I’m at my wits end. My 14yr DS has been isolated by his former friendship group. School has been amazing, I’ve been as supportive and understanding as I can be. Have allowed mental health days and kept him home when asked but then he wants to hang out with his friend.
I have discovered in last few days he has been smoking weed and vaping. He constantly wants sleepovers at a friend who is not at his school but same age. This friend is skipping lots of school, smoking weed and shoplifting. The mother of this child is also struggling as she has two very younger kids and is a solo parent.
my son keeps saying only this friend understands him and hates living with me and hates living with his dad (we split 70/30 custody but since a big fight with his dad he is with me).
He keeps pushing for sleepovers at this friends house. He spent 2 hours yesterday messaging me to convince me to allow a school night sleepover I refused. I allowed him to hang out after school and have dinner.
I am trying to get him to see a counsellor and he is pushing back on that too. In messages to me he has threatened self harm on more than one occasion and last week he showed me cut marks on his arm they are thankfully not deep and he has told me he won’t do it again.
I am exhausted from the constant asking for things I’ve said no to he is relentless (has adhd). His behaviour is impacting my mental health as well as that of his younger sibling.
his messages to me are incredibly manipulative promising the world if I allow him sleepovers mentioning his mental health and how much he is suffering on the one hand I know what he is doing on the other hand it upsets me and I worry. Below is just a small snippet and as soon as I agreed the next day when home he reverted back to extremely poor behaviour.
“Mum I have no friends I sometimes I just rlly wanna kms mum ik what i have to do to help out and i’ve learn my lesson can we please just consider it i don’t want to annoy you i jus rlly want to stay here i’ll come home and we can have a good chat you can tell me the things that are gonna change and i will obey and if i stay over i’ll be home at a reasonable time making sure it’s not stressful”
he has refused support from school and now refusing to see counsellor. At this point do I just put my foot down and make him and no matter how relentless he is not give in? The whole house is under a cloud when he behaves this way. He has also called his sibling some disgusting names and has become physical with her.
the relentless and other behaviours are not new ie they were before the friendship group breakup.
im sorry it’s all a jumble.