<p>We needed to leave our younger daughter home twice. The first time was for two days and we had to attend older D’s college graduation in another town (younger D was a freshman in HS then, and it wa AP test time). She stayed with a family friend from about 9 pm through the night, went to school from this friend’s home, but did come home from school and stayed until late evening because she was more comfortable studying in her own environment.</p>
<p>A similar procedure was adopted for a longer journey (an emergency trip to India this time) – she stayed home until evening but was not allowed to stay home alone at night, went to sleep at family friend’s home (who also fed her well and took great care of her).</p>
<p>I’m glad you seem to have worked everything out so well. </p>
<p>When I was in the hospital in Montreal for three weeks last summer (a lot of it unexpectedly), my 19 year old son was alone in my apartment for two of them, taking care of our cat, etc. I really had no worries, since he’s pretty responsible, and I know and trust the only friends he had over. Besides, my ex was 10 minutes away if anything happened. And I think there’s a difference between someone in high school being left alone and someone in college (my son had already finished his freshman year and was used to being more on his own), as well as between an apartment and a house. (If I were still living in a house, I might have hesitated a little more and insisted that he just stay with my ex.)</p>
<p>The only thing that went wrong is that despite doing a wonderful job with Ziggy, he didn’t do very much to keep the place in any kind of reasonable shape despite his assurances that he had done so; he had forgotten to take out the garbage the whole time, and I won’t even comment on the shape the kitchen and bathroom were in! The day I finally got home from the hospital, I have to admit that the very first thing I did, as weak as I was (as some of you may remember), was get down on my hands and knees and spend an hour scrubbing both! Sigh. He’s always been kind of a slob, like many boys his age, and knows that if he waits me out long enough I’ll take care of things. I still hope he’ll change someday. But this time, I really did cut him a lot of slack. I understood how much stress he’d been under, and how upset he was, given that for a while he (and I) really thought I wasn’t going to make it. I do wish he’d asked my ex for a little help with all that kind of thing.</p>
<p>Did anyone mention to leave a signed note with the supervising adults that gives your names, his and theirs to present to any hospital/medical emergency crew if necessary during your absence. You authorize them to have medical authority over your kid during dates x through y (your schedule). </p>
<p>I always did that because I didn’t want a hospital to delay or waste time chasing us by phone overseas to authorize, for example, to begin sewing up a wound or x-raying a possible broken bone.</p>
<p>Not the OP’s situation, but something to think about for some families:</p>
<p>When I was 9 years old and my brother was 6 years old, my parents went out of the country on a 2 week vacation. They left us at home with our grandparents in charge. My grandfather had early stages of Alzheimer’s disease and could not do much (ie:not really capable of cooking, but perhaps was still able to put together a sandwich). My grandmother was in good health.</p>
<p>My brother had his first asthma attack while my parents were gone. He had absolutely no medical history of asthma at that time. It was pretty bad. My grandmother called our pediatrician and he came to our house. Our doctor gave him some quick medical treatment, threw my brother in his own car and raced to the hospital with my grandmother sitting in the back seat. My brother was hospitalized for 4 or 5 days. My grandmother stayed at the hospital with him. I was left at home with my grandfather. I stepped up to the plate to get myself to and from school (walked), cared for myself, and I cooked for myself and my grandfather. </p>
<p>My grandparents told my parents that they would never babysit again while my parents went out of the country.</p>
<p>My brother and wife were out of country and their 19 y/o daughter (she was in college but at home at the time & in charge of two younger brothers) called me. She was horribly sick and her tonsils were “bleeding.” It was late Saturday nite, so I took her to the ER. Apparently it was a very bad case of strep. </p>
<p>Because she wasn’t admitted, their insurance didn’t cover the visit. They refused and told daughter she had to pay. When I found out (a year later) I paid. I don’t think my brother knows - I gave niece the money.</p>
<p>Anyway - make sure someone has health info and general idea of how you would want things handled.</p>
<p>My “good”, “responsible”, non “partying” son announced his 17th birthday party on facebook. He said only “friends” could see it, but it happened to be when they where making some changes. For the first time, I could “see” the invite, and RSVP’d as a “maybe”. THAT sure generated a few posts!</p>
<p>Wow, ***Worknprogress, ***I wonder what lesson they are trying to teach their daughter by making her pay for the ER visit herself out of limited funds–not to seek medical treatment when she feels awful, bleeding and scared? I would NEVER want my kids to hesitate to go to the ER if they were concerned about payment and felt very ill. BRAVO to you for paying for your niece!</p>
<p>It’s curious to see the adult standpoints of such a “controversial issue”. Undoubtedly, a good parent should understand their kids and their emotional maturity levels like he should understand his own. If a parent is questioning whether their child is responsible enough to take care of themselves for 10 days or not, and on top of that asking other parents to share predominantly negative anecdotes about the time they let their “good kid” run wild, then there is some loss of emotional connection between the parent and the child. </p>
<p>Speaking from the perspective of a teenage boy, I wish that my parents could understand that I have some emotional maturity instead of making sweeping generalizations of how I am based on how they perceive everybody else my age and gender.</p>
<p>While I do agree that if you aren’t sure then having someone watch him is a reasonable choice (safety reasons and such), but I wonder at what point is your son going to able (in your mind) to function independently?</p>
<p>All of “my group” of parents have learned not to leave older teenagers home alone. I won’t go into all the details from all of the families and there are definitely ranges of bad behavior from the really, really bad to the marginally bad, but suffice it to say none of us do it anymore. Even if your kids don’t drink, the liability issues of kids in your house, and there will be, when you aren’t there is just the bottom line. Our subsequent children whine like crazy saying their older siblings ruined it for them. Too bad.</p>
<p>I agree with momofthreeboys, and others feeling the same way. I have noticed in our neighborhood that all of the kids know whose parents are gone for a long weekend or more. That house becomes “party central”. Any of the kids who want to party, go to that home. Don’t think that the students that you might consider the type to usually stay home on Saturday nights playing video games, watching a movie, or baking cookies do not participate, because many of them do participate. JMO.</p>
The varying opinions make it seem controversial to me.</p>
<p>
Really? So only a bad parent seeks to understand his or her child’s emotional maturity? The original question related to DS’s emotional maturity only to the extent that posters may have offered that I was not considering it; I didn’t sense that at all.</p>
<p>
I don’t follow. I was not questioning DS’s level of responsibility, in fact I stated several examples that he IS responsible. I didn’t ask for negative anecdotes, but feel that sharing one’s experiences is often the best way to make a point. That most who shared had negative anecdotes could mean that the topic is one that mostly those who have had negative experiences would feel compelled to respond or it could mean most of the time bad things happen when teens are left alone, or left alone too long. I value the anecdotes for their demonstration of issues I did not think of. If I was questioning DS’s responsibility level, and I had asked for negative anecdotes, I don’t understand how that would indicate a loss of emotional connection.</p>
<p>
From my perspective as a parent, your keen interest in recognition and understanding of emotional maturity and connection, and your attribution of the question of the propriety of leaving a minor child alone to emotional factors is curious. </p>
<p>
I think the preface to my question indicates that I believe DS to be very near, perhaps even at, that point.</p>
<p>I posted that we had a problem when freshman son was home alone and a few people turned into a ton via cell phones, etc. But I forgot that a few years ago, we left then-almost 21 year old DD in charge of two younger siblings (almost 17 and 13) while we were out of the country (Canada) for about a week. She had completed three years of college and was home on break doing research at a local university. MIL was available to stop by with food a couple of times, etc. A few years make a very big difference at that age (18-22) and we all knew to keep our absence a private matter. The kids didn’t tell their friends they were home alone. DD did an outstanding job being mom while I was away and my boys were thrilled to have her attention, since her college was far away and they missed her when she was gone. It probably would not have worked in all families, but my kids banded together and pulled it off.</p>
<p>As I said, I’m glad I live in an apartment building, for purposes of leaving my son alone. Roving bands of uninvited kids would never have gotten past the doorman!</p>
<p>Even when my son was younger (say, 12), he felt safe being left alone in my apartment for an hour or two while I ran errands, if he didn’t feel like coming along, while at the same time he would have been frightened to be left alone in my ex’s house at all, especially at night.</p>
<p>We all live in different communities. Our kids have always been OK about being left for a few hours or longer, even when they were 10 & 12. We are very close to our neighbors and our kids very rarely ever have friends over (heck, our neighbors have a key to our front door, which our kids have had to retrieve several times when they’d otherwise be locked out).</p>
<p>I know of people who have left their kids (17, 15 & 13) large home without any adult for five plus days many times, when they were thousands of miles away. It was fine for all concerned and there were NO parties and NO visitors and NO problems. Much depends on the community and individuals involved.</p>
<p>@ Shrinkwrap: Of course good parents have doubts, because it’s an indication that they are trying to become better parents. </p>
<p>@Schmoomcgoo: I was relating the understanding of emotional maturity from the parent to the child and the parent to himself and this did not include any relation between a bad parent and seeking to understand their child.</p>
<p>I understand that the anecdotes on this thread make quite a few points and allow you to consider issues you did not think of, but many times when discussions shift towards one side the data or issue becomes skewed. Because the majority of posters felt the need to write about their own negative experiences in order to help you make a decision, I don’t see how their ad populum argument is logical. </p>
<p>While the parents on this thread have valuable information from their own experiences to share and could possibly help another parent whose methods and children are virtually unknown to them, no one should forget that every kid is different and that experiences (good or bad) are not interchangeable from family to family. </p>
<p>I offer that in your quest for advice you seek people such as family members or neighbors that really know your children and can help you far better than the people on here.</p>
<p>Quantifier – this isn’t from a parent but from someone who is past their teens – I don’t see this issue as being about parents not trusting their kids or saying that all 17 yr old teens would act in a certain way went left alone. Rather, it’s about the parents on this board recognizing that even the most responsible, mature, considerate teen who is a ‘good’ kid faces certain pressures. Thus, when that teen’s friends find out that he’s home alone and decide to hang out at the house – the intentions can be good; but it’s when those friends tell another random classmate etc. and friends of friends of friends start showing up – things can spin out of control much faster than anyone expects. There’s a certain amount of pressure to not be uncool and kick people out, but even if the teen can stand that peer pressure, sometimes it’s hard to kick hundreds of unwanted partiers out, without involving adults, cops etc. I see this issue as being about not putting teens in that situation; sometimes the easiest way for a teen to get out of a situation is to say ‘sorry my parents won’t allow it’ – it’s kind of hard to say that when the parents are thousands of miles away.</p>
<p>When our D was a junior, we went to Israel with her younger brothers and some other families for 10 days. She stayed nights at her good friend’s house but came home to her house after school every day. She liked having access to her own stuff and snacks and we felt good that she was being cared for.</p>
<p>(She went to Israel that summer so we didn’t feel guilty that she couldn’t miss HS to go with us.)</p>
<p>I remember we did a proxy health care form. The only thing we forgot was telling the HS. So when she was absent one day (religious holiday) they called our house…no one there! oops.</p>