Teenagers and sleepovers, how often?

Rambosmum

At his age I was sleeping at friends, or they were sleeping at mine most weekends. My parent's put a 1 a month at my house rule in place for term time, but it was more during the holidays. I had about 4/5 friends that I'd regularly sleep over at, averaging about once a fortnight.

Lunar_Eclipse

Not very often currently, thank goodness. They've fallen a bit out of favour here currently (13 & 15), but I suspect they'll be back in full swing (weekly) by sixth form.

Depends on how much sleep they get and how disruptive it is to everyone else. At 14 they still need quite a bit of sleep (9-12 hours here currently.)

Once a month seems fine, more in holidays than term time.

missbiggles1

YORKSHIRELASS wrote: »

Thank you so much, especially 2gorgeousgirls. Yes the other issue here is that my 14 yo needs his sleep and of course teenage boys want to stay up until 4am playing on the Xbox.

According to my son everyone else has sleepovers far more often than him and this is why I wanted to know what other people thought.

And yes he does get invited to sleepovers at friends too but then thats becoming more regular than I would like really (again sleep issues) so I think we need a little chat about it.

What he wants and what you allow him to do aren't the same thing.

silvercar

Wait until the worry isn't how long they stay up, but how soon they go to bed

CathA

Caroline_a wrote: »

I always used to wonder who this amazing woman was "Everybody Else's Mother" who entered into our life when my oldest was around 13 and left when the youngest was about 16. Thank god the b1atch has gone!

When my girls used to say everyone else is doing this/going there/etc I used to say 'How lovely, they can tell you all about it when they come back!' The best one was when one of my twin asked if she could go on a school trip to Spain or somewhere, £700 for 5 days!! Everyone else was going, funnily enough the trip was cancelled due to lack of support.

balletshoes

YORKSHIRELASS wrote: »

My 14 yo son is constantly asking me if he can have friends around for sleepovers. If he had his way he would sleep at a friend's, or have someone here, every weekend.

Usually these sleepovers mean having a friend around for 24 hours.
Our other child has health problems and doesn't always cope well with this so we try and do one sleepover a month but that's not enough apparently.

Don't mind having kids around during the day, staying for tea or whatever it's just this whole sleepover thing that's becoming an issue.

What do other parents think?

my daughter is 14, for the last year or so its been fairly normal in our house for her best friend to be sleeping over at my house once a week on the weekend, or for my daughter to be sleeping over at her best friends house on the weekend. Yep, on their sleepovers, its usually over 24 hours the friends are together at one house or other.

I don't have younger kids though, so its no problem for me to be honest, I don't mind at all.

jinty271

3 of my 4 ( two are all grown now) have always had sleepovers almost every weekend. I used to regularly have at least half a dozen non natives at any one time floating round my kitchen.It has always been a pleasure for us.

Our youngest also has severe health issues, but for us, having guests is always a novelty for her and doesn't affect her in any way - if anything it makes things easier.

The main issue is how it affects you and all the other members of your family - and it will be a compromise, whereby the teenager who wants to have his chums over doesn't feel restricted by the younger child's condition, but also ensuring the younger child (and you ) aren't giving yourself more work on top of an already demanding schedule.

It sounds to me that as things stand you have a pretty good balance. Some weekends just for (whole) family time, some weekends where your lad can sleep out at friends, and some where you are the host.

midnightraven3

another one here who always has a houseful of teenagers
we have 3 of our own, so numerous friends are always here
we are lucky that they all have a great bunch of mates/parents, who reciprocate
we love having them all here, i just count the pairs of shoes at the door to determine how many to cater for brunch
luckily we have plenty space for them all

enjoy it
once they have grown up and gone the house will seem mighty empty:o

j.e.j.

Do whatever you feel comfortable with. I wouldn't feel happy with a gaggle of randoms sleeping in my house, but having a friend stay over on the odd occasion is ok.

Savvy_Sue

2gorgeousgirls wrote: »

I get it in the ear from the older one if I say no and from the younger one if I say yes. I can't win, either way someone is moaning.

This is normal ...

YORKSHIRELASS wrote: »

Thank you so much, especially 2gorgeousgirls. Yes the other issue here is that my 14 yo needs his sleep and of course teenage boys want to stay up until 4am playing on the Xbox.

According to my son everyone else has sleepovers far more often than him and this is why I wanted to know what other people thought.

And yes he does get invited to sleepovers at friends too but then thats becoming more regular than I would like really (again sleep issues) so I think we need a little chat about it.

In my house, part of the discussion would cover the fact that IF sleepovers were going to happen, THEN respect would need to be shown to those wanting to sleep. And guests would be reminded of this too.

If that makes your house less desirable than others, so be it.

BTW, DS1 and his mates sometimes slept in a tent in the garden. They could make (almost) as much noise as they liked as they weren't likely to disturb anyone. But actually they used to settle down reasonably well. Obviously only works in the summer ...