Curfew
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- May
- 28
Does your teenager have a curfew? What time?
My 15-year-old usually winds up coming home at 11 p.m on a weekend night. If he’s at a friend’s house, sometimes we’ll pick him up at 11:30.. But 2 a.m.? Forget it.
Yet there are a few kids I know who can come home whenever they feel like it.
The other night, they left a friend’s house at 1:45 a.m. Apparently nobody was waiting for them outside, so they walked.
I wonder: did their parents even know they were walking home at that hour? Did they maybe tell them they were having a sleepover?
But curfews can be tough. From going through this curfew thing with my two older kids, I also know it’s unrealistic to impose a crazy-early deadline for teens, especially if all their friends get to stay out later. But what time is reasonable? And do you let them walk home in the dead of night?
This entry was posted
on Wednesday, May 28th, 2008 at 5:36 pm by Linda Lombroso.
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Baby boomer Linda Lombroso was born in Queens and grew up in Port Washington. She began her journalism career at New York Magazine and Rolling Stone, but left to pursue a master's degree in elementary education. Shortly afterward, she returned to magazines as an editor at US magazine, but again left the field, this time for the birth of her first child. Linda and her family moved from Manhattan to New Rochelle in 1988. After spending 10 years as a stay-at-home mother, she joined The Journal News as a police reporter in 1997. She's been a Life & Style writer since 2000. This is the only year her three children are teenagers at the same time, which means she undergoes a daily critique of hair, makeup and wardrobe. Her parents still live in Port Washington Ń and they like everything she wears.
at 15? for me? i think it may have been 10. on a non school night. 11?! forget it i would be grilled to no end.
2am. after the smack and the grounding I think i might be allowed out after 2 weeks. at 17 and 18 i dont think i was allowed out after 11 let alone 2am.
once i hit college. i was on my own. a phone call letting them know i was alive was good enough .
Linda – I know what you mean. I reluctantly extended my 15 year old’s curfew from 11:30 to 12:00 on non-school nights. But some of his friends can come home at 1:30. We ‘debate’ all the time about this – and I tell him that I’m tired and since I can’t sleep with him out of the house, he has to come home so I can go to bed. End of story. And I really don’t care what his friends do… or more to the point, what their parents allow.
Oh – and while he’s out he has to call me if he’s going somewhere else besides where he was headed when he left home. He loves that part. Again – don’t care…
Mamanon—My son laughs when I tell him I wait up until he gets home. He thinks it’s hysterical. I also argue with him about what everybody else’s parents say. But I also don’t care. You have to stick to what you believe in!
Steve-You always make your point in such a great, entertaining way!
I was a die hard mom for curfew. I would punish them if they were late. Not 10 minutes but 30 minutes qualified for punishment. I worry, therefore, I would be crazy, especially when they began to drive.
My husband and I were pretty tough on all of our kids, but they pretty much followed through, because we followed through on punishment. If you were late, your curfew was cut back an hour, for a few days. Try making them come home at 10 when they were used to 11. 11 sounded pretty good then.