what consequences for sneaking out of house???

ksm

Well-Known Member
I am sitting here, exhausted, because our difficult child (age 15) had an overnight with a friend (16) at our house. At 2:50am we are woken up by a phone call and when we answered, no one was there. I didn't recognize the number so I called the number back and difficult child answered and said "Can you come pick us up? We are at 7th and xxx street" I kept trying to get more information from her but she wasn't telling us much. Finally she said, there are two cops here, and he will release us to a parent or guardian" I asked if little sis (13) was there too... and she was. I asked if her friend wanted us to call her parents and was told that she would call them.

husband went and got them... and they had been in a pick up (dual cab) with three boys... and a 14yo was driving, and then two older twin boys who difficult child's friend has a crush on. I guess the police said the truck was driving erratically and swerved in front of them. They let husband take our girls home, their friend was waiting on her parents to show up. easy child said they were all given a breathalizer test. easy child was in tears, scared to death. difficult child said it was all her and her friend that arranged it... that easy child just went a long. But she didn't share the same remorse that easy child did. I think she was just mad she got caught. Maybe there was some true regret, but I didn't see it. We said we would be discussing it this morning.

husband thought he heard the door close at about 1:20am - so he got up and checked the front door... and it still had the dead bolt on... so he went back to bed. He didn't think to check the back door. I am furious with the girls. I am sitting here trying to figure out what will be a big deterrent to this ever happening again. I doubt that easy child will try it again any time soon. Not so sure about difficult child. I guess I am more disappointed in easy child as I hadn't expect this behavior from her. We took away easy child's iPod last night. They do not have their own computers. difficult child has lost all her electronics and we have not yet given them cell phones. This was all arranged on the other girls cell phone. Needless to say, the other girl will not be welcome in a long time.

Tuesday next week... we see the neuropsychologist for test results on difficult child. KSM
 

PatriotsGirl

Well-Known Member
We ended up putting alarms on the doors and windows because this was such a problem. difficult child would meet up with large groups of kids, hang out all night and be back in bed before I got her up for school. Then she got busted...I couldn't believe how long she had been doing it before getting caught!! And no, she never regretted anything but getting caught...
 

TeDo

CD Hall of Fame
To be perfectly honest, I would not punish easy child beyond the iPod. She is clearly just following her big sister like my little sister used to do to me. She always wanted to go where I went and do what I did. I guess she's lucky I was the good kid. easy child clearly just likes to be with her big sis and being included.

Now difficult child, I would take away ALL privileges: leaving the house for any reason without being with you or husband, using the phone, watching TV (even with the family) etc. I would be this harsh since it's not her first time. I would also pile on the chores and make a point of doing things SHE likes with the other kids WHILE she's doing those chores. The loss of all privileges is because you can't trust her to have any of them. Privileges are earned, they are not a right. Her rights are to food and housing. As for the chores, that is to work off the gas money and you and husband's time having to come and get her in the middle of the night. And even some "pain and suffering".

I am so sorry you are having to deal with all this koi. It has to be so frustrating and I really hope the neuropsychologist can help figure her out. ((((HUGS)))) to you.
 

DaisyFace

Love me...Love me not
Oh yeah...definitely alarms.

If you can afford it - I would go with an ADT (or similar professional company) whole house system. Alarms on every door and window. Make sure the screens are the kind that cannot "pop" out.

Good luck!
 

ksm

Well-Known Member
So far... we have but them both under a one week total restriction. They can not leave our home or yard, can not have friends over, can not call friends, can not get on computer/fb, will not be left home alone with out husband or I there. If we both go somewhere they will be with us. If they go to the pool... (not sure if they will get to!) one of us will put on a suit and go with them. At the end of the week, we will add back some things if they have done well.

If this had happened last week, we would not have purchased tickets to fly to Seattle to visit their maternal grandparents for the first time. They have actually seen the girls, but they were so young our girls don't remember them. Their older brother in the army will be on leave at that time, and their uncle, who came to the midwest a couple months ago will be there too. We told them that if there is anything like this in the future, they will not go. One of us will stay home with them while the other gets to go with one of us.

As Paul Harvey used to say... "now for the rest of the story". The three girls snuck out of our home, leaving the back door unlocked, walked abnout 4 blocks thru the alleys to a convenience store where one kid (age 14) picked them up and drove them several miles to the two older boys home (age 17). While there, the driver got out of the car and smoked a joint. Then the other two boys came and they drove around, until the 14yo did some erratic driving and pulled out in front of a police car. That is when they got caught. The 14yo did have a learners permit, but it had been suspended because of some previous problem. The two 17yo's called their "biomom" instead of their legal adoptive mom, who then came and told the police she was the mom, and those two were released in to her custody. Not sure what happened to the 14yo who supposedly had his cousins vehicle. Oh, there were eggs in the vehicle, but the girls were not aware of them egging any thing.

I checked fb pages for the two boys (twins) and both were open to the public. One had posted "Fun while it lasted" and then I noticed that difficult child's friend who had got picked up too had already clicked "like" by 8am this morning! The kid who was driving had commented "Sorry Bro, didn't mean to get pulled over." and a couple more remarks about "yea i r stupid"

To take things a bit further, husband and I decided to cancel DirecTV today. Will buy a cheapy antennae and have 3 or 4 channels and will keep Netflix. I am officially the Gestapo mom. But, we are not rubbing their noses in it. We will go to the library and pick up some books and maybe some DVD's for appropriate movies. They will be getting up by 8am each morning. They won't be hanging out in their rooms, unless it is getting spotless. They will be cooking and cleaning. I am tired of providing a level of care that has been so unappreciated for too long.

The girlfriend that spent the night has called and wanted to speak to difficult child. Nope. Told her we would get her stuff and put it in a sack on the porch. Don't want them to have a chance to compare stories. I have a feeling we might be hearing from this girls parents. I am afraid that our girls will take the blame for everything... but she was the one calling the boys on her cell phone and arranging it and ours were just as responsible for going along with it all. Not blaming her for it - but I don't want her and her parents to think it was all difficult child's fault either.

Will be a long week - but hey, my job just ended yesterday and I decided I wouldn't be looking for one until school starts. Lots of together time. KSM
 

BusynMember

Well-Known Member
You did the right thing. I would definitely also punish 13 yr. old so that she doesn't think her sister's behavior is ok to copy. I like the alarms idea, although I'm thinking she'll learn how to disable them. We had a videocamera for a while, but psychokid broke it and that was that. He broke it on purpose by smashing it with a baseball. My older daughter (who is NOT psychokid but is the one who used to use drugs but doesn't anymore) used to get out through her window. Hubby put bars over it so she at least couldn't leave THAT way and we were more apt to hear her. Daughter got brought home by police several times for curfew violations. I used to also drive her to and from school after that sort of a problem, which embarassed her, but oh well.
 

TerryJ2

Well-Known Member
Arrgh. I'm sorry!
I have a feeling my son will be doing this any day.
I agree with-the restrictions. Good job!
They have no idea how lucky they are that the 14-yr-old didn't get them killed or injured.
 

DDD

Well-Known Member
Sending very experienced and understanding hugs your way. If I had a C note for every time I went to pick up a teen from a place he/she should not have been AND at a ridiculous hour.....I could finally retire. My last difficult child was the hardest one since he got into booze and pot in his early teens.

My advice is to make sure you and your husband are totally on the same page...no deviations allowed. Don't keep the hammer on their head too long as you want them to realize there are consequences for poor choices BUT that making a poor choice does not define who they are. Ease the way back to normalcy and pray they want to live a normal life. If you have a huge difficult child to raise, sigh, then you'll be seeing a pattern and have to preplan what other steps you need to take in hopes of keeping her safe. on the other hand, fingers crossed that this was a teen whim. Hugs DDD
 

ksm

Well-Known Member
Oh, what a difference between a difficult child and a easy child! I thought yesterday had gone pretty well. We didn't keep berating them after the first discussion in the morning when we told them how disappointed we were in their behavior. We did some things together and difficult child only got grumpy a couple times. Last night, I went to easy child's room and I could tell she was crying in bed. I tried to console her but she wouldn't stop. Had her come downstairs with us for a while and tried to talk to her and she just couldn't stop crying. Finally, thru tears, she said "I ruined everything!" We explained that she had made a big mistake, but everything wasn't ruined. That our trust would come back, but it would take time and good choices. And that even if she made another stupid mistake in the future, nothing is ruined forever as long as we change our behavior. difficult child? no deep sense of remorse, just irritation that she can't talk to her friends. She hasn't really came to us to apologize or express any remorse. KSM
 

TerryJ2

Well-Known Member
Oh, boy, does that sound familiar!
Finally, at 14 or so, our difficult child really expressed remorse in a way that we could recognize, but the instances were few and far between. He's 16 now and much better, but he still has his moments. (I posted a thread about him the other day.)
You're right--when the kids were little, we could practically drop the house on difficult child and not elicit an appropriate reaction, nothing but arguing and blaming and brooding. on the other hand, if we so much as looked at easy child the wrong way, she would burst into tears.
We've had yrs of therapy to discuss WHY difficult child should feel remorse for certain things, and HOW he can get into other people's heads (theory of mind). It's a lot, lot, lot of work.
I feel for you.
 

ksm

Well-Known Member
Well, it has been a week and a day since the girls sneaked out of the house and the police caught them in a vehicle with 3 teen boys. Yesterday was the first day that difficult child could use the phone and have limited contact with the girl who was sleeping over and helped plan this escapade. At supper last night, I asked difficult child what kind of consequences did her friend get... would you believe she was grounded for a day? AND... she got to go and shoot fireworks with the two boys who were in the car? Told husband that her parents needed to grow at least one pair between the two of them! I thought we were letting the girls off easy with one full week of grounding... and then loosening the reins a bit over the weekend. Geesh. KSM
 

greenrene

Member
Oh wow. It doesn't sound like a good friend for difficult child to hang out with. on the other hand, maybe your difficult child was fudging a little to make you feel like you were being too strict? I don't know, I just know that my difficult child got to a point where everything that came out of her mouth was suspect.
 

DDD

Well-Known Member
I TOTALLY understand your shock. Because I've raised so many I won't begin to list the times when I was gobsmacked that other parents didn't do any form of punishment...any. In 1967 easy child son and two neighbor boys walked two blocks to a grocery store and stole candy. I marched him down to the friends house and told my neighbor "friend" that we were headed to see the Manager. Her response?? "Boys, don't you ever do that again!" easy child faced the Manager and I don't think he ever stole again. When he was 15 he slept at his boyfriend's house. No problem
and at three in the morning my doorbell rang. There was a policeman with both boys who told me they had been driving around town in his Moms VW Bug. Of course, neither had licenses! I called the Dad in the morning to report what had happened. His response? Laughter. I don't get it. If parents don't take a leadership role who to heck is suppose to?? Peers?? Sorry. You are RIGHT. They are WRONG. It's awkward but stick to your morals. DDD
 

ksm

Well-Known Member
Oh wow. It doesn't sound like a good friend for difficult child to hang out with. on the other hand, maybe your difficult child was fudging a little to make you feel like you were being too strict? I don't know, I just know that my difficult child got to a point where everything that came out of her mouth was suspect.

No, I don't think so... I saw this girl walking past our house (she lives a block away) the day after the incident, and thru out the week. Also, her fb page wasn't private, so I kept track... going to the mall... seeing friends... going to shoot fireworks... All there to read about. KSM
 

DammitJanet

Well-Known Member
I know lots of parents dont take the word parent as a verb but just a noun. Those are the ones who will wonder why little Johnny ends up in prison or little Susie has a baby at 14. Kids will end up with friends in their lives but they only have two parents. (normally)
 
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