DD came home 1.5hrs late because she wanted to. WWYD it WASN'T a year 11 leavers thing

[LegoTherapy]

I don’t want to overreact but I’m really annoyed with her.
She’s 16 and in the middle of her GCSEs and wanted to go out last night with friends to a park. Not a play park but a series of fields and open space next to the river where all the school idiots jump in and risk drowning every summer. It’s a mile away and very isolated. I was happy for her to go on the understanding I knew where she was, what time she was going, what time she’d be back and who she was with and that she wouldn’t be walking home alone. She agreed to be back at 9.30pm at the latest but I said preferably 9.15pm before it went dark.

Last year she ended up in A&E after going missing due to drinking and being given a spiked vape. She didn’t know where she was and it was extremely s art for us both, police involved etc. I didn’t know she was in the park, she was supposed to be at her dad’s. Due to this and the fact she doesn’t really go out, I worry about her going out to parks.

She messaged after 9.30pm to ask if she could stay out longer and I said no. At 10pm she said she was heading home. I then got a notification half an hour later to say she’d spent money in a take away. By this time I was really pissed off.

She came in 1.5hours late and then got upset that I didn’t want the pizza she’d bought me because I was going to sleep. She knew I was really tired and we’d arranged to watch our favourite tv programme together once she came home. I don’t eat late at night and she knows that. I sent her to bed and told her I’d speak to her in the morning. She may have been drinking but I don’t know for sure. I’m not too bothered if she was, depending on what and how much she was drinking due to the past experience.

I don’t want to overreact so please would you say what you would do/what you have done in situations like this?

Her location also wasn’t on and hadn’t updated for 24 hrs so I couldn’t see where she was for certain.

Her time management is awful generally and she’s late every day to school. I suspect ND (like me) but she won’t consent referral for assessment. She knew to be home before I was dark though so even if she found it suddenly dark she’d have only been 20 minutes late.

WWYD?

I think a 10 o’clock curfew for a 16 year old is a bit more reasonable.

Perhaps it was. Leavers thing but it wasn’t explained to me like that as this is something that’s been happening img every Friday for months but she didn’t know about it. A friend’s mum collected her and the friend and she was home at 10.50pm. If the friend’s mum hadn’t have gone I’d have got ds out of bed and gone and got her. I’ve no one to watch him. She’d have been in even more trouble then. She did have her location on so I could see she was right next to the river where it’s quite deep and where people are known to go in.
When she came in I said goodnight to her and shut my door, lights out and tried to go to sleep and then she came in and started saying goodnight and that she loved me and would leave until I said it back. I get that but she’s been told repeatedly that if my door is closed and my light is out that she doesn’t come in unless it’s urgent especially when I’ve already said goodnight. It’s annoying because at her dad’s when there’s an issue with her sibling or any issue if it’s after 9pm she won’t go and get her dad because he’ll be asleep because he’s got to be up early she says. No such consideration for me.
I’ll be having a long talk with her today. She’s proven twice now that she can’t be trusted to do as she says and that’s an issue. Teenagers 🙄

At 16 that's not overly late. I think safeguarding leads going on about tracking are ridiculous it doesn't make it any safer, just more controlling.
You need to talk to her about safety, presumably she was with others coming home?

Can I just ask that you hear her out on what happened and when.

When I was 16 I had to be home at 11pm on a Saturday (the only evening I was allowed out).

I would be in a gang from VI form but at 10.30 I had to leave the group to walk across town alone to get to the bus station. The bus I had to get dropped me about, well I'm not sure but a bit of a hike home.

It took me about 6 months of arguing with my mother that I could get the 11pm bus, with other people, that dropped me just opposite my home.

Sorry for the long rant.

She might have just decided to stay out. She might have been in a situation where she had a choice of walking home or being in a group.