.

By the way, DD and I have already had several long chats about boyfriends/sex/pregnancy and she assures me that nothing is going to happen like that until she finishes her GCSEs.

blanket rules

Or duvet ones....

I had to have my bedroom door open when my first boyfriend was allowed upstairs. We still managed to have sex. I was 15. Gave birth to dd1 two months after my 16th birthday.

It happens and it's a real tricky one as we were having sex everywhere.

I never let dd1 have a lad in and I wont be letting dd2/3 have any boys in either. There wasn't any real sex education when I was in school and I really drummed in safe sex to dd1 more than any thing.

I think the point is that these are children, we should be protecting them from each other with their utter cluelessness and rampant hormones. As that is how things get out of control, and illegal activity and pregnancy happen. It might seem all sweet and innocent and a bit of snogging on a bean bag. But the consequences can be severe and we need to ensure that our kids aren’t pressured / don’t have the sheer wherewithal to do things they are not ready for.

For what it's worth.

The ultra-protective/strict parents saying their teenagers are simultaneously a) children and b) have rampant uncontrollable urges and c) must have their time filled with activities so they are too exhausted to ever grope someone behind the bikesheds, plus d) the only thing that matters is 4 A*s and a place at a Russell group university are bonkers.

Even if by sheer force of will they manage to get their teenagers to conform, those teenagers are not going to leave home feeling supported and they are not going to leave feeling they've had a proper chance to begin learning about relationships.

As a result they're going to be incredibly vulnerable when they go off to university and stand a much higher chance of going off the rails.

must have their time filled with activities so they are too exhausted to ever grope someone behind the bikesheds

To clarify, when DD started dancing aged 3, and DS started music aged 7, nothing was further from our minds than the possibility that this might fill their lives as teenagers!

It is a family joke that it leaves no time for anything else, but both have large, close, and in DS's case very mixed groups of friends through their chosen activity, so it definitely isn't about cloistering them up and wearing them out - just working as a team, often a mixed team, towards a shared goal rather than pairing off.

(I should imagine, tbh, that both will take their hobbies with them to university, and meet lots of like-minded friends through them, rather than having time-consuming hobbies rendering them vulnerable and liable to go off the rails)

DS often has quite a sizeable number of friends, including female friends, in his bedroom. They're just usually improvising or trying out film scores...and there are seldom fewer than 4 in there....

This reminds me of when I was 16. We were sat on my bed watching a film ( nowhere else to sit in my box room) and 18yo sister didn’t know he was there so walked in topless and gesticulating dramatically ... shrieked and ran down stairs. Apparently mortified she told my mum ‘she’d just walked in here’ but didn’t say what really happened. Mum ran upstairs like an enraged bull only to find out it was my sister being inappropriate ( without meaning to be) not us.

It was hilarious and I felt so bad for my sis.

I think the point is that these are children

I think the point is that, at 14, these are not children. Rather, they are adolescents, and adolescence is not the final stage of childhood that many parents seem to think it is.

One of my former colleagues - we were both teachers - used to refer to teenagers as "adults in training", which is a delightful term in my opinion. Sort of apprentice adults, if you will. And that means they need to have the opportunity, and encouragement, to practise adult things whilst still having the safety net of parental support when things don't go according to plan. That way, they really will be adults by the time they reach the official age, and won't flounder.

I think this current trend of treating young people as children and making all their decisions for them is a fairly recent phenomenon - and not a wise one.

leonard I completely agree. 14 is not a child. I don't think it's fair to shelter a child until they're 18 and then just let them go into the real world with no experience.

Totally agree Leonard. I think there may be a toxic mixture of love and control. Firstly some parents continue to put children so much at the emotional centre of their own lives that they struggle to realise that these children gradually become separate individuals. Secondly, there is increasing affluence. Parents invest economically in their children - buying them large amounts of goods and services and continuing to provide them with material support into early adulthood. In return for this investment they feel a sense of ownership of their children's lives. The children want love and the material support is useful. But they would still like to feel that their souls - and bodies - are their own.

"toxic mix of love and control..."

tosh

some of us just want to allow our kids to be kids for as long as THEY want to - without the peer pressures pushing them into illegal behaviour - smoking, drinking, sex - 16 is there for a reason... it is a lower limit, not a bloody target!

My kids (15 +16) are separate individuals, they are growing into wonderful, independent women, I'm sure they don't "conform" to my view of prim and proper, and experiment with all sorts of things - and we will be there if needed as a safety net of course - we are parents - but at 14 would not have had boys alone in their room -

and their own ideas of self-respect (instilled by us toxic controlling parents) would have had a bearing on that.

16 is there for a reason

This statement crops up a lot on MN.

Would you care to say what the reason is?

Yes what is the reason? I know the age of consent is lower in other countries. What is their reason for that?

We do seem to try to keep them "children" for longer than necessary. Classic case in point is them being kept in the education system until 18 years old. Just no need for that unless they're learning/training for a higher level qualification/job. It's sending mixed signals. Physically, they're "mature" in the early teen years, but society is saying they're still children to 18. Why? If they're not actively training or learning higher level qualifications, they could leave school at 14 and get a job. Considering nearly half left school at 16 without the basic "living" standards in Maths and English, it seems pointless to keep them there past 14 as their GCSE years seem wasted. I'd love to see the statistics now that they're kept to 18 to see whether substantially more do in fact ever achieve the "living" standards of numeracy and literacy. All society seems to be making "childhood" last longer, often for no good reason.

Yes what is the reason? I know the age of consent is lower in other countries. What is their reason for that?

OK. Long story as short as I can make it. (Not very short.)

When the 2003 Act was drafted, there was some suggestion that the age of consent should be lowered to 14 or 15. (Most of Europe has set it at one of those; in most of the rest of the world it's 16 - higher in a few places.)

No reason was given for keeping it at 16 - it was just stated it would stay the same. Reading between the lines, however, and considering the aim of age of consent laws generally, I think it is probably to increase the robustness of the law in terms of protecting vulnerable young people.

The Act does make clear that it is there to protect "children" (my quotes - child in the legal sense), not to punish them.
The main danger is seen to be from adult sexual predators, but there is an acceptance that some young people might be at risk from their own peer group. However:

The Crown Prosecution guidelines state "[I]t is not in the public interest to prosecute children who are of the same or similar age and understanding that engage in sexual activity, where the activity is truly consensual for both parties and there are no aggravating features, such as coercion or corruption."

This statement shows clearly that the government accepts that there can be consent below the age of consent, which seems nonsensical until you realise that there is another, lower, age of consent -13. Sexual activity with someone below the age of 13 is an absolute offence with no defence acceptable.

But the acceptance of consensual sexual activity between 13/14/15-year-olds is an example of what is known as a Romeo and Juliet clause. Other countries have similar laws - New Zealand, for example, and The Netherlands (one of the few European countries where the age of consent is 16). Personally, I think it sends the wrong message. "You're breaking the law but we're going to let you get away with it."

A better way, in my opinion, is the close-in-age exemption, where the law doesn't apply in the case of truly consensual sexual activity between young people of similar age. Canada and South Africa use this system, according to Wikipedia.

I think many countries are moving towards 16 being the standard. Spain raised their age of consent from 13 to 16 recently, and Croatia from 14 to 15 - in both cases with a close-in-age exemption.

One thing is clear. The law is not there to stop young people from being sexually active as long as it is really what they want. The law is there to protect them from having sexual activity forced upon them against their wishes.

And let's not forget, under-16s have been able to access contraception without their parents' consent or even knowledge, since the Gillick case of the mid-1970s.

That was really interesting. Thank you

I think the age of consent is 16 because that's reckoned to be the age by which most girls can be assumed to be old enough to give meaningful consent to sex, understand and use contraception (or care for a baby).

In reality girls are never going to reach this level of maturity at exactly the same time on their 16th birthdays, which is why they don't generally prosecute sex between 14/15 year olds, and also have additional legislation protecting 16/17 year olds from sex with people in a position of trust (eg teachers) where it's recognised the relationship is less balanced.

I don't think it's very useful to rely on the "it's illegal" argument alone really, as at 16 some girls may still not be ready, or not ready for sex in the particular relationship or situation they happen to be in. So they need to be able to understand when they're ready themselves, and communicate this. I wouldn't want my DD to think she couldn't say no to sex once she's 16 just because it's now legal

I First had sex aged 15,well nearly 16. It was fully consensual and I had the nous and wherewithal to sort contraception etc. I had done many other things beforehand, some of which I was happy with and some less so but felt that I “had” to do for peer pressure or situation at the time. Teens are going to do what they are going to do. All we can do is speak to them, educate them so they have high self esteem and full control over their own bodies and what happens to them.

I enjoyed being a teenager and have a happy and fulfilled life now which sometimes includes sex.

But that's because I am an adult. Life for a teenage girl presents particular problems. It would be boring to go into the whole range but my teenage sex life involved having things done to me by boys my own age for their thrills rather than for my own benefit. That doesn't mean it wasn't consensual; it just means I wasn't getting anything out of it.

I'd ask anyone here to say anything different. If they did, I'd be the first to congratulate them.

That's the problem I have with Funder's and leonard's advice to OP that makes her feel so happy about her decisions. Hardly any of us on this thread wants to stand in the way of young people who were once like us and want to make their way in the world and have pure and simple fun.

But I do think that as adults you have to keep a loving eye because you don't want to spoil fun or be draconian but because are adults and you've been through it and want to guide. That's what I think and I think that's what most people are trying to say to the OP

I haven't given the OP specific advice. I have tried to state facts, as far as I have been able to ascertain them.

But if I were to give advice, it would be to continue as she is, talking with her DD. Keeping the lines of communication open.

I have worked with very many teenagers. As a teacher, houseparent in a boarding school, Scout leader, and DofE expedition trainer. So I have experience with teenagers both within and outside the classroom. More of them have been girls because I worked in two all-girls' schools.

I have not discussed sex and relationships with them. Other teachers covered this. On the other hand, I have had many conversations on more general matters and gained a fair appreciation of their attitude to life. And it seems to me that the vast majority of 14-year-old girls I have met are far more concerned about their future (exams, career) and wouldn't even contemplate having sex until they are older, hormones or no hormones. As the OP says of her DD, they are quite clued up.

And if they can make this decision for themselves, why not let them? They are far more likely to keep to it than to a rule imposed on them and to which they have no input. The only way young people can practise making decisions is by, well, making decisions.

Of course, my sample may be biased, with a high percentage of well-educated girls who know their worth and that their body is their own. And there will be some girls who are not. I suppose that's why the law treats consent and coercion as two separate things - it is possible to be coerced into consenting to sex. And that's wrong.

But having rules about bedroom doors is treating the symptoms, not the cause. If girls really need to be protected from abusive over-zealous boyfriends, the real solution is education to empower them to "just say no".

Don't you think?

Are you a man leonardthelemming? I don't think that would preclude you from the debate; in fact I think that would be a valuable contribution. But I think that before going further it should be essential for you to say that in the interests of clarity and lived experience, don't you think? I am a woman, btw

....so I have incredibly 'old fashioned' values and I'm perfectly happy with them.

If they really really need that degree of privacy from you and you DH to conduct their relationship of bike maintenance and basketball tactics send them round to his place see if his Mum and Dad let him sit on a bean bag in his bedroom.

At the very least I'd find out if his Mum would be allowing it, if she thinks they have the same open and close relationships you say you have with dd. Being an unber cool laid back Mim requires a lot more background work than you'd think. (I'm not one as I said, life is too short to base my opinion of myself on how cool ds's friends think I am)

They dont have a human right for privacy to carry out sweaty groping please do check with the other parents tobsee if it meets with their approval as much as it does yours. It's not just your child involved in this.

I wouldn't allow my just 15 yo ds upstairs in bedroom with gf (14). We have 2 living rooms downstairs, they can do films/snogging in one

Sounds like my mum, no boys in bedroom but OK in front room, where I had sex. As well as the back of a car, in the park, in public toilets, but never in my bedroom.

FunderAnna

Totally agree

Leonard - if I've understood correctly you seem to be saying if teenage girls feel able to make the decision to start having sex when they feel ready we should let them?

I couldn't disagree more, firstly, it's illegal and actually for the same reason we don't let them drive cars. They don't generally have the cognitive skills to handle what might happen.

Some will, but personally I prefer the idea of a law being in place to protect the more vulnerable in society. If the age of consent is ignored by bright high achievers who are confident of their own worth then it'll be trampled on by manipulators of those less confident and sure of their worth.

Ffs, isn't life complicated enough for teenagers now without us letting them rush into a sex life. You only have to look at all the threads on here and so many other forums to see how complicated it can get, why do we want that for them?