<p>It would be for ten days. I do realize that I wouldn’t be asking if I didn’t have reservations. I can’t really think of any reason not to, but my mom guilt is nagging a bit. He gets himself off to school every morning, has a pretty full after school schedule that he manages on his own, has a part time job that he’s on top of, he’ll have first semester senior year under his belt and just be starting second (he’s been very responsible on the academic front, but if he drops the ball there’ll be time to recover). I have friends he can go to in a pinch and who will check on him for me, plus I can call. </p>
<p>No, it is not OK to leave a HS student alone for 10 days while the parent(s) is/are out of the country.</p>
<p>If other kids find out he has the house to himself for that long, he is in a bad position; either there is going to be a lot of underage partying at your house, or your kid is stuck fending off his friends’ plans and trying to keep the order at the house himself.</p>
<p>Your mom guilt is right. It’s not fair to the kid on lots of levels.</p>
<p>You must live in my town…this seems to be a common practice…let me tell you what happens when some of the lovelies go overseas and leave their kids:</p>
<p>PARTIES…and when they are done…more PARTIES…and these are the “good” kids…</p>
<p>IMHO it’s not a good idea. An 18yr old neighbor boy was left alone while his parents were out of town for a week. He’s a really, really good kid and they asked us to keep on eye on him. One night a couple of friends came over and then a couple more. One girl who stopped by that he didn’t even know well, arrived intoxicated. He asked her to leave. She went around the house and came back in. He asked her to leave again. She walked down three houses, knocked on the door and told the owners that there was a party three doors down and that people were starting to fight. Police arrived. Boy let them in. He thought he had nothing to hide. There was NO alcohol in the house, and the kids were all sober. Police issues a “noise violation” ticket. Story was on the front page of the local paper. Boy got probation and a fine. Couldn’t leave the state without court permission for a few years.</p>
<p>The problem is that no matter how good your kid is, things happen and he’s a minor and you’ll be out of the country. Really good kids who wouldn’t dream of doing something wrong with parents there, think otherwise when they are gone.</p>
<p>I think it depends on the situation.
Perhaps he could stay at a friends?</p>
<p>But I agree in some areas wouldn’t be a good idea no
matter how responsible and mature your child is.
It is pretty hard to deal with 30 or 40 people showing up
in your driveway.</p>
<p>We got a house sitter for a similar situation.</p>
<p>Seems like too long a time to leave a 17 1/2 year old in charge of the place . . . he may be able to take care of himself, but dealing with his peers as if he were an adult property caretaker puts toomuch responsibility on his still young shoulders . . . and that’s the part that you have to think all the way through.</p>
<p>So what do you think of an almost 19 yo high school senior home alone for three days midweek? Not in the public high school … attends a small day school two towns north. He will have adult resources, but doesn’t want anyone staying with him, or him staying with friends.</p>
<p>We left our 16 year old son for a long weekend to attend a funeral in another state. I called all of his friends’ parents, told them where we would be and that no one was allowed in the house but him. I commissioned the across the street neighbor to serve as bouncer if anyone showed up. He met his friends in the park one afternoon to play frisbee with the dog, declined dinner invitations from all the parents, and was very responsible. He loved it. It was a small town, and we knew all of our neighbors well. </p>
<p>Leaving the country is a different topic. Perhaps a friend has a college aged or working son who could stay at the house with your son…someone who is not a babysitter, but a resident adult. Good luck!</p>
<p>Loralei, we’ve left DS for one or two nights at a time several times. He has a good friend whose parents are gone much of the time–dad got a job two states away and mom goes to be with her ailing dad across the country for a week at a time. I’ve not talked to his mom, but he knows he’s welcome at my house anytime and has come for the night a couple times and just for dinner several times.</p>
<p>I do sense DS is not completely comfortable with the idea…but I’m sure he wouldn’t want a babysitter either. The “friend’s older son” suggestion could work. I have a friend whose 25 yo just lost his job.</p>
<p>if you were 100% sure it was ok, you wouldn’t be wondering about it…hire a house sitter. </p>
<p>i knew i could probably trust my kids, but i’ve seen first hand how easy it is for a party to get started–just a few good friends over for a movie, and boom! it can run out of control quick if their friends realize no adults are around…it’s usually friends of friends of friends that cause the problems.</p>
<p>Probably so. I’m sold on the house sitter/stay-with-friends route with maybe some weekdays home alone with neighborhood supervision in the middle.</p>
<p>I have mature, great kids, but I would never leave them unsupervised for ten days when I was out of the country. Teens are teens and as much as we trust them, they can still surprise us sometimes. I don’t want to be surprised when I am far out of reach.</p>
<p>I would have him stay at a friend’s house if possible and have those parents accountable for the house and where your son is each night.</p>
<p>For 10 days, I would split it up. Have the adult come for weekends and have your kid go to a friend’s house during the weekdays – or vice versa.</p>
<p>I, too, trust my kids. It’s other people’s kids I don’t trust, and I don’t want to put my kid in the position of having to be the bad guy if a bunch of kids show up at the house ready to party. Also, I don’t want to be the precedent that convinces other parents (including parents of kids less trustworthy than mine) that it’s OK to leave HS kids unsupervised alone in the house while their parents are out of town for an extended period of time.</p>
<p>My son is also a senior and the same age as yours. He is also a responsbile kid but here is a recent story.</p>
<p>For the past several years, a few of our kids’ friends come over and spend New Years Eve with us for a small party/gathering. This year, 5 came over and 3 spent the night with us. We stayed up until 1am and went to bed while the kids are still up playing video games and stuff. The next morning when we got up, we saw a note that our senior son wants to talk to us and to wake him up.</p>
<p>He told us that his friend called around 2am, was at a party and police was called to break up the party. Friend was freaking out and wanted to come over. Son said not good idea, my parents are sleeping and it is too late. But friend sounded desparate. Son was afraid something might happen to friend so he said ok. Friend arrived shortly drunk and vomitted in our house. Son and friend who was spending the night cleaned up and drove drunk friend home.</p>
<p>We live in a big house. We heard some noises but we thought that the kids were still up watching TV or something. Also we knew all the kids staying with us very well and they are all good kids.</p>
<p>Son was never put into such a situation before, was upset and probably did what he thought was right. We told him that he could always call on us anytime for any situation.</p>
<p>You never know what will happen and it is a lot of responsibility to put on a minor alone for so long.</p>
<p>Anytime I hear someone say “My kid is a good kid; he would never ____________,” I just shake my head. ALL kids, even the most special, honest, responsible kids on the planet are capable of making poor choices. They are human. Let’s face it; many times the only reason they don’t make a poor choice is because they know we are around and it would be too difficult to hide it from us. Ten days, parent thousands of miles away, and no supervision is putting a huge temptation in front of even the best kid. Unless they have had a whole lot of practice being “responsible” with absolutely no supervision, it seems to me to be a recipe for some problems.</p>
<p>Can you have an adult stay with him so he keeps his own routine, but has an excuse/protection from peer pressure when others find out you are gone?</p>
<p>I left my 17 year old “alone” when we were out of town, except her college sister came to stay and is old enough to “know better” plus the 17 year old was not in HS, but CC, so no peer pressure…I also have nosy neighbors who would inform me of anything off base.</p>
<p>The kids here have partying down to an art. One driver will pick up as many kids as their car will hold and often times will make additional trips to pick up more kids. No one will park anywhere within a 3 blocks of the house holding the party. They’ve even been known to host parties at houses where one of the teens is dog-sitting/house sitting, if one of them has a key and they know the people are gone. And I guess that somehow they are very good at cleaning up afterwards, as it’s rare any of them get caught.</p>
<p>In May of 2006, DH and I went to New Zealand to visit S1, who was there for a semester. </p>
<p>Yes, we left S2 – who was 16 years old and a junior in HS – home alone.</p>
<p>It was the week of AP exams. We knew he’d be studying hard. We told all the neighbors we were going away and left an itinerary with each of them. We told them that if more than one strange car showed up at the house, to immediately go over and see what’s going on.</p>
<p>We talked to his (very close) girlfriend’s family and gave them similar instructions.</p>
<p>We made two or three other families around town aware of what was going on.</p>
<p>We had a good sit-down talk with S2 about our expectations and our concern that the entire football team would show up with four kegs. We told him to call our very good neighbors at the first sign of any trouble.</p>
<p>Nothing happened.</p>
<p>That said, in retrospect, I think we were stupid.</p>