Whats "normal" these days?

Nikka, my stepdaughter, is 12, about to be 13 and I guess I'm just an old fogie because her cell phone rang at MIDNIGHT the other night I was shocked, to say the least.

She doesn't have boys calling, it's just her girlfriends and apparantly what they like to do is call each other, find a movie they both have, and watch it "together" over the phone. I don't know why, but it drove me insane and when I talked to DH about it, he didn't think it was a big deal. He said he was sneaking out by 13 so on weekends he doesn't have a problem with her staying up/being on the phone/computer as late as she wants.

What are the limits for your teens? How much computer time, how late can they get calls, etc? Also any advice on coming to a compromise with DH would be appreciated. She's a good kid, I don't have any concerns necessarily, it just seems excessive to me.

This post has been edited by luvmykids on Sep 3 2007, 05:54 AM

Tough Calls all of them.

First, my son is 16 so a bit older. There could be big difference maturity wise in a 13 yr old and 16 yr old. Second, I base alot of my decisions on the premise that I am teaching him to become an adult who will have to make these kinds of decisions on his own very soon. So, on some things like bed times I give him my best advice and then he lives with the consequences of choices he makes. However, he cannot have his 'nightowl' disturb or interrupt other family members. IE: No phone ringing after 9pm. So he uses vibrate. Also, my son does not enjoy being on the phone, so if someone calls him he has one word answers and hangs up, usually.

Trust, communication and constant vigilance. That is my best advice in dealing with teens. Good Luck

Our younger teens had strong rules. I think between 12 and 15 teenagers really do need a lot of guidance. They're experiencing freedoms they'd previously not had because they're entering into middle and high school years. So we kind of started the teen-aged years strictly and allowed looser control over their choices and options as they got older and made more mature decisions. So there's really no age at which to exercise parental control and enforce a rule; it's more along the lines of how they mature and what decisions they make on their own that decides for us how closely we monitor and how stiff the rules are.

It's a balancing act between making sure the kids are making good choices and becoming respectful and motivated young adults and making sure the kids don't get caught up in peer related teen trouble. So, I would definitely say that putting a limit on phone calls is within the realm of making sure your 12 year old makes good decisions. Talking on the phone all night and ignoring family and family social time is not respectful, so a house rule is in order.

ok first off 12 year olds dont need cell phones
But if they do and it rings at midnight OMG that would so be my cell phone for a few weeks.

ITA, I fought that one and obviously lost DH's reasoning is that they don't have a land line at her moms and her moms cell phone was always off and he couldn't get ahold of her.

I'm happy with the fact that up until now, in spite of my opposition to it, she's been responsible with it. But this weekend I was out of my mind with the whole thing.

The real problem here isn't her, it's that DH doesn't see the need to tighten up and revisit the rules that come with it, and when it comes to her he doesn't give me any weight or back me up. He was such a TERRIBLE teenager that anything she's doing seems benign. My problem is that while that may be true, it's innocent for now, allowing HER to determine the terms is a big mistake that is opening the door pretty wide for problems in the future.

I could live with it if he even told her no phone after 11 or something, just to show that WE are in charge, not her.

Oh thats right I remember you saying that before when he was thinking about getting her one
And along with the other problems I guess it has not gotten any better since then

Kids at that age need limits with the freedom and respecting YOUR HOUSE RULES are #1

I agree with you on this one. It may not be a problem now, but it could lead to bigger issues as she gets older.

However, I can see how being the step-parent puts you in a difficult situation. Maybe you can talk to your DH again and come up with some sort of compromise. DH and I have different parenting styles, and it is often difficult to come to a compromise, so I understand your situation. We usually end up with somethign that neither one of us agree with 100%, but we do our best to stick to it.

As usual, Ed explained things more clearly than I did. We have started with stricter rules and when Billy proved he could be trusted we relaxed them. And when he makes bad choices we pull in the reins. I think your instincts are good, Monica. I hope that you can get hubby to agree.

Oh thats right I remember you saying that before when he was thinking about getting her one
And along with the other problems I guess it has not gotten any better since then

Kids at that age need limits with the freedom and respecting YOUR HOUSE RULES are #1

NO

I think he tries to be the "cool" dad, my theory is if your kids aren't disgruntled with you at least sometimes you're too cool

My worry is this: By starting out with a lot of freedom, what do you give them as they get older and mature? Also, already it's changing who her close friends are based on who is allowed to do what. Her BFF has very strict parents, so she is getting farther away from her and closer to the kids with lenient parents. I'd rather she stick to the original BFF because I know her parents keep a tight rein, kwim? I think at this age it's important to kind of "manage" their influences. Plus, I'd imgaine if you don't start out laying down the law, it's just that much harder to do when it's not so innocent. I can totally picture her saying "You never gave me rules before, why now?"

And I don't even want to go there with her wanting to come here just because she's allowed to get away with more. On top of that, the main thing is, they just don't need to be on the phone at that time of night. Just like my dad used to say, there is NOTHING going on at that time of night that you need to know about

Thanks for the input, at least I know I'm not just overreacting. Dee Dee, that's a good idea for trying to work something out with DH, maybe neither one of us gets what we want but something we can both stand behind.

I feel like he really ties my hands when it comes to her, he wants me to treat her like my own, which I do, but he wants me to stay out of it when it comes to rules or discipline. It doesn't really work.

Being a step parent is a really tough position to be in when it comes to initiating discipline. She really needs to hear it from him, I think. I would negotiate with him, behind the scenes, and let him be the one to deliver whatever solution you arrive at.
About freedom and teenagers in general, I tend to let the leash out a little at a time- if they prove they can handle it, I let it out some more. It's a case by case thing- some kids are ready for that at 13, others much much later. So far, I'm confident that my ds understands that his freedom and priviledges are commensurate with his ability to keep up with his priorities. So far, so good.

try getting her a prepaid phone or a pay as you go phone. hope i help

AT&T recently announced a new phone that allows parental controls - you can control the hours of use etc. I don't have AT & T service, but I'm really hopeful that other carriers will follow suit. I find that my daughter takes her phone to bed with her and gets calls in the middle of the night, or at least she used to. Right now her phone isn't working very well and I'm not in a bug hurry to replace it! When she first got it I think she was sneaking and using it to text message during class. We laid down the law, and now she keeps it turned off at school. I would love to have easy control of the cell because it is one of those "consequences" that seems to work really well. If find that taking away cell phone use, computer use, or other electronics is very effective discipline. These are priviledges that they really don't want to lose.

Good Luck!

ALSO:

It really sounds like the problem is that your and your DH are not a unified front. He may think that this is not really a big deal, because she's not doing wild crazy stuff like he did. Of course, thank goodness for that. But maybe you could approach it as more of a health issue than a behaviour issue. Kids really do need their sleep. There have been studies lately in the news about how are kids have too many electronics in their bedrooms which interfere with their sleep each night. it is important for their growth and healthy development. So even if he thinks that she's not being totally out-of-control, and even if he doesn't buy the suggestion that giving in to her now will only make things more difficult later (which I also do believe is true,) them MAYBE he will see/agree that it is not healthy to sleep with those microwaves next to her brain each night, and calls interrupting her sleep.

Both are things that I did at 13/still do now.

If having people call her at midnight bothers you, set a curfew for her phone. You can either let her keep the phone and tell her you'll be looking through the phone bill to see what time her calls are, or you could take the phone and turn it off every night at the curfew time.

And for the movies - I don't know why that bothers you. Unless it's on her cell phone and making her go over on minutes? But it's just a fun thing to do, a bonding time. Especially since sometimes it just gets so hard to schedule in time to actually sit down together at the same place and watch a movie.

Thats part of it, and the other part is they don't even talk to each other during the movie, just sit there with the phone to their ears and to me it's just silly Either talk or get off the phone

It's actually gotten better though, we've been busy on weekends so she's been too tired to stay up all night online/on the phone. I don't mind it sometimes, but not every night she's here.

how do they not get kicked out of the theaters?

They're not in a theatre...Nikka is here, her friend is at her house, and they both put the same movie on in our respective houses and sit on the phone while they watch it

oh i get it..i hate when people do that, you don't even watch the movie half the time and if you rented it, you wasted money