A difficult situation!

[TeenageConfusion]

NC for this.

My 15 YO daughter's friend is a lovely young woman who's having a tough time with her mother at the moment.

It's come to light that she's smoking a lot of weed, her mother is under the impression that she's getting it from my daughter, she's actually getting from her father (mother and father are together, obviously not a good and honest relationship).

I've had communication from the mother that she sees my daughter as a bad influence and doesn't want her daughter coming to my house any more.

I do have a very good, open and honest relationship with my daughter (I'm not delusional, or a credulous fool, before anyone says anything!) we really do, which is how I know it's the father of the friend that's supplying her with weed.

I see their friendship as a supportive relationship that they've had for six years. The last time her daughter was here, they got the Schleich horses out, made pancakes and watched movies, we are not a den of iniquity!

And I'm not about to dob the father in, because it's not my job, if I had any communication with him I'd tell him to sort this out, but I don't, and his daughter apparently asked him if she could tell her mother that he was giving her weed.

His response?

'Don't get me involved'.

And I know they'll be a million responses telling me to just tell her, but I can't do that because I'd be breaking a confidence which is the bond of trust between me and my daughter and there's obviously a dynamic in this family that wouldn't be helped by me just lobbing a bomb in it.

Any advice?

I'm not even sure if I need advice, because there's no sensible solution, I guess I'm posting to talk it through.

It sounds like the adults (you and the girl's parents) are caught up in seeing the problem as lying in the other family rather than focusing on what your dd's are doing and need.

I can't believe that you don't want to know who is supplying your dd. In your shoes I'd be concerned about her dealing too.
Her dd is probably telling her mum things that make your dd look bad. If my 16yo told me she smoked weed at your house then I wouldn't be happy with that but it sounds like she needs to look closer to home as her dd is as bad as yours. Most people would hope that an end to the friendship meant an end to taking drugs rather than accepting it.

So, what you're saying is that weed use is common in your family. Your 15yo dd uses it, and while you're not a fan, you don't think it's that big a deal and as long as she doesn't smoke at home, you let her get on with it. All under the category of normal teenage experimentation or self medication.

Fair enough. You're entitled to parent as you think fit. However, having seen what weed often does to the minds of teens who smoke it regularly, I would be really uncomfortable with my dd spending time with yours. I completely understand where the other mum is coming from. And given that you don't actually seem to care where your dd gets her own drugs, it may well be that she's right that your dd is supplying the weed to her daughter after all. You wouldn't know.

In many ways, I'm with you about giving your teens a safe space to discuss stuff, not being overly controlling etc. That's pretty much how I approached parenting during the teen years and it worked well. I do have some red lines though, and my dd always knew it. Shrugging your shoulders and turning a blind eye to a teen doing illegal drugs is not good parenting in my opinion... and especially not a teen who has adhd! (As do I!)

Your daughter and her lovely friend are smoking weed. This is not legal.
Your daughter may be supplying weed.
Your daughter smokes weed. You say you don’t approve but that’s as far as your parenting goes here.
You have open and honest communication but don’t know how much she smokes or where she gets it.
Frankly you do sound rather feckless here.

If you genuinely believe the father to be supplying drugs to your daughter you tell him to stop, you tell his wife what is going on and you tell the school.

Stop bring cool with your dd. You are damaging her life chances. Not only is smoking a health issue, weed makes you sluggish, demotivated and unable to learn.

Dont break your daughter’s confidence. It’s so important that she knows she can tell you anything. I would follow the other mums lead and agree to keep the kids apart. Because assuming what you have been told is true, you know the other girl is the bad influence. I wouldn’t let this kid come over, and thankfully I assume your daughter can’t go to theirs. Be honest with your daughter, tell her you don’t mind her smoking the odd bit of weed, but you don’t think it’s a good idea to spend too much time with someone that comes from a family like that. Not to mention if something goes wrong this girl will drop your daughter in it. Focus on your own child, keep her busy on the weekends. Don’t worry about the other child. Eventually the mum will find out what is happening.

How do you know that there’s no grooming involved? You’re refusing to ask her where she gets it from.

It’s entirely up to you how you parent and you’re happy with your decisions. But most people would care where their child is getting drugs from. Even the coolest of moms.

I absolutely know that there's no grooming involved.

I know where my D is pretty much all the time.

She is not 'Out and About'.

We have therapy sessions Weekly.

I pretty much know she's getting it from her boyfriend. Who is a nice kid really. And is 15. I believe he gets it from his uncle. We live in the middle of nowhere and he's here half the week. That's where she gets it from.

And they go out in the fields and smoke weed.

It's not the worst thing.

I don't think either of them are 'bad influences'.

They are just teens going through a rough time together.

I am absolutely not 'a cool mum'.

I totally understand op I have teens too!

If she stops seeing your daughter and still smoking weed that will be a tell tale sign. Maybe the mother will click? Maybe she won't.

They've had a good friendship, and sometimes things change for teens, they meet new people, grow up and move on .

Probably best to just leave it and concentrate on your dd. They'll be 16 soon and have a bit more independence and maybe they'll stay friends who knows.

A neurodivergent 15yo being supplied with illegal drugs by her boyfriend? It isn't the worst thing, no, but personally, I would find this extremely concerning. You seem very chilled about it?

I am absolutely not 'chilled' about it.

But what are your options?

It's not OK.

So hit me with your brilliant parenting plans for this situation.

I am all ears.

If my teen and her friend smoked anything in my house they would get far more than “it’s not ok please don’t do it”
Your DD smokes weed with this friend, her father supplies it.
Stop worrying about being a cool parent and do something

Well exactly. Here we have the mother of a 15 year old girl who she knows smokes weed and she is wondering why another mother might see her child as a bad influence! FGS!!

Look, I'm not going to tell you how to parent your child. You say you have a really good relationship with your dd so you will presumably know better than anyone how to influence her. I certainly know what works for mine.

I do think it will be harder to change course now because you have effectively been condoning your child's illegal drug use to date by shrugging your shoulders and letting her get on with it. And of course, it won't help if smoking weed is completely normalised by your family. You say that you're not chilled about it, but you don't come across on here as being particularly worried about it... you didn't even mention it in your first post, which was more about your concerns over her friendship with another girl.

I'm not having a go, genuinely. We all have different boundaries as parents and we will all assess risk differently. I wasn't ever one of these parents who sought to control my dd's every move. We have always communicated openly and honestly, and I have tried to let her have as much freedom as possible while trying to keep her safe. I get where you're coming from. But I have also seen the damage that regular weed use does to young people, and this is one of the few things that I would most definitely intervene on. All the more so because she has adhd!!!

Definitely this.

I have a nephew who had a serious psychotic episode after smoking weed - it has intermittently plagued him over the following years.

The mother of your DD's friend is protecting her child's best interests.

How to deal with it?

By outlining the health dangers, the illegality, the fact that the money ends up with very unsavoury characters doing very horrible things to people.

By pointing out that a drug habit will be detrimental to her overall life chances in terms of career & relationships.

By not welcoming other drug users into your home.

By acknowledging that even though teenagers do experiment, it’s your job as a parent to set appropriate boundaries.

You make it sound almost inevitable that your teen will become an habitual drug user. Plenty of teenagers have zero interest in drugs, it’s not a foregone conclusion that kids will take drugs.

You just sound so passive!

I was in a somewhat similar situation. Well, no weed, but it involved a girl lying to her mother about something my DD did and herself did together, making out DD was the bad guy. Yeah of course you don't want to get in middle of their mess or violate your kid's desire to tell you truths.

We took the 'hit'. I apologised without confessing anything specific, without saying things other girl did. DD became much less friends with the other girl. Their mutual friends hollered at other girl (via social media) when they found out, because the friendship circle knew full picture.

I've had communication from the mother that she sees my daughter as a bad influence and doesn't want her daughter coming to my house any more.

So hit me with your brilliant parenting plans for this situation.

I imagine saying "I am convinced my DD is not the supplier you think she is. But I utterly respect you putting up boundaries on behalf of protecting your daughter so of course she will follow your wishes & not visit. I hope things improve soon."

I imagine being a lot more shouty if DC were smoking weed on my property.

I wouldn't let an adult scapegoat my child. I'd say, 'They do smoke weed together and like you I'm unhappy about that, so if you want them not to hang out together for this reason, I will explain and respect that. But you should know that your daughter's weed supplier is her own dad. She wants to tell you but he asked her not to. I wouldn't get involved in this but you seem to think my daughter is the supplier and she isn't. I want that to be very clear.

I also agree with @Paq, Saying 'teens will teen' about weed is really passive. My teens got told how dangerous and strong weed is these days. We never expected them not to try it but we did openly discuss issues people have with it, from being unable to get out of bed to triggering psychotic episodes.

@MrsBennetsPoorNerves
Your final para mentions it’s particularly bad if a child has ADHD.

Do you know why exactly (not being funny here), I’d be very interested to know?

I totally get you too. I have a 19 year old and a 21 year old and have a similar relationship with them and their friends. I have seen the difference between one of ds's friends who has the kind of relationship with his mother as you and the one who does not. (he has come through the other side, no longer smokes weed, will listen to reason and accept help and is a thoroughly nice young person whereas if you come down too hard they can just rebel and go the other way).

I think you need to speak to your dd and her friend and tell them that you don't want to break confidences but her mother needs to know the supplier is a family member.

Your decision about how you handle the weed with your own DD is yours - but I do not think it is reasonable to expect other parents to be happy about that. They will have taken their own decisions as to how best to protect their children. So you must not be surprised if they avoid contact with your DD.

Where or how this friend acquired her weed is not the basis of the problem here and is a bit of a side issue. The issue is that you have chosen a route for dealing with it - and it will not be the same route that other parents feel is correct for their child.

it will turn into a shoot the messenger situation if OP tells other mum what OP knows.

The odds that OP can make this situation "better" for anyone by telling the mother who the true supplier is, only about 5%.

vs. telling other mum the truth, the chances are

90% OP's DD will tell OP less
90% OP's DD's friends will take note & tell their own parents less
90% OP's DD's friends will blame OP's DD for trusting an adult with that info
90% the other mum will have degraded relations with OP, because other mum is embarrassed or decides OP is interfering or not telling full truth, is who triggered here marital breakdown, somehow still to blame, possibly in many ways, too permissive & enabling, etc.
50% OP will get dragged in further because of denials & dismissals from the other DD & her dad
15% the picture isn't as simple as dad is the only supplier.... kids with weed share it
50% Other mum will still blame OP's DD as a bad influence, regardless of dad being a supplier (too)

This dilemma comes up often in my experience of teens, because I have teens who talk to me. You have to decide which info is so important that it over-rides the relationship damage. Abuse & neglect obviously fit in that category. And you can convince your own teens why. Rumours like OP describes: no way.

mid-teen DS came home with detailed tale of who had shoplifted wine at local supermarket. Yes DS drank some, too.

I told the supermarket the time & date & what was item nicked. I sure as heck didn't approach the parents (live around corner from me, lovely people, "good parents").

Lots of reasons.

Firstly, as someone who has adhd myself, I'm always mindful that substance abuse of any kind is more prevalent among people with adhd than without it. I think the risk of addictive behaviour is higher than for the general population. And I would be concerned about the weed itself but also about weed as a gateway to other illegal drug use. (I believe that the evidence on this is inconclusive but given that impulsive behaviour is a common feature of adhd, I would be concerned about an adhd teen having access to people dealing illegal drugs and to their barriers of what is acceptable being lowered by already crossing that line.)

Secondly, lots of people with adhd try to self medicate with cannabis but there is a growing body of evidence that a)this doesn't work as well as they might think and b) it can actually make adhd symptoms worse.

And thirdly, there is a danger that the weed might interact badly with the adhd medication.

If you Google adhd and weed, you will find plenty of info.