For those who have teenagers (say 15-17 years olds), do you (or are you aware of other parents) buy alcohol for your teens whilst they are attending parties? I’m not talking about bottles of wine or spirits, more a few cans or flavoured drinks?
How prevalent is it in your peer group? Are these parties supervised?
How do you get the attention of and communicate with children who are on their headphones in a vehicle when traveling? I need to pay attention on the road and I find this sometimes to be a risk.
I don’t know if this is the right subreddit to post this in, but I thought I’d give it a shot. I’m a teenager (15f), and my parents aren’t around a lot so I have no one to talk to about this. (Also, I don’t think they would react very well haha) for context, my mom works 2 jobs and does most of the housework, my dad is very reactive. I have a younger brother (13) and an older sister (23) who is an addict and takes up much of my parent’s time. I don’t see them a lot, and I don’t have many friends, so I’m alone a lot.
Recently I’ve been feeling different, and I’ve begun to start chatting with older men online. I think it’s because I like the attention and it makes me feel mature. They know how old I am and keep messaging me weird stuff anyway. (Yes, I know this behavior is not good and dangerous, I don’t give out personal information. I just make them happy and they make me feel happy too)
(Most of these men are 30-40 for anyone wondering)
I don’t know why I’m posting this or what advice I’m really seeking, maybe just a person with teens or children to tell me what they would tell their kids in this situation. I know it’s wrong but it makes me feel good. I don’t know, I guess I just want to be talked out of it. I know these interactions are predatory, and it creeps me out a little how dumb they think I am.
I would get in massive trouble if my parents found out about this, so I’m looking for someone to maybe share their experiences with this/what you would tell your teen if they were doing this. I don’t have any adults I really trust with this information in my life so this is kinda my last shot. I don’t want to regret it in the future.
Thank you for taking the time to read this, sorry if this is the wrong subreddit!!! My dms are open if you want to chat privately (:
My 13yr old son is allergic to antiperspirants thay contain aluminum. We have tried several and they all end in a rash under his pits for multiple days. He is currently using Native aluminum free.
Has anyone found a good aluminum free deodorant that lasts through a whole day? Thanks!
My son just started grade 6 and while he has never had a big friends circle, he would always like playing tags etc in elementary. One odd time, he mentioned his friends were being mean. But now in middle school, I see him pulling back from everything. I know school just started, but he does not want to try out for anything, there is a school dance that is not really a dance, just a go eat come kind of a thing this week, that he does not want to go to either. I am not sure how many of his elementary school classmates he has here, but he feels like he will be made fun of? Not sure if I should push him to tryout, go to the dance or just let him be.
Hello fellow parents. I need help.
My teenage sons act like everything I say is the most annoying thing they’ve ever heard. And to be honest I’m pretty annoyed that I have to repeat myself all the time.
Is it useless to explain reason to a 17 year old who doesn’t see that becoming nocturnal over the summer is going to make going back to school in a few weeks really hard for him? I wish I could just let them “know it all” but ultimately I’m (the entire household, dogs included) the one who suffers the repercussions when the storming around the house or rage hits because he is late for work or the house is too noisy.
The 13 year old isn’t that much better. Won’t do the chores he “knows” he needs to do so I have to ask a million times and then he gets mad at me for nagging.
I’ll be honest, I’m tired. I don’t want to nag, I don’t want to have to tell them what to do. It really goes against my personality but nothing gets done if I don’t say something over and over.
What do I do?
Before summer break my daughter was playing Roblox & at the time I had no idea that she could message strangers on there (I know 🤦🏽♀️). Occasionally I would go through her phone for security reasons to make sure she was being safe & doing age appropriate things. I found many chats with her messaging strangers from Roblox & talking about inappropriate things, even being in a “online relationship” with someone on there. Then I found out that she gave her number to a man from Roblox & sent a picture of herself to him (It was just a picture of her outfit, covering her face in the school mirror). I flipped out & couldn’t control my anger, especially since I’ve warned her about stranger danger since she was little. I was screaming at her while crying, asking her why the fk she would do something that could put her in danger & that she had no business messaging men, let alone giving out her number. Her dad & I had a long talk with her that ended with her crying & apologizing. I erased her whole phone & put it away for about 2 months. I also kicked her out of her room & told her she didn’t deserve privacy since she wanted to be grown & sneaky.
She got her room back not too long ago & I recently gave her the phone back under certain conditions:
She cannot download or play Roblox.
The phone is not just hers, she’s sharing with her brother since they attend the same school.
She’s not allowed to give their number to anyone, not even friends.
After questioning suspicious things that didn’t add up & catching her in lies, she admitted that she gave her “crush” her phone number & has been deleting their messages. She also deleted them from the deleted so I have no idea what they talked about. Then she asked me “why can’t I just be normal?” , I responded “why can’t you just stop lying about things & being sneaky, you’re just a child & you lie so much”. I guess I am just wondering what I am doing wrong, why is my daughter so sneaky & why does she lie so much ? Am I too strict is that why ?
My 19 year old son started having pain and bleeding in his gums. Got him into a private dentist (thanks NHS), and he has gum disease and also needs a night retainer. He flat out refuses to wear a retainer. He's got an appointment with a hygienist on weds. My problem is I don't think he's taking this very seriously or just doesn't care as he's still only brushing his teeth once a day if that. I keep going on at him to brush them but he just says Im nagging at him. I'm even going to see if I can get a message to the hygienist to give him a right talking to as he won't listen to me. I don't want him to lose his teeth and then say to me I wish I'd listened to you now. I know he's an adult but I don't know how I can get through to him.
Single mom here and I'm so confused about this I cannot even form a clear thought about it and my family is too close to it as well to speak to. I just want some feedback from other parents. I plan to speak to my daughter's therapist next week but I need a place to share this and I am open to suggestions. I in no way plan to respond to the other parents anytime soon but was curious what you would say if in the same boat. I'll call my daughter's friend "Lisa".
My daughter is 17 and has been dealing with mental health issues since the pandemic. It's a combination of depression, anxiety, and a lot of worry and compulsive thinking about things around body image that sometimes sends her into a mental tailspin. I do understand some roots of this, however, from past trauma related to losing her dad suddenly. Not the point here though.
What this looks like are occasional meltdowns of hard crying, screaming at times with anger, and saying how much she hates herself. She gets very down and sometimes locks herself in the bathroom for awhile to contain herself. It's hard to be around and hard to hear but it passes fairly quickly and she's back to herself. She has had two of these major episodes in front of Lisa, her best friend, over the past couple of years. She's known Lisa since elementary school and I've known the parents all this time as well. But my daughter has also more mildly vented her woes many times to Lisa via text and when they are together...and Lisa has been very sweet and supportive all these years. I'm assuming Lisa has vented her own woes as well but I can only assume. I mean they are teen girls. But my daughter's mental health has been complicated and she's has had big ups and downs but is getting support and mostly has good days now as she improves.
She still has bad days if she gets poor sleep or is under extra stress but she usually keeps it to herself until she's alone at home. Again, what this looks like is venting and crying about how she hates her life and herself and she has nothing to look forward to and is very hopeless. She sometimes says she just wishes she was dead but always clarifies she's not serious about that part and I know that to be true and it's just something she says now that has no meat to it. But it's not fun to hear. It's depressing to witness when she gets upset but she tends to rein it in when around her friends but it slips through sometimes. She only sees Lisa about once or twice a week but I think they text a lot.
Recently, my daughter and Lisa returned from a group sleepover and my daughter was very upset about something another girl said about her physicality, which is a sore spot for my daughter. She was tired and burned out from a long celebratory weekend and had a slobbery crying meltdown in from of her friend in the livingroom. Her friend and I listened her and it was not huge deal in the end and it blew over. Her friend apparently mentioned it to her parents later. She had mentioned before how my daughter struggled at times in front of her and they have been aware for years of this and that my daughter is on meds and sees a therapist. I don't want it to sound like a daily ordeal by any means though. It's not at all to that level now but more episodic and mostly hidden from her friends anyway if she's struggling.
Lisa is homeschooled, has very protective parents, and shares everything with them to the point that my daughter is even hesitant to share too much info now. But Lisa and my daughter are still very close, tight friends. My daughter has other friends via high school but won't let her guard down with them like she does with Lisa. They are like sisters and I have had her over for sleepovers and family trips for years so she's been like part of the family.
Here is some of the actual text:
"The recent incident at your house was a line in the sand for us. This is on top of many years of Lisa having to deal with being a part of the psychological impacts of seeing her friend struggle. My priority right now is Lisa's sense of safety and preserving her own mental health. I feel like the lines got blurred, which compromised my trust. So I don't feel comfortable with overnight visits at this time. That being said, your kid is obviously doing her best to conquer this. This is a complex issue. I know she apologized to Lisa for that hard moment recently and I appreciate that. Lisa tends to be overly sympathetic and caught in a role that I think is time to shift out of. Lisa has to learn to create her own boundaries too."
To paint a picture of her parents: They didn't send their kids to public school because they don't trust the government. They don't vaccinate. They don't allow Lisa to see certain scary movies even as an older teen because of the negative vibes and messages. She wasn't allowed to visit a haunted house last years (as a 16-year-old) because there was a legend around the house that there was a murder there 100 years ago and they didn't want her around "the negativity." So there's clearly a lot of fear happening with them so I guess I should not be shocked by this. But I have no idea how to respond.
My daughter feels saddened and awkward about this and I'm concerned this will only make her view herself in a worse light than she already does. She already thinks she's damaged somehow and this doesn't help...especially since the info I'm sharing here from the parents were also shared to my daughter, so no concern apparently with sparing her feelings and how this could impact her as a young person already struggling.
To be clear, I am in no way going to encourage any victim mentality here onto my daughter so I don't wanna sound that way at all and I think it's important to not go there. So far, I am encouraging her to remember who she is and how she's successfully dealing with a temporary setback that she WILL overcome. I am reminding her that these parents are operating from a fearful place and clearly don't understand the full picture of her issues or path she's been on to healing, which is absolutely true. But of course I'm too close to the situation to see clearly both sides so I'm curious what the community thinks of this. I understand on one level of a parent trying to protect their kid from being around hard stuff....but I guess it's the way it's being communicated and how it was via a text and not a phone call that upsets me too. After all these years and basically cutting off their friendship via a text message and she really has no idea what's been happening with my daughter except the info Lisa shares on occasion.
The mom sent me the text this morning and I thanked her for the message but told her I was not able to respond yet. Not sure if I will. I get her perspective on one level but I also feel like she's taking no accountability on her end as a parent and it's all been on me and my daughter in terms of somehow potentially messing up Lisa's mental state and well being.
And what about the notion of coming together as two moms and helping them both navigate this?! Wow what a concept, right? My amazing mom would have approached the mom of the struggling teen and offered to help and guide the two girls through it all instead of running away and avoiding. Maybe that's what I need to suggest.
I have homeschooled my daughter since she was 7 years old. She is now 17. She has crushed on 2 boys in a homeschool co-op she attended, but it was never ANYTHING serious, just puppy love in middle school. When she reached high school she and a boy at church liked each other and wanted to date. She was 16 at this time. I did tell her that she needs to be friends first and worry about dating later. However, she and the boy, who was 17 both insisted that they were smitten with each other and wanted to date. She eventually met the mom and the mom thought my daughter was sweet but immature (I do not necessarily disagree). My daughter is quite young minded. My daughter can be shy and playful for her age. The mom had lived a strict and rough life, causing her to grow up fast, so my daughter's childlike personality annoyed her. Long story short, the boy's parents didn't agree with the relationship and it eventually ended.
The second relationship is now happening where my daughter turned 17 and met a young man who is 19, met at a Christian camp. They were both program coordinators and worked with young children. The young man is courteous, respectful, and bright. He is in his second year of college and wants to be an engineer and later go on to get his PhD. At this time, my daughter had matured by being a camp counselor at the camp and taking on a lot of responsibility. The young man also became interested my daughter and wanted her to meet his dad. The dad was friendly but told him that he did not agree with the relationship because my daughter was homeschooled and may not have received a proper education. He also stated that she seemed to be mentally immature. My daughter has been a member of Civil Air Patrol for 3 years and would like to join the Air Force or go to college and participate in ROTC. However, this is not enough for the boy's father. He wanted to know what other activities she was involved in. All she could say was drama and volleyball. I do not I think the father thinks this is not worthy enough; however, it seems that his main hangup is that my daughter is homeschooled and has not "been out into the world." He feels she will not know how to handle life. Therefore, he told his son in front of my daughter that he could date my daughter, but he doesn't support the relationship. My daughter is crushed. She doesn't want to be in a relationship where parents are not completely onboard, but she and the young man claim to "love" each other. The father hurt and offended my daughter. I think she was most offended by the part about "proper education." This part also offended me because I am a former teacher and take pride in educating my daughter. We are on a strict schedule, and she is learning subjects that are accredited by the state. The part about her being "mentally immature" really hurt my daughter because she has heard this in the past from a previous parent and she feels like it's something she needs to "fix."
I am hurting for her, because I feel like a homeschool student has to prove they are smart but also a valuable partner. I wanted to list all the wonderful things my daughter brings to the table, such as her creativity, love of children, her big heart, and yes, her naive nature. She is loyal and will help anyone in need. However, I feel it really doesn't matter now. I believe the father envisions his son with someone who seems to be extremely ambitious and can portray the "power couple" image. His son says that the things that his father questions are the things that he loves about my daughter. He loves her childlike nature and free spirit. he also says she is the most nonjudging positive person he's met. He is also frustrated and wanting to defy his parents and not visit them on his college breaks. I am totally against this and just feel bad for them both. I really want to tell my daughter to just walk away and not pursue this relationship. I can't watch her feel like she is not good enough for the dad. I also had never thought about how homeschooling can affect dating if the partner was never homeschooled and comes from a high performing academic environment.
Does anyone have advice or has anyone experienced this?
I’m guessing by the title you can gather I’m not a guy lol. im the oldest out of all my siblings 17f followed up by younger brothers 15m,14m. They have 0 medical reasons for why this would be happening nor are they developmentally delayed in any way. 15m has suspected adhd but not in any major way just the say racist shit and blame it on adhd type. But this has been an ongoing issue for about like 4-5 years or so. It wasn’t quite as bad when they were younger but it just seems to have gotten worse as they have gotten older. Most likely being as they don’t lift the seat anymore. You would think with age it would get better but apparently not.
To preface we have 3 bathrooms. 2 my brothers are allowed to use and the 1 that they still use because they’re lazy. The reason they aren’t allowed to use that bathroom is because of the reason im posting this.
So half of the time when i go to the bathroom there will be piss either on the seat, floor or both. Thats if it hasn’t dried up yet. I bet a good majority of the missing is from them pissing in the dark without a light. I only know this as i’ve seen them walk out of the bathroom door open, light off, middle of the night, as im about to walk in and there is just piss everywhere. At this point its like they have to know there doing it but are to lazy to clean it up or something i don’t know. Another time i was chilling in my room late at night ( i live in an attic. no door ) and i heard 15m get up to use the bathroom and all i heard was the splashing sounds of pee hitting tile floor. I live with 3 boys ( my father included) so at this point i know what peeing into a ceramic bowl sounds like and it was not those sounds. So i shoot downstairs and you guessed it half of this boys piss on the floor some in the bowl rest on the seat. he didn’t even bother to turn on the light, so bro didn’t even know what happened. typical. So i ask him to clean it up and he does and it wouldn’t be that big of an issue if they missed and just cleaned it up but they don’t.
its just starting to get really frustrating because i can only throw up in one bathroom because the rest stink to much like piss for me to even put my head near them. The one i will throw up into also smells of piss because of them but it’s way more manageable. The only bathroom on the bottom floor smells like a men’s public restroom 23/6 just because of 2 boys. Its also starting to get to the point where im accidentally pissing on the floor while trying to avoid their piss on the floor, seat or both. Like i could go to another bathroom which i do most of the time, but the other half when i do use them is because im about to piss myself. other girls out there you know. Unlike them i do clean up after myself because i’m not absolutely fucking disgusting and also flush the toilet which is something they our also incapable of. Not only that is there is no piss on the toilet seat i bet you that it’s sticky because they always are. honestly i wonder why.
But it had gotten to the point that the only bathroom downstairs ( aka their toilet ) my mum has basically stopped cleaning it. Don’t worry it does get a clean one a week and isn’t that bad, but my mum had to bleach the toilets once a day because of them. She still technically “has to” but chooses not to as they cant keep it clean. The skirting board ( aka trim ) around the back of the toilet seat it black and smells so strongly of urine no matter how much its cleaned the smell never goes away.
Countless times have i and my mum tried to have conversations about it with them and they always say. its not me i don’t do it anymore, or yeah i will or it wasn’t me. if not that its just laughing about it. At this point im just getting fed up because it would be nice to have one bathroom that doesn’t smell like piss. so if anyone has any suggestions of how to make them stop i beg please let me know. if they don’t stop i will be shaming them on tiktok. cough cough james and george, and tagging their main profiles as a form of humiliation for still needing to be potty trained. also is anyone else siblings having these same issues that are this age or just me?
( not fixing any grammar i just want to sleep )
TLDR: brothers are basically toddler, can’t aim for shit, piss on everything in the bathrooms. that intern piss me off, wont stop after many talks.
My son (18) just told us that college isn't for him..he's known this since June but didn't tell us.He's supposed to move in to the campus dorm this Sunday.
I'm sad that he didn't feel like he could have shared this with us sooner. He has a therapist and he actually met with her today and didn't share this information with her either.
We can still disenroll him. I'm trying to figure out what he wants to do and how to support him. I'm feeling a lot of things right now (Fear, anxiety, frustration, sadness).
Has anyone's teen decide to opt out of college at the last minute? How did you navigate through the situation?
My husband and I have 3 children (all under 5 years old) and one on the way. We recently took in my 16 year old brother who didn’t want to be home with my mom after she split from his father. He doesn’t want anything to do with both parents. When he decided to live with us, he was told there were gonna be rules and he agreed to them.
Now with school starting and his job, he’s always grumpy (he lowkey always pretty depressed looking but lately it’s been worse). It’s gotten to the point where my husband and him have bumped heads a couple times and now my husband just doesn’t say anything to him when my brother looks extra grumpy. I don’t want him to continue to “be careful” around my brother.
We try to engage in conversation with my brother and he just doesn’t respond, responds quietly that we can’t hear him, or he said “ok” or “I don’t know”. So, parents of teenagers, what should we do? How do we handle talking to him about this attitude he always has? I don’t want to be rude to him but he has to understand he can’t just get an attitude and that’s it.
This is a very long post but if you read through this I’d love some advice. I’m at my end I have no idea what to do. I don’t want to destroy my relationship with my daughter but I also don’t want to let this continue if it’s as bad a I feel it is. I don’t know if I’m making this a catastrophe or if it’s a really issue.
My daughter is turning 16 this month. She started dating a boy July of last year. It started like any teenage romance. They meet at the fair. At first she spent time with him at school, our house and his house. One day after they’d been dating for a few months her friends were over after school and her boyfriend was coming over to hang out. Her fiends mom was on her way over to get her but might bot be there before her boyfriend showed up. My daughter told her “you have to hurry up. (Boyfriend) is going to be mad if you’rel still here” I was really taken by surprise. They’d been friends since kindergarten and I never thought she’d treat her friend that way. I tried to talk to her about why that wasn’t appropriate or kind. The excuse was that she gets to spend all day with her friend (they had almost every class together) so he doesn’t want her friend around when they are supposed to hang out “its not fair to him”.
They started to match outfits everyday. She would put his initials on her nails every time she did them. At first this seemed cute. Now after everything it seems controlling and positive.
From then Halloween came around. She had always spent Halloween with this same friend but this last year she went with her boyfriend and his parents. She said it was because her friends were going to be with their boyfriend and the other with her family. Seemed legitimate at the time.
Then she asked to go to his house on Christmas Eve. I let her go over while I was at work. This was ok. It wasn’t until she came home and I found out his family had bought her some pretty expensive gifts that I started to feel a little uncomfortable. But I blew it off because I’m a single parent that doesn’t have the means to buy her Nikes and Uggs and jewelry. So I told myself I was just being emotional.
From then I didn’t really notice much of anything that concerned me or gave me reasons to question anything.
Around March I started to notice she wasn’t really spending time with her friends. She hadn’t had them over, gone over to their houses or had any sleep overs. I told her I needed to see her phone. That’s when I found out she was sharing her location with him. He would question her about where she was at, why she was there and with who. He would also get upset with her if she wasn’t messaging him back. If she took to long to respond. He’d even do this while she was in class. I tried to talk to her about how that was not ok behavior from him. This started a fight. It was also around this time that my daughter made a comment about her boyfriend’s mom wanting to buy her prom dress. This kind of hurt my feelings a little bit because I had been in my emotions about how I’d felt like she was drawing closer to his family. (It felt like she was withdrawing from me and her siblings) I told myself again that I’m just being emotional. Afraid of being left behind or forgotten. (My biggest fear is my kids leaving home and never wanting anything to do with me after that.) I asked her what that was all about. She said “I don’t know (boyfriend) just said his mom wanted to buy my dress.” I told her that I was saving up to try to buy her a dress. She just said ok. Then maybe a month or so later we were eating dinner and her sister asked about dress shopping with her friends. We all assumed that she would do that since she gone dress shopping with these friends for every dance they’ve gone to since 6th grade. But my daughter’s response was that boyfriend’s mom wanted to go dress shopping with her. My older daughter said ok but are you still going with the girls and she snapped at her that boyfriend’s mom wanted to go shopping with her. This was news to me. All I had ever heard was that she wanted to buy her dress. I thought that letting her know I was getting her dress would end that but I guess there were more in depth plans to go shopping together and nobody had said anything to me about this plan. When I asked my daughter about this we acted as if she didn’t have any idea about it or that she was just told thats what his mom wanted. I let her know how much this hurt me and she didn’t really respond. I told her ok I’ll have to talk to his mom about it then. She just said ok. So I called and talked to his mom. She danced around it like “I just thought it was be fun to go shopping and get her dress for her” I told her I was saving up to get her dress for her. She back tracked and was like I understand how special that is for a mother and daughter is to do together. We ended that conversation with the fact that she was going to go dress shopping with me. I felt like his mom was over stepping but again told myself I’m being overly emotional. So it came time to go shopping I asked if the girls were going to come and she basically said she didn’t think they were available. So we went together. We ended up at a shop that one of her friend’s mom worked at. I asked if we should have her fiends come over and she was reluctant to call her. She started to FaceTime her and then shoved it in my face to have me talk to her. Her fiend did come and help pick out dresses. Then she came and had lunch with us and walked around a couple stores before going back home. I found out later that her boyfriend got really mad about this and said he wasn’t even going to tell his mom about it and upset her. I also found out about that time that she was sharing her location with him again after I told her to stop because he would watch her location all the time and question her about where she was and why she was there.
Since then his behavior has not changed much, my daughter has just gotten to where she will not talk to me about him. When I try to have a conversation with her we always end up fighting. I’ve told her that she needs to do better dividing her time between her friends, family and boyfriend. She has made efforts with me and her siblings but her friends pretty much do not want to have anything to do with her anymore. When she spent time with them would be texting him the whole time. She cannot put it away. The screen time app on our phones shows me that they send about 600+ messages between them in a day. Then they face time at night. Every time I tell her she needs to disconnect from him she just hides it better.
At the beginning of summer I made an appointment to get her birth control. I let her know and she told him. She messaged me at work and asked if boyfriend could come to her appointment. I was so upset. That is so far beyond Ok. I was ready at that time to tell her she needed a break from him. I called his mom to let her know and express how inappropriate I thought that was and that I felt they needed to take a break. She said “me and his dad will have a talk with him. Can we see if things get better then if not we can go that route?” She said she was going to talk to her husband and call me after they talked. That never happened.
Then the fair came around again this year. This is another thing when she’s always done with her fiends. Every year they buy wrist bands that let them go everyday and ride rides unlimitedly. She did buy a band this year and I was under the impression that she had planned to go with them. The first day of fair came around and she told me she was going to have boyfriend come get her. We fought again because I asked why she wasn’t going with the girls like she had told me she was going to. She ended up going with her friend but I found out later she basically ditched her friends once they were there.
I had told her the first Saturday of the fair we were going to go together as a family. She worked that morning. Then asked if she could go over to boyfriends house for a little bit before going to the fair. I said sure and it seemed like she was taking the conversation about splitting her time seriously. I thought she was going over to spend time with him and then come home and go to the fair with us. But she text and asked if they could just meet us over there. I was confused and asked for clarification. When I told her no that we were supposed to do this as a family she then proceeded to text me trying to convince me to let him come with us because his dad and him got into a fight and his dad was pushing him, so he really needed to get out of the house. I told her no. She said you think I’m lying I told her no I didn’t. I told her I was heading over to pick her up early. I went to get her and she took a long time coming out. His dad came out in the garage, then went back in and back out and sat down by his grill. Then his mom came out, then went back in and came back out. I got out of my car and walked up. They knew I was there to pick up my daughter. She said oh she’s coming but then we stood there for a minute and she went back in. Then my daughter and her boyfriend come out, sobbing. She gets in the car and I asked her why it took her so long to come out. She said I didn’t know you were there. Anyways we fight again. Ended up going to the fair. Turned out my sister and best friend who basically helped raise my kids were both there. We walked around together with my sisters and her kids and by best friend. Sometime later her boyfriend showed up. Which is whatever it’s a public place I never tried to say he couldn’t be there. I just said we were going as a family. It just seemed like he showed up to prove a point that he “will always be there for her” but really it’s like he wanted to prove to me that I can’t stop him from seeing her.
Since I found out his dad and him had a physical altercation while my daughter was in their home I haven’t let her go back over there. We’ve of course fought about this too. She told me she’d never talk to me again if he has to break up with her. I said why would he have to break up with you. She said cause “his mom will make him if I can’t go over there.” I told her that was really odd. That his mom does not to have a close relationship with you at this age. It seems inappropriate to me. And I told her that ultimatums are never a good thing in relationships. In the end I told her if she never talked to me again then that’s fine since it’s my job to protect her not be her friend.
Just this last weekend I took her on a trip to a concert in a city a couple hours away. It was kind of a big deal and part of her birthday present. From the time we left the house she was texting him non stop. She does not really interact with anyone around her when she is constantly texting him. I got upset and we started fighting. I asked her if we just needed to go back home because it didn’t feel like she wanted to be there with me at all. (I feel terrible that I let my emotions get the better of me. I really wanted it to just be a fun trip and had told myself the boyfriend situation was off limits but I did the exact opposite). The rest of the trip went Ok but she was still texting him all the time she just hides it so much better now. I’m betting myself up for overreacting but I felt kind of disrespected that I was spending the time and money to do this with her and he was along for the whole trip.
He is basically the only person in her life now. I know he’s told her in regard to me trying to get her to see her friends “she (meaning me) needs to understand that I’m number one now” She used to have her friends and family pinned at the top of her text conversations, now it just boyfriend. All of her social media accounts have been pretty much wiped clean of her friends and only features posts about her and him. There are other little things that show she is wiping all traces of anybody else from her life. She now claims that she tries to reach out to her friends but they blow her off so why would she want to keep trying. I’m so frustrated because I can see that he has created this situation where he’s positioned himself as the only person her cares about her. Me and her fight. She fights with her sister and now her fiends don’t want to spend time with her at all. I feel like this is a dangerous situation. I’ve sent her articles about abuse and red flags but of course she shares all of it with him.
I’m so lost as to what to do. I fear that forcing her to break up with him will only make her see him in secrete and hide even more things from me. I fear that I’ve brought this up so many times that each time it just drives her closer to him. I’m also concerns by his mom and families behavior and she idolizes them. She seems them as the perfect family. I feel crazy and totally hopeless. If anybody had advice please help. She has started therapy but I know that is not a fix all. It may not even help with this at all and I’m just so worried.
My mom has always took me and my sister photos after 1am but now i am 17 and i am questioning is it normal and if actually other people suffer from that ? And i can’t take it to school either ?
Hi there! So, to start off, we’ve always told our daughter that she wouldn’t be allowed to date until she’s in high school.
Today, one of my friend’s kids told me that my daughter has a boyfriend. At first, I honestly didn’t believe it. But when I picked her up from school, I asked her about it, and she admitted that she does. She immediately said, “I’m sorry,” and sounded like she was about to cry.
I asked her why she didn’t tell us, and she said she wanted to, but she was scared because we had already told her she wasn’t allowed to date. At first, I told her that I thought she and I were on a completely different level when it came to trusting each other, and that it hurt me that she hid this from me. But after thinking about it, I realized she was right—we probably would have told her no if she had come to us.
The hard part is that our son started dating at her age, and we allowed it because we felt like he was mature enough to handle it. With her, we just don’t feel like she’s emotionally ready yet. Recently, she and one of her close friends had a disagreement and stopped talking for a little while. She cried for days and was really down about it. At the time, I even explained to her that this was one of the reasons we wanted her to wait to date. If a disagreement with a friend affected her that deeply, I worry about how much more a relationship or breakup could hurt her emotionally.
Now my husband and I are stuck on how to handle this. The biggest issue for us isn’t necessarily that she likes a boy—it’s that she knew our rule and went behind our backs anyway. We took her phone away for now while we figure out what the appropriate consequence should be.
We don’t know if we should make her break up with him and take away her privileges because she broke our trust, or if we should consider allowing her to date him with boundaries while still giving her a consequence for hiding it from us.
My concern with letting her continue the relationship is that I don’t want her to walk away thinking, “Even if my parents say no, I can just do it behind their backs, and once they find out, they might let me do it anyway.” At the same time, I don’t want to be so strict that she becomes even more afraid to come to us and starts hiding more things.
We want her to understand that trust, honesty, and respecting our rules matter, but we also want her to know that she can always come to us—even when she thinks we might not like what she has to say.
We’re just really torn on what the right approach is.
My child is 12 years old and he doesn't listen to me. I'm disappointed and have no idea what to do. Talking isn't working. Thank you in advance for your help. Best regards.
Marzenka
I first found that my son was suicidal when I saw how to cut your wrist in his phone, we tried to talk about it but he wouldn’t open up. It’s been about 11 months and I have found a suicide note. He said he wrote it when he got grounded. I don’t feel like these are normal reactions.
He has never made a self harm attempt. He is in counselling and life coach. But he refuses to talk to me and says he is safe and he is fine, even tho when I read his messages he tells his friends he has a plan.
I have to work and he is an only child so I have to leave him during the day and every single minute I am constantly worrying.
What do I do? He won’t talk to me, he seems happy and fine and we laugh, he continues his sports, he calls his friends, we watch movies and talk and it all seems normal. He seems happy but obviously in his phone he is not.
I continue to try and get him to open up and he says I force him to talk. I give him counselling and he said he is fine.
I really don’t know what to do. It’s not normal for 13 year old to go through this is it?
Any advice would be helpful
My son just turned 18 in June and graduated from high school in May. He is an incredibly talented athlete and has received numerous offers to continue playing sports. He is a natural-born athlete who plays multiple sports, and for most of his life, he has been such a good kid.
But somewhere along the way, things changed.
We moved to a new school district around his junior year, and unfortunately, he started surrounding himself with friends who I feel have had a negative influence on him. His attitude and behavior have changed so much. He doesn’t seem to care, doesn’t want to listen, and has become very disrespectful.
He no longer lives at home. He comes by occasionally to grab a change of clothes and then leaves again. I don’t know where he stays, who he is with, or whether he is okay. As a mother, that uncertainty is incredibly painful.
I’m exhausted. I’m worried. I’m heartbroken. 💔
What hurts the most is knowing how much potential he has. He has so much talent and so many opportunities in front of him, and I’m scared of watching him throw away his future because of the choices he is making right now.
I know he is 18, and I understand that I can’t control every decision he makes. But that doesn’t make it any easier to watch your child struggle or make choices that could have lasting consequences.
Parenting teenagers and young adults can be so incredibly hard. Sometimes you can love them, pray for them, talk to them, set boundaries, and still feel completely helpless.
Has anyone else been through something similar with their teenager or young adult? How did you handle it? What helped you reconnect with your child? Is there anything you wish you had done differently?
Please, no judgment. I’m simply a heartbroken mom looking for advice, encouragement, and maybe some hope from parents who have walked through something similar. ❤️🙏
While at the mall with my 13yo daughter, I noticed 3 men checking her out (on 3 separate occasions). The looking her up and down was not subtle and it was unmistakable. She was chatting away to me and didn't seem to notice. I felt like wrapping my arms around her and hurrying her away! I want to talk to her about it but worry that I might make her self-conscious, rather than aware of the situation. Any advice?