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Teenagers

Parenting teenagers has its ups and downs. Get advice from Mumsnetters here.

Help with 14 year old!

3 replies

LemonCrow · 18/06/2025 12:46

I'm so worried about our 14 year old DD; I feel like we're losing her and she's going out of control. We treat her with love and kindness and always try to speak with her but her standard responses to everything seems to be either 'it's not that deep,' 'you don't need to know or 'I don't care / I don't want to talk about it.'

She has a number of things going on including a recent ND diagnosis, which she first embraced but is now in denial over; mainly bc DH and I want her to move schools to one that is less intense and more suited to supporting her to get her GCSEs. She doesn't see why she should move and is verbally aggressive and very angry about this and refusing to move, despite all of the really nice options and the fact that she's been able to do a taster day there already.

She is going to a party at the w/e and last night told me she and her friends were sick at the last party bc of what they drunk, they want 3 (three each!!!) cans of alcohol to have before they go. I've said it's OK to have a small drink with the family over dinner but making their own cocktails is not OK and having multiple cans of alco-pops is definitely not OK.

She recently had a sleepover at our house with friends and last night I learned they pretty much cleared out our vodka stash between them. And the same night she climbed out of the window at 2am and disappeared off with a boy for 2 hours. We've already talked with her about her the last incident - breaking our trust and it needs to be earned back, personal safety etc.

I just don't know what to do. I fear it's only going to get worse. She is extremely bright and seems to know what buttons to push.

I feel we're doing all the right things for her future but her responses and behaviour....I'm afraid she is going to spin out of control and become more reckless.

Advice, experience...anything?!! Thank you in advance.

OP posts:
Sunshineandgrapefruit · 18/06/2025 17:29

Inform the other parents about the vodka. Ground her re sneaking out. How often do you check her phone?. increase that frequency. Talk to her about safe sex and maybe take her to the drs to see about contraception.

Turquoisesea · 18/06/2025 17:31

I didn’t want your post to go unanswered but wanted to say when my DD (who is now 17) was 14 we had a really bad time with her. Doing similar things your DD is doing.
Are the friends she’s having for sleepovers etc school friends or new friends she’s trying to impress? When my DD was 14 she got in with a bad crowd from our village and that was the main reason for her behaviour change. She had to find out for herself they weren’t nice as she wouldn’t listen to me or DH. It was truly an awful time. She has since admitted she was lonely and she just wanted people to hang out with even though she knew they weren’t good for her. If the friends she has are generally nice though, maybe they are just pushing boundaries as they won’t be the first teenagers getting drunk at parties although stealing your vodka on a sleepover isn’t great and obviously climbing out the window to meet a boy is a bigger concern.

I’m happy to say my DD came through it and now is embarrassed about that time and how she behaved towards us. I just kept lines of communication open with her and had to let a lot of the rudeness go (I suspect she has ADHD), the more authoritative I got the worse she became. I know that wouldn’t be everyone’s way of dealing with it but the more I tried to control her behaviour the worse she got. Sorry that’s probably not very helpful but just wanted to know she did come through it and I let her know that even thought I disliked a lot of her behaviour I loved her and wanted the best for her.

One thing I will say though is that moving schools at that age is really difficult, especially as she is ND and I can see why she really wouldn’t want to do that.

Jellymoon1 · 18/06/2025 19:38

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We've removed this thread as the OP had some privacy concerns.

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