Asking for parenting advice for older teens/young adults still living at home.

Yes, I really am asking! We're not facing any horrible event right now and the kids are great, but for those of you who did it right or did it wrong, please post your tips in this thread.

We have four kids, one age 19 (lives at home, finishing tech school this summer and works part-time); age 17 (graduating high school in two weeks, will stay here at home while commuting to college full-time and continuing to work part-time); two younger kids ages 15 and 13.

What kind of chores do you expect them to do? How do you handle going out and bringing people back to the house? How do you handle drinking (they are both underage but obviously will have friends who drink at times)? What do you expect them to pay for with regard to their living expenses (we are definitely hurting for money).

My parenting style is more laissez-faire but since they will be staying home for quite awhile due to the economy we want to keep things positive.

Anyone can chime in, you don't need to be a parent. :)

locally. My mom made them pay rent (probably about $100 each, this was the mid-late 80s). They worked full time and finished with night classes. Honestly, aside from laundry, I don't remember them doing any cleaning chores. They were of age so drinking was not an issue.

5 kids....

We were expected NOT to have SEX in the house (mostly abided by...)
We used to stay up most of the night and sleep most of the day.
We all moved out before we were 21.
...EXCEPT for my youngest sister (who was 8 years younger than my youngest
brother). She ended up staying home through college and then for 2 more
years, helping to take care of my father, who was afflicted with ALS.

I currently have 2 teenagers living at home, both girls.
The 19-year old is home for the summer after her first year away at college.
The 15-year old is a junior in high school.

We are planning on having a "family meeting" soon, as soon as my husband
and I have a chance to get out on our own and discuss our objectives.

My advice to anyone living with teenagers?

Don't buy a RANCH HOUSE.

I used to love this place, but now I wish we had a second story
for some PRIVACY!

What goes around, comes around, and my 19 year old will NOT GO TO BED
at a "normal" hour.

The "family meeting" must be undertaken before the youngest one gets
out of school!

:)

:hi:

We have a one-story house but the living quarters are set up in "wings." The girls each have their own room w/private bathroom, the boys have their own rooms in their wing with a private bathroom, and then there's a master suite on the other side of the house. We don't hear what goes on over there but can hear the front door/garage door when it's being used (plus we have a very active doggie alarm system, lol).

The sex issue isn't ongoing yet (YET), but I don't feel right about it happening here with the younger teens. However, I also don't want it happening in an unsafe place either. We know it's going to happen regardless (they are prepared), we just don't like the idea of it happening *here*, if that makes any sense.

Staying up late is par for the course in this house anyway, that's not a biggie.

Love the idea of a family meeting.

My youngest usually has at least one friend sleeping over.
I can't get "in the mood" when they're padding around all
over the place, whether my bedroom door is closed or not!

This creates "stress" for my husband (me too, sometimes!).
Hence, the second story seems like a good idea.

The "family meeting" is completely necessary, as we will
have to outline SPECIFIC duties (and compensation) for each
daughter. If my oldest is not working (she's not) then she
has time to do laundry and cook dinner, but I'm not going
to treat her like an unpaid servant. This works for her,
the problem is, while my oldest
will do her "chores", the youngest gets away with murder...
and everything goes to hell.

So, when they are BOTH out of school, they will have specific
and separate duties and paychecks.

(I'm not talking big money here, the oldest gets $5.00 for cooking
dinner....but at the end of the week, she can have 50 or more dollars
depending on how much cleaning she does).

We make good use of every single square inch, trust me!

I "hear you" wrt the youngest getting by with murder, we hear complaints about that regarding both younger kids from time to time. I wish we could pay more for chores but we just can't afford it, and since the older two have jobs we don't pay them at all (except in hugs). Now the younger two get money for chores and that seems to help.

The three older ones can cook, but the older two are usually working during dinnertime so we set aside a plate for them. They've done their own laundry since late elementary school (I have a bad back and can barely do mine, much less 5 other people's).

What I like best about your ideas is planning ahead and discussing specific duties. At least that should help clarify our intentions and then hopefully we can inch forward together in the same direction (wishful thinking, right?).

when school is out for the younger ones.

The hold up on the "meeting" is my husband and me...
because FIRST, we have to agree on what are reasonable
expectations given their ages and personalities and
capabilities...

THAT'S not always easy, as my husband is a
"When I say "JUMP" you should only ask "how high?"
kind of guy, and I'm a "never do today what you
can put off until tomorrow" kind of person!

If they have income, they can chip in a percentage for household expenses. They should share the household chores with you, as well.

As far as the social aspect, if they have company over, establish a time when company has to be gone (kind of like a reverse curfew). I would stipulate that there be no underage drinking in the house. It can come back to bite you in the butt. This might be the last chance you have to train them to be self sufficient adults while still providing a safety net.

The idea of reverse curfew is especially good.

We expect them to do what we have always expected them to do - even the eldest. If there's a list of chores on a note on the kitchen table, it better fucking get done. My eldest has a steady boyfriend (her first, and they are serious). If he spends time living here this summer, he'll have a list as well and he's 21 and in the army. Pull your own damn weight.

Curiously, we have an excellent relationship with all three of our daughters and with the eldests's boyfriend. There are just expectations and it is about keeping the household running.

they need to know the difference between drinking socially versus drinking habitually. Alcohol is huge and it is everywhere. I'm no expert but one thing that I remember clearly from my late teens is when my parents gave me a full beer at the table with dinner. they didn't make a big deal out of it they just did it one day. of course, it wasn't my first beer but it literally put drinking on the table as an issue. It made it less secretive and less cool.

through adolescence, and then a couple came back after college, briefly, for temporary stays. Right now I have a 22-year-old here till he goes into the Air Force later this summer, and my 18-year-old is at this moment driving home for the summer between college semesters. Both will be expected to do their laundry, keep their rooms neat, run errands (going to the store for nit-noy items, etc), assist with whatever I ask for help with (I'm not so great with moving furniture and heavy boxes and we just moved from MD to IA, so that'll be an issue.) If they choose to drink alcohol, I have no major issues as long as they don't get behind a wheel, and they know from bitter experience during high school (when a close friends's dad was killed in an accident) that choosing to do so is a tragedy waiting to happen. Sex - um, no. Not in this small place, and we're new in town anyway. I do all the cooking, but I like that, anyway. I guess I don't demand a lot, but I DO demand respect. I'm fortunate, though, the kids are all military brats and respect is something that they've grown up with.

Good luck, and do enjoy them while they're with you! Even in challenging times - maybe especially in challenging times - having family together can be a real blessing and a way to bond that will last forever. :)

She took a year off between college and grad school to help us but she had skipped a grade and graduated college in 3 yrs so she was actually only 20 when she started back living with us, turned 21 during that year. FWIW, she was employed as a regular employee by us with a salary so her "work" was completely differentiated from living at home with us. It made it easier to differentiate expectations that way.

Rent: We did not have her pay rent because she was actually home to help us and it didn't feel right to charge her for being there. But if she had come home to live and had another job off the farm, I'd charge her some kind of rent to cover food etc. If I had the financial capability, I'd bank that $$ and return it to her as an apartment/house down payment when she finally left. If we were in financial straits, I'd take the $$ without any qualms to help the family get through the hard patch.

Drinking: we've always let her drink at home if she wanted since she was a teen (we're European). She knows how I feel though about drinking and driving, and that's it illegal for her to drink away from our home before she was 21.... But for us however, it wasn't an issue. My daughter doesn't like the taste of any alcohol (yet).

Boyfriend: Could visit at our house and he even slept over a couple of times camped out on the porch with my daughter but no sex since she has a younger sister. Which meant my daughter actually spent a LOT of nights at his apartment.

Chores: Everybody does chores in my house that aren't tied to an allowance. If you live at my house, you are expected to help keep it clean so weekly everyone works together and my daughter was expected to do her fair share of household chores. She did her own laundry and cooked once per week or so because she liked it. I bought all the food.

Going out: My rule was that she had to either call or text by midnight with an arrival home time, or be home by midnight. I ALWAYS wake up in the middle of the night to pee which means I make a quick bed check on my kids on the way. If it were 3 am and she weren't home and I hadn't heard from her, I'd freak. By midnight, the kids know where they're going to be for the rest of the night and an approximate arrival home time, or not. Common courtesy for ME meant that she let me know if she were coming home. No judgment if she didn't come home and I didn't pry about where she was - hell she's an adult - but home or not was all I needed.

We had a great year (actually 18 months) together that I wouldn't trade for anything. She took off for grad school at the end, as a genuine adult, peer and friend.

Let me know if you have any other questions! Good luck.