<p>my friend went out of town and sophmore D was home alone…mom and dad said NOONE IN THE HOUSE…NO ONE!!!</p>
<p>so ofcourse D let BF come over…well they got caught</p>
<p>how you ask</p>
<p>well the loverbirds took picture of themselves (nothing naughty) and dowloaded them onto family’s photobucket</p>
<p>BUSTED!!!</p>
<p>ya just gotsta laugh</p>
<p>What kind of people would leave a HS sophomore home alone while they go out of town? </p>
<p>I don’t “just gotsta laugh.” I think it’s pathetic – on the part of the parents.</p>
<p>i agree, she shoulnd’t have been left, parents learned a BIG lesson with that one</p>
<p>I am laughing at the stupid kids</p>
<p>ps- if the mom had asked, that girl would have spent the night at my house with my D, but they were being all hip and cool i guess</p>
<p>lucky it was just the boy, BUT, gut tells me more happened then just picture taking</p>
<p>Why don’t they think they’ll get caught - is it that self-protective adolescent “it can’t happen to me” mindset, or do they just never consider the possibility? Two years ago, a couple of guys from our hs blew up a toilet in a bathroom located 20 feet from the principal’s office DURING school hours. They apparently set up some sort of timing device that was supposed to allow them to escape. Guess who just happened to be walking down the hall while the explosives experts were trying to make their getaway?</p>
<p>And how many underage kids post photos of themselves on Facebook drinking what is obviously beer (sometimes out of the can)?</p>
<p>Sometimes people seem to want to get “caught”?</p>
<p>I agree that the bigger issue is the parents leaving a 15 yr old home alone while they go out of town.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Well, in a lot of families, high school kids are home alone for a couple of hours every day after school because both parents are working. So lots of kids have sex in their own homes (or their boyfriend/girlfriend’s home) in the afternoons. I did. My son did. Probably you did. I don’t see where doing it in the dark is any worse.</p>
<p>But the parents shouldn’t have left that kid home alone overnight anyway. There’s too much risk that hordes of kids will find out and descend on the house for a drunken and destructive party – which is a lot worse than sex between consenting adolescents.</p>
<p>Hmmm. The issue of whether one should leave a 15-year-old alone at home fascinates me. You see, my family is large and we have had kids wanting to do things and go places. Naturally, we couldn’t always go with them. So I have sent kids solo to national and international tournaments, music competitions, and the like. Usually, they had adult supervision at the destination, but not always. For instance, I once sent a son to Spain for a fencing competition. He then took a train to France for another competition. Then, he hopped a train to Paris and grabbed a flight home. He was 14 and spoke not a word of Spanish or French.</p>
<p>Others in my wife’s family have sent 12-year-olds home to grandmother and had them change airports in London by themselves, or sent their 16-year-olds to Nepal to do some mountain hiking.</p>
<p>I realize that this is a bit unusual, but I’m not sure it’s wrong. Recently, we had to send a son to DC for a competition on a red-eye. The competition was the next morning. Another family sent their daughter with our son. The parents were absolute wrecks. We couldn’t understand it. All they were doing was flying into Baltimore at 5 a.m. and getting a cab or limo to DC. No big deal. I think our attitude unnerved them.</p>
<p>So, I guess the upshot is that I believe sending kids out on their own makes them more independent and self-sufficient.</p>
<p>I am not one who hermetically seals my children, overprotecting them and keeping the dependent. </p>
<p>On the other hand, I wouldn’t leave a 15 year old home alone for the weekend. After school, during the day, or at night when parents are out for a few hours is completely different (and my S has had friends…even girls… over, even when we aren’t home, which some people consider a “no no”…). </p>
<p>I just think overnights alone at 15 is too young, mostly because kids that age have no clue what to do in an emergency.</p>
<p>tarhunt, when my daughter was 16, she flew to London and Greece by herself (she joined up with a church group in Corfu). I think, as always, it depends on the kid.</p>
<p>
Don’t make too many assumptions! 
</p>
<p>Allmusic, as seems to be the case in so many matters, I agree with you. It’s the staying by themselves at night that I find troubling. My kids have been on school trips where they stayed in hotel rooms (chaperones in rooms down the hall) and I wasn’t concerned. They were generally supervised. But beyond the issue of sex at home, what about burglury or fire? Or, in the Bay area, earthquakes? I just think it’s irresponsible for people to leave HS kids alone overnight.</p>
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<p>Kids beware! Around our neighborhood, we have Neighborhood Watch–your mother’s friends are watching what is going on around the house when she isn’t there.</p>
<p>I agree that the bigger issue is the parents leaving a 15 yr old home alone while they go out of town.</p>
<p>My family left me alone for a week while they went to the Spokane Worlds fair in “74”
I was 16</p>
<p>Yeah, I’m seventeen now, but I’ve been spending some nights alone since I was fourteen-fifteen years old.</p>
<p>It was never a huge deal.</p>
<p>Brandon just turned 18 last week; my husband and I are going out of town for a couple of days, and I still wouldn’t DREAM of letting him stay alone overnight in our house for that time. He’s got to stay with his aunt & uncle.</p>
<p>Guess I’m still too protective . . .</p>
<p>that does seem a little extreme brandon, but it depends on your perspective and child.
For instance- I didn’t want to go to the EXPO because spending the week with my family was just too stressful to think about-I could have stayed with a friend- I suppose but I was fine on my own
( and just over a year later I was living on my own anyway & my father was dead)
But my oldest goes on most of our big family adventures and she is 24 ( although I have left her here- with her 16 year old sister- because the sister doesn’t feel comfortable staying by herself)
Oldest also doesn’t live here anymore- but she enjoys coming up to visit</p>
<p>It really depends on the kid and their maturity level, as well, obviously, as the comfort level of the parents. Our Ds have travelled together or alone, in various combinations of ages, etc. since they were about 14, all over the world. They’re all familiar with what needs to be done in various types of emergency situations, both inside and outside the home.</p>
<p>We’ve left the first three alone, probably the first time around age 16, at home when the rest of us have had to be out of town, with no untoward happenings. In a couple of cases, a trusted friend has been asked to stay overnight, again with no problems. My older two Ds babysat extensively starting from the time they were 12. Several of their regular families hired them to stay with their kids overnight, or for a weekend, by the time they were 16. I can’t imagine not feeling comfortable leaving a 17 or 18 alone at home overnight. Thousands of kids this age, and some younger, are away at college at that age, living on their own.</p>
<p>“tarhunt, when my daughter was 16, she flew to London and Greece by herself (she joined up with a church group in Corfu). I think, as always, it depends on the kid.”</p>
<p>It’s far easier for kids to get into trouble staying home alone overnight at age 15 or 16 than for them to be flying abroad to meet up with a church group or other type of tour.</p>
<p>The problem with kids staying home overnight is that it’s a big temptation to host a party, to allow a romantic partner to spend the night; to get into the family booze or to do other things that are downright dangerous.</p>
<p>There are certainly other types of things to be cautious about with alllowng a teen to travel abroad alone, but I don’t see it as leading to the same types of temptations that occur when a minor gets to spend the night at home alone.</p>
<p>
But college kids aren’t really alone at college – they are typically in dorms, and I would imagine that underage students have someone keeping an eye on them, or have been vetted for maturity during the application process. </p>
<p>I guess it’s a matter of different parenting styles. I still feel it’s somewhat irresponsible to leave anyone under the age of 18 home alone for a variety of reasons. But to each his own.</p>
<p>Northstarmom:</p>
<p>Thanks. I think I understand the difference. Having eight children means my wife and I haven’t the money to travel alone, so it’s never come up before. Still, I think that for at least six of the eight, I would be perfectly comfortable leaving them at home for a few nights. To me, it’s a matter of maturity.</p>