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“L&O: Handicapped Parking Violators.” That made me burst out laughing.</p>
<p>Anyway, my sister had one for her 16th birthday at the beginning of Jr. year. The only guy was gay, but my parents still had him sleep upstairs and one girl, whose parents didn’t believe in homosexuality and I guess thought he was faking, was picked up early.
After prom though, co-ed sleep overs are very common. My sister went to one after prom. I think there was only one guy though, and he’s bisexual and had a girlfriend at the time anyway.</p>
<p>My friend sort of wanted to have one. She’s moved 4 hours away from us and the only practical way for us to visit her is to sleep over, but her parents were really not into the idea of the one guy coming with us. I think they thought she and the guy were too close anyway (they were right that the relationship wasn’t fully platonic), and they say “No dating until grad school.”</p>
<p>Well, my “you’re kidding?” comment referred to the inference that kids are sooooo busy that they require coed “sleep-overs” to have time to socialize with friends. I was presented with that justification and I just never bought it. My son had plenty of time to spend time with friends…and yes, I consider classroom time to be part of that. By the time they are seniors, their classes included plenty of interaction/group projects, etc. They spent their after-school EC time in activities that they had in common. They also had plenty of free-time to have fun outside of structured activities. There were plenty of weekend parties/activities. I didn’t feel that they were unduly hampered in their socialization.</p>
<p>I still believe that those hours between midnight and (let’s say) 7am should be spent at home asleep. If they needed to get out at 7am for a breakfast activity with their friends (and then to spend the day), I would have been in favor of that.</p>
<p>
I assume this applies to same sex sleepovers for you as well.</p>
<p>Some folks do not like sleepovers. My kids, in general, were not big into them. But sometimes it reaches an hour where visiting friends, regardless of sex, need to stay put until the am.</p>
<p>We allowed one, de facto, at our house, post prom. Four couples, I think, though one girl went home. It was unplanned and they were all sleeping in our family room. Not clear that anything happened (though it is not clear that nothing happened either, though there were no girlfriend/boyfriend combinations, but that in and of itself does not mean nothing happened).</p>
<p>A few months later, one of the girls there – not his prom date but a wonderful girl who is a soulmate style and had been obviously interested in earlier on – fell asleep in his bed while reading to him (he’s dyslexic and loves to have stuff read to him). I emailed her Dad saying that she had fallen asleep in ShawbridgeSon’s bed but that it appeared innocent and that nothing had happened and he responded by saying that she was a college freshman and it would not be a problem with him if something had happened. [A realist – he doesn’t know who if any one she’s sleeping with at school anyway, so why should he worry about Christmas break?]</p>
<p>We did ban a coed sleepover for my HS daughter (at the end of sophomore year). But Daad! We won’t do anything with those three boys. … . We just didn’t want to tempt fate and the girls have all matured pretty well and need to wear a burkha-like outfit to cover their otherwise skimpy clothes.</p>
<p>If you’re not worried about sex, (or you just don’t care about it), then what’s the difference between a co-ed sleepover and an all girls/all boys sleepover? I mean, I can’t really tell the difference if I’m sleeping next to a boy or a girl or no one at all. Plus, as you’re all already well aware, teenagers definitely don’t need a sleepover to have sex or anything like it. </p>
<p>I didn’t go to any coed sleepovers in high school. In college, I’d say the majority of “sleepovers” result from people passing out after drinking, partying, studying, watching movies, etc., and by that time it’s not worth it to wake them up and get them home unless they have a big reason to do so. After all, most of us have similar things to do the next day (which are either class, nothing, or sleeping, depending on the day), so if someone needs to wake up at a certain time or catch a ride to campus, chances are another person there is doing the same thing anyway.</p>
<p>archiemom - you communicated well - I understood the “you’re kidding” comment.</p>
<p>Look - my two oldest kids never would have participated in a co-ed sleepover - save for the cast party. They just were homebodies and I never would have allowed my oldest to participate anyway. I also think there is a huge difference between a freshman/sophomore and a junior/senior in high school. As my kids showed continuted responsible behavior through high school they were awarded with more freedoms. Freedoms that since I gave freely could have been taken away by me.
My two younger kids had a very large circle of friends which included males and females.
This was a diverse group of kids - and no they didn’t ‘socialize’ during class. Hard to have a guitar hero marathon in AP World History.
This activity is not something they did every weekend - they were far too busy for that. It was more like every couple of months, usually it was impromtu.
Different strokes for different folks.</p>
<p>All thru HS, my son’s closest male friends slept over. They each had their chosen couch, and knew where to get sheets and pillows. Occasionally I’d see a few strangers sleeping over. My son was much happier to be the host than sleep-out.</p>
<p>There was an annual sleep-over at a girl’s house on NY’s eve. Her parents both MDs, house by ocean and large, and much safer than driving on that nite. I want to add that these parents are responsible and always strongly involved in kids’ lives.</p>