15 DD, pandemic and secret boyfriend

[TZelix]

Need advice on handling this situation...
Having my 15 year old daughter in an all girls school and with us being on lockdown - I was completely unprepared for this...
We have been tracking her on her “wellbeing” walks at the weekends and found her going to weird, quite secluded places in the parks and local commons for the last few weeks.

Yesterday we decided to surprise her and join her in one of those places to see what she gets up to. Well, it was us who got surprised, as we found her there with a boy!
Apparently they met through a school friend and have been meeting like this since Feb. He cycles to see her at the weekends from London and they walk and have been kissing.

Yes, I am shocked to find out like this. But most of all I am paralysed with fear of what could have happened to her - we had countless safety talks before!
We talked a bit yesterday, she knows quite little about this boy, they were only getting to know each other, but he makes her laugh and she seems to like him.
What’s the appropriate response and reaction here? In the heat of the moment I have grounded her for life and taken her phone off, but clearly this is not a sustainable approach. I want her to know that I know she is growing up and will want to have relationships, and I do want her to feel safe talking to me about these things, but the fact that she has been secretly meeting this stranger and during pandemic just makes me furious and sad in equal measures

She has been crying most of the day in her room today, bless her, I think she is shocked and exhausted herself. I am just completely unprepared for handling this kind of situation calmly and wisely, it’s not at all how I thought my daughter’s first boyfriend would appear in our lives. What would you do?

My son is 16 and year 11. He has a girlfriend and they too met via a friend in lockdown. I think you have to accept that is is normal for this age. The boy isn’t a stranger. A teenager is not going to tell you everything. It is hard your DD is growing up and will be having sex soon. You just need to make sure she understands consent and that she can say no at anytime.

What are you even going on about? Your poor daughter.... she's entitled to privacy ffs 🤦🏼‍♀️

Ladies, we talked some more and we are on route to resolution, thank you.
A couple of points I wanted to clarify before I sign off:

1. My daughter is not “poor girl” and my style is not “draconian”. It is not her first time out with friends, and we don’t normally use the app for these purposes. There have been some discrepancies in her telling us where she is going and with whom. Hence us taking a closer look at her location.
2. Our relationship is normally open and honest, hence my concern and overreaction at her dishonesty on this occasion.
3. Location tracking is agreed to, transparent and not imposed.
4. Contrary to some of your comments where she is is our business. She is still 14.

5 Her phone was given back to her in the morning.

1. Thank you for your suggestions of giving this relationship an option to develop through face time and zoom calls - ill encourage it.
2. Just went in to see her, we chatted and both apologised. She understands that my reaction was to her safety and not the fact that she was with a boy. We are also planning to invite him over and meet him properly after the lockdown
3. Your comments on balance have given me a great insight into how much freedoms is expected by 15yo these days and what I need to aim for to keep my relationship with my DD open and honest.
4. Some of you need a reminder that making strong and vocal assumptions about someone’s personality, views, life style, values and relationships based on a paragraph on social media is not ok and often wrong.

Have a good evening and hope your children stay safe x

@Extremelyilluminated

I think it’s acceptable to expect teens not to lie about where they are, especially if they’re going out alone.

IME the stricter the parents, the bigger the lies.

@TZelix

Ladies, we talked some more and we are on route to resolution, thank you. A couple of points I wanted to clarify before I sign off:

1. My daughter is not “poor girl” and my style is not “draconian”. It is not her first time out with friends, and we don’t normally use the app for these purposes. There have been some discrepancies in her telling us where she is going and with whom. Hence us taking a closer look at her location.
2. Our relationship is normally open and honest, hence my concern and overreaction at her dishonesty on this occasion.
3. Location tracking is agreed to, transparent and not imposed.
4. Contrary to some of your comments where she is is our business. She is still 14.

5 Her phone was given back to her in the morning.

1. Thank you for your suggestions of giving this relationship an option to develop through face time and zoom calls - ill encourage it.
2. Just went in to see her, we chatted and both apologised. She understands that my reaction was to her safety and not the fact that she was with a boy. We are also planning to invite him over and meet him properly after the lockdown
3. Your comments on balance have given me a great insight into how much freedoms is expected by 15yo these days and what I need to aim for to keep my relationship with my DD open and honest.
4. Some of you need a reminder that making strong and vocal assumptions about someone’s personality, views, life style, values and relationships based on a paragraph on social media is not ok and often wrong.

Have a good evening and hope your children stay safe x

Some of you need a reminder that making strong and vocal assumptions about someone’s personality, views, life style, values and relationships based on a paragraph on social media is not ok and often wrong. Have a good evening and hope your children stay safe x

The fact you asked for our opinions and didn't like the responses is what happened there.

She has the app for you to make sure she is safe. Not to track her at weekends. That is very controlling.

I agree in Covid she shouldn’t have been meeting lots of people but she is allowed to go for a walk with one other person so I would let that go.

This is normal behaviour.

Sneaking around?? Like how you sneaked around and followed her?

She’s not done anything wrong, your being way over the top- now wonder she hid it from you, your going about this all wrong.

You’ve lead by example as far as the sneaking around goes. I do understand that you’re concerned for her safety, lockdown rule breaking etc. But she won’t trust you if you don’t trust her.

Strict parents = good liars.

I have a 15 year old boy, we don't have a location app or anything but when he goes out I do know roughly where he is going and who with and especially at the moment due to rule of meeting only one friend. When ds had a girlfriend at 13/14 I knew when he was going to meet his girlfriend as welll as again he said .
I would be upset of the secrecy etc but also want to find out why , did she think you wouldn't take it well and thats why dhe kept it all to herself ?

As for what all these posters were up to at 15 , not all my friends were and also we were not in the middle of a pandemic .
The Op had a problem with the lying and sneaking around as opposed to her daughter having a boyfriend as such

OP, l think you are right to try and protect your daughter by whatever means. 14 is too young for sexual activity. 2 teens in private are going to be doing something sexual. Yes, lots of girls have drinks and snogging in early teens as good fun but also lots of girls are raped or coerced in sexual activity they are not ready for, that is why there is an age of consent. As well as trauma, there is pregnancy and STIs to consider, and covid. It's good that your girl will listen to you, keep that up as long as possible, it is more a negotiation as they get older. Good luck! What age is the boy? There is a pattern on mumsnet of posters attacking mothers who are having sensitive problems with their children.

@Seatime

OP, l think you are right to try and protect your daughter by whatever means. 14 is too young for sexual activity. 2 teens in private are going to be doing something sexual. Yes, lots of girls have drinks and snogging in early teens as good fun but also lots of girls are raped or coerced in sexual activity they are not ready for, that is why there is an age of consent. As well as trauma, there is pregnancy and STIs to consider, and covid. It's good that your girl will listen to you, keep that up as long as possible, it is more a negotiation as they get older. Good luck! What age is the boy? There is a pattern on mumsnet of posters attacking mothers who are having sensitive problems with their children.

So we’ve gone from a consenting snog in broad daylight to rape 🙄 good grief, no wonder mums like OP are a bag of nerves.

I can’t believe you track your fifteen year old and follow her about. That’s really wrong.

Back off or she will end up rebelling big style, not a snog in a park

@Imapotato

You’ve lead by example as far as the sneaking around goes. I do understand that you’re concerned for her safety, lockdown rule breaking etc. But she won’t trust you if you don’t trust her.

Strict parents = good liars.

Mostly this.

You're also clearly unhinged. If I'd decided to "surprise" my daughter when she was out (I wouldn't, that's mad) and found her with a boyfriend it would've been funny and I'd have just done normal introducing type things and either let them be or all carried in walking together.

She must be mortified by how you behaved.

I am imagining how embarrassing it will be for the young man to come to your house!

You do need to have the conversation about sexual activity (or not having such and staying safe).

The boy I was sneaking around at 15 with and meeting in the local park (who was also 15) , is now my DH 16 years later!

It doesn't sound like she is doing anything wrong to me.

I don't know if you're still reading OP, but you did something my dad would have done. I felt I had no privacy growing up and that was hard.

Keep lines of communication open, and I think you have to try to show her you do trust her and you're not big brother. I'm mid 30s now and for a long time struggled telling my parents anything about my life, and faced really hard times alone.

I know this might not make sense but because they would spy on me and even though I knew it was cause they were worried, I just felt like they were judging me rather than trying to understand me.

Feel for your girl. I really do. My folks and I are good now but it did take a while

I also think you need to reflect on why she felt she couldn't tell you she was seeing a boy.

Not to 'pile on' but my mum once did this when I was 17 and it had a huge impact on me. I already felt I couldn't talk openly to her about growing up, and for her to then find out where I was and turn up and drag me home was just awful. Tread carefully with how you treat your teenagers privacy and maturation into an adult, please. I've navigated the teen years of two of my kids now and I think I did ok. More to go like as my younger ones are still primary age, but if you want them to be open then you really need to give her some space to find her own way, show her a bit of trust, and trust that you did a good job raising her to this point.

@TZelix

I would like to thank everyone who shared their thoughts without making attacks on my character, parenting style or judging my views. I think I have a good idea on how I need to fix my situation.

I guess we are here to learn from each other and people who ask for advice often already feel vulnerable and kindness is appreciated.

That's very graciously put. I think many people were unnecessarily rude. I don't know what they seem to gain by such comments. If you can't say anything helpful when someone asks for advice, perhaps take your judgement elsewhere.

If it's any consolation, most of my friends with teenagers would have reacted similarly upset by having their DD keeping secret that they are meeting a bit they have met online, given that this could have turned out differently. Hopefully going forward this will open up new conversations between you. I have a 18 and 15 year old DDs. It's certainly a roller coaster ride.

@KurtWilde

Your last sentence is a really good one. Apart from a minority, if kids are raised being open and honest and knowing that when they make mistakes (and they will, it's not an if), they can go to their parent and know they can ask for help without being scared, there's no reason to not trust your child and yourself for raising them.

This could have been my son and his girlfriend 12 months ago (just before lockdown).

They met through friends. I've always talked to my son about safety too. About the dangers of people online not being who they say they are but this girl goes to school with a friend of his from his theatre group. They met in a group first before going out together. She got her friends to follow her round town the first time they went out alone just to make sure she was safe!

I now know that they were meeting up in a local country park before ds admitted to me they were going out. They had about 4 months where they didn't see each other at all (March - June). My first reaction was, how lovely/sweet but please be aware of the covid risks.

@daisyjgrey thanks! I always thought part of my mums insecurities abuts me and my siblings as teenagers was down to not really trusting herself to have raised us 'right'. So that made her quite controlling and invasive. I trust I'm doing a good job - or to the best of my abilities - and that helps me in trusting my DC.

I've always trusted my kids and let them get up to the usual things as teens (they are now both at university). What DD was up to was pretty standard hardly shocking. I never did find my phone or followed them and I think that is why we have quite an open relationship. But you've been listened OP and have made amends with your DD and hopefully you can get back on a trusting and caring footing.

In fact my DD20 and I have just agreed to do findmyphone. She suggested it. Because I live on my own and I'd like someone to have an idea where I am if something happened to me and she'd like me to have hers too for the same reasons - particularly since I don't know any of her college friends personally so couldn't contact them if she went AWOL for a while.

"Having my 15 year old daughter "

When did she have her Unbirthday and become 14?