<p>My 17 yo D is a very private and gaurded person. She recently broke up with her boyfriend of almost 2 years, and understandably she is not talking to me about her feelings about it. I believe it important that she talk to and seek support from friends during this time, which she has. What I am concerned about is that she is also turning to texting someone who I believe she met in a chat room.</p>
<p>I periodically check her texting usage on the online billing site if our cell phone carrier. I noticed that this unfamiliar area code number came up with many messages associated during certain times. I have been monitoring the bills these last few months as my daughter’s relationship soured, and it turns out that there would be lots of messages back and forth to this cross country number on days when my daughter was stood up or otherwise upset.</p>
<p>At one time she left a chat window open on the computer and I read a discussion thread that would make most adults blush. I did further checking and associated the person she was having this explicit conversation with as being in the same area code as the mystery texts. </p>
<p>Finally, today I checked the texting and saw that she is conversing with this person during her free period at school. My gut instinct tells me this is unacceptable, but I really can’t figure out what boundaries to set on her texting/computer usage as we never have had cause for concern or issues with mistrust before. She is an outstanding scholar, headed to a great university next fall, and will not be under our watchful eye.</p>
<p>What do folks think about confronting her during this vulnerable time when she is getting over a tough breakup? Where should we draw the line on allowable texts? Does it need to be only people she has met in person? What about at school during lunch, etc? Sexting, I didn’t think we would have to deal with that too…</p>
<p>Don’t “confront” her. Talk to her. Something along the lines of, “I’ve noticed an unusual phone number on our cell phone bill. It shows you’re texting that number during school hours. Who is this person?” Then take it from there.</p>
<p>You can bring up the chat room in a similar manner.</p>
<p>I’m suspicious and cynical. I’m worried that the person at the other end of those texts is a 50-something dirty old man. I wouldn’t be subtle about it with my kid–I’d be right there with “who’s the person on the other side of the country?”</p>
<p>As a parent you have to trust your gut, and I do not mean to make light of your concerns, but the area code of the phone number may have no relation to the phone’s location.
The phone number could belong to a classmate who had the phone before moving to your area.
My children on the west coast have Virginia area codes.</p>
<p>Thanks folks - The person who she was chatting with had is real name on the Facebook chat window, so it was easy to locate his FB profile and check him out. His profile appears legitimate, although not the type my daughter would normally be attracted to. I hate that I have done this much snooping rather than talking to my daughter, but as I stated in the OP she is unfortunately a pretty gaurded person and difficult to get to open up about her personal activities.</p>
<p>There are a lot more parents out there who wish they had done more snooping and some of them don’t have a daughter now to question. I think it’s part of the job description</p>
<p>Assuming she can demonstrate that the texting/chattng “friend” is not a pedophile, what boundaries around communication are appropriate under the circumstances?</p>
<p>You’re the parent so take control of the situation.</p>
<p>If you’re not comfortable with her behavior, sit her down and TALK. Call her from her room and tell her that you need to have a discussion with her. </p>
<p>You need to decide how to handle the situation. Even if the person she’s been texting and communicating with online is someone you approve of, do you think it’s appropriate for her to communicate with this person at all hours? You could take her phone and laptop away at a certain time in the evening and give them back in the morning. </p>
<p>Just sit down and talk with her. Express your concerns. Listen to her responses. Ask the hard questions. Don’t avoid the difficult parent/child discussions. Talk openly and honestly.</p>
<p>chedva stated exactly the response I was going to - you need to talk to her about this. People who have had recent breakups are in a vulnerable position and sometimes easily taken advantage of. It’s best to have a discussion with her about what’s going on before she gets even more drawn into this ‘relationship’. It doesn’t matter if she’s going off to college next year - right now she’s under your watch.</p>
<p>I would like to know how she could possibly demonstrate that he is who he says he is. I have had very close online friends since I was about ten years old, so it’s not like I am someone who is hyper-vigilant about online relationships, but my attitude has always been that I NEVER know-- I have met some online friends in person but only after 5+ years of friendship, and I was STILL not certain then-- my attitude was that I would meet them in public and that if they had managed to fool me for that many years I deserved what I got, which isn’t exactly something I’d hope my mother would condone. I think discussing what boundaries to set is a moot point unless you can come up with a good answer to this question. His facebook profile tells you absolutely nothing. You can make a fake profile and get tons of friends in that age group without even trying. Literally, effortless. He can get a younger looking/sounding friend to go on webcam or on the phone. I can’t think of a single thing he can’t fake somehow.</p>
<p>And for the record, the only boundary my mom set was no personally identifying information-- that includes phone number. He can track your D down just as easily as you tracked him. He can google her area code and figure out what region she lives, and wait for her to drop clues to narrow it down more-- and it doesn’t take much, at all. And if she’s friends with him on facebook, he probably has all he needs. I gave my phone number out once and I got in MASSIVE trouble and had to change numbers, and for good reason.</p>
<p>My response is based only on my relationship with my daughter at that age. She would know that I am monitoring text messaging. If I’m paying the bill and/or she’s living at home, I have no problem keeping an eye on that. So, I would have asked about these texts immediately rather than waiting. If I had seen an explicit chat session with someone on line, I would have had a very serious discussion with her at that very minute. I don’t care whether she knows the person or not - it’s not happening with my knowledge and if I had to move the computer to the kitchen, I would. It’s such poor judgment. She has no idea what this person could do with those sessions - they can be saved and end up on the front page of the Wall Street Journal. So, personally, I’d come down on this stuff pretty hard.</p>
<p>I have met a few people that I had known on-line. Most of them I knew for about 5 or more years before I met them and we met in a public place with LOTS of people around. I am still very good friends with many of these people and the info I gathered over the years before we met was validated when we met on-line.</p>
<p>That said, I would NEVER post anything that I would blush to have my parents/grandparents read on the front page of the paper, because that is one of the places some of this stuff CAN end up or be used for blackmail. We remind our kids of this, especially if they may someday want a job with the government or a job that might not hire them based on any of these posts.</p>
<p>I believe they are very careful and hope you can get your D to understand her vulnerability and the dangers out there. Unfortunately, there are more imposters out there than one would like to believe, many of whom could take advantage of an innocent, vulnerable person like her.</p>
<p>You have to start with the conversation. And trying to figure out some way for her to prove that he IS who he says he is. (You might try just phoning the number if you are not getting a straight answer when you ask your D). I will say, my kids (and even me as an adult) have friends online that we have never met in person (in fact, I recently invited someone I met here on CC to stay at my house while in town!). But given the sexual nature of the conversations, I would be overly cautious if it were my kid.</p>
<p>Worst case… if you think you really have his real name, you could also do an online background check. It costs a little bit of money, but might give you some peace of mind.</p>
<p>Agreed that you need to point out that the other person could copy and misuse her text messages. Hopefully she has not sent any inappropriate photos. :eek:</p>
<p>I don’t think you’re out of place asking her who she’s talking to but it might upset her that you are snooping around. My mom used to see numbers on my texting when I was on her family plan or she’d see the times of days that I sent things and she asked me about things one time too many so I left her plan and broke off onto my own individual plan. I pay a lot more for it now but I have privacy. Regarding online friends, I have quite a few friends that I’ve met online throughout my life. Some of them I’ve met in person, but most I haven’t. I made an online friend when I was 14 on AOL and I still talk to him this day. We used to buy calling cards and call each other all the time when we were teenagers. I remember talking to him the day he got his drivers license… My mom knew that we were calling each other as we were tying up her phone line, lol (pre-cell phones). Now we just chat online and text occasionally. I’ve yet to meet him but I think it would be neat to do so someday considering I’ve known him half my life now.</p>
<p>Thanks folks for your advise. Unfortunately, we found that the situation with our daughter is much worse than I initially thought. Since I saw on the cell carrier website that photo messages had been exchanged, I decided to look further into her online activities before she got home from school. I guessed my daughter’s password to the chat room site where I thought she first connected with the person she had been having a texting relationship with. What I found there was that she has been engaging in in extremely explicit messaging conversatoins online. The message threads date back some time, even to during and prior her last relationship.</p>
<p>I am utterly heartbroken to learn of this behavior, and what is says about her self image. At this point we are in damage control. My husband and I talked to our daughter, and she cried in shame, and seemed relieved to have a reason to stop. She now realizes the potential long-term consequences of her actions. She had not thought at all about the risks to her safety and security. She was so naive that she had even given her regular email address to connect on IM, which someone could use to find her Facebook profile (school, hometown, pics, etc.). I am so sorry and regretful that we did not monitor her computer and phone use previously.</p>
<p>So far, we have blocked the cell number of the person she was texting, made her “unfriend” him from facebook, and uninstall the instant messaging services. We are also attempting to have the chat website erase all of the associated message threads from their chat room. It is terrifying to know that she had sent pics to this person on the other side of the country. The explicit message threads have her email username associated with them. God forbid those surface anywhere. If anyone has any technical knowledge on how to clean up cyberspace from her messaging, I would greatly appreciate hearing.</p>
<p>I’m sorry to hear that your daughter made a poor choice but so glad to hear that you talked to her about it and are helping her get over this. You have all done now what you should (though I can’t speak to the technical questions).</p>
<p>Good that you & your D are working through this. Please consider having family & individual counseling for your D, so she can make better choices in the future, especially as she reaches college & will have so many choices to make.</p>
<p>Also, consider consulting with some local tech support type about how to do as good a cyber-erase as possible, especially so your D can’t/won’t be stalked.</p>
<p>A lot of what gets sent can’t be gotten rid of. You should do what you’re doing to try to get some things deleted but realize that it can’t all be deleted.</p>
<p>Some other thoughts - </p>
<ul>
<li><p>Get rid of her email account. This should be easy. She can make another email account and be much more careful who she gives it to. </p></li>
<li><p>Get rid of her Facebook account. If she feels she absolutely must be on FB, which I suppose she will feel, then she can create another FB account that ideally doesn’t use her real name.</p></li>
<li><p>She needs to get out of the chat rooms and not return. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>She really needs to get to the bottom of why she’s focused on these online ‘relationships’ and especially the explicit messages and perhaps replace the time with something more constructive - sports, volunteering, ‘real’ friends, a part time job, etc. It sounds as if she might have too much free time on her hands.</p>
<p>I’d probably go further and cut off her internet access completely for a while, probably months, so she can get used to doing things that aren’t focused on cyberspace. It’s true that she could get around many of these limitations if she really wants to, i.e. using the computers at a library, school, etc., but if she still wants to do that then you have another, bigger problem on your hands that likely should involve at least a therapist/counselor to get to the bottom of her issues.</p>