Late Night Telephone

iVillage Member
Registered: 12-14-2006
Late Night Telephone
11
Thu, 12-14-2006 - 11:54am

Hi All,

We have figured out that my 14 year old daughter has been having late night telephone calls with her boyfriend and other friends. I really don't think it is appropriate for her to be on the phone after 10 at night, especially with boys. So, I played the mean mom and asked her to unplug her bedroom phone and turn it in. Am I being too strict? Of course, she thinks I am being unreasonable.

Mimi

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iVillage Member
Registered: 11-28-1999
Fri, 12-15-2006 - 12:39pm

My DSD (16) has been a continual source of annoyance w/ her late night phone use. Even after losing her phone privilege, she hasn't learned. I guess she is just immature. The latest was a few weeks ago when DH heard her on the phone after 11:30. She counts on the fact that he usually goes to bed early since he gets up at 5:30 for work, and he's hard of hearing. In the summer when everyone had their a/c on that worked, but this time, she talked a little too loud. The worst thing was that when he went into her room to question it, she denied being on the phone even though she knows he can check the bill on line. She was quick enough to delete the records of calls made from her phone. Well, when he checked, he found out it was a regular habit to be making calls late at night on school nights, even up to 1:00 or 2:00 a.m. She does manage to make the school bus every day, which means she has to get up at 6:30.

Now the thing is that she is not a good student. She failed science the first quarter. In her mind, she probably doesn't associate not getting sleep w/ doing poorly in school, but she doesn't put that much effort into her school work. Her priority is what's on TV. So now, she doesn't have cell phone use at all. My DH may decide to give it back if she gets her grades up. He also told her he wants weekly reports from her science teacher about how she is doing. yesterday she told him "I got a 70 on the test and I thought I knew the material."

On the other hand, my DD (17) will stay up late IMing her friends, although not on the phone, it's the same thing. I don't care because 1) she drives to school so I don't have to worry about her missing the bus and she has already had to go to detention for being late, which isn't my problem 2) she is on the honor roll, 3) when she goes away to college next year, I'm not going to be there telling her what time to go to bed. If her grades weren't excellent though I might get on her more. I just got sick of telling her to go to bed. In 11th grade I gave up, although I told her that if she missed the bus and I had to drive her, it would be different since the high school is on the other side of town.

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