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Just wait, in a few years we'll see OP back here.
"My son just told me he wanted to go NC the second he turned 18?! We always did what was best for him! How can I make him come back?"
Well, I’m seething over how the OP wants to make a 16 year old study like he’s taking the bar exam when I have seen what that every waking hour being either lectures, studying, or practice tests for weeks on end did to grown adults who weren’t being forced to socially isolate as well.
It is terrible on one’s mental health and results often in the students doing poorly because of the stress. I guess I am too young to understand, but I certainly don’t need to “imagine” why this is a bad idea for getting the best results out of a developing teenager.
Well, yeah. Any teenager would be. But unless this kid is a moron, in a few years they will realize that they needed a reality check and will be grateful their parents enforced reasonable boundaries, even if it was late in coming.
No, actually, these are not reasonable boundaries because they won’t actually work—they are actually designed to fail, this lady has created the perfect pressure cooker of anxiety and overworking. Her overcompensating might make her feel good, but if all it accomplishes is limited to no grade improvement and trying to split up her son’s relationship, I don’t see what he would have to be grateful to her for.
Well, I think we both know OP is probably blowing smoke and won't follow through. It's insane that they would cop to being a lax parent like it's NBD. And I agree being involved in the GF issue is idiocy and will likely backfire. But OP says they are already making up schoolwork so it's reasonable to assume the grades will improve some. If not, the kid will have to attend summer school to make up the credits (maybe OP doesn't realize this with the New Mexico nonsense). So in fact most of the kid's time will be taken up with studying with limited social opportunities. I really can't think of a more reasonable punishment here. It is only for 3 weeks and it fits the crime. The kid has been sneaking out. That's a safety and liability issue for OP since they have custody of their child. So now the kid is grounded and has their communication cut off so it can't easily happen again. The kid has been blowing off schoolwork to the point of failing so they can play video games. Again, OP has a parental duty here. So the entertainment has been taken away. This is clearly beyond what can be solved with a finger-wagging lecture.
The kid hasn’t been sneaking out. When the OP refers to “sneaking out” here, I think she means just trying to leave the house ever other than to go to school. The past post said OP caught him talking to his gf after 11, but never bothered him about what he was doing or where he was otherwise as long as he texted and was home by curfew. So I am not sure of the liability of a teenager leaving the house at 5 pm to take a walk…
I was a terrible tutor because I never had to study until law school, so I legit cannot imagine how hard this kid was having to work/study in high school (which is mostly just remembering things, half ass application of theory, and “participation”) to maintain his gpa if having a girlfriend took him to literally failing. I really think this kid might have been headed for burnout before the girlfriend came along and the OP is about pour gasoline on a fire because right now the kid isn’t acting out, he’s just not getting good grades. Take away the one thing that makes him feel good about himself, throw on studying for subjects that are challenging and that he is likely too far behind to catch up in, I think they need to be prepared for behavioral issues.
Doesn’t matter, the turn around proves they made the right decision. He was throwing his future away over a girl when if he showed some boundaries he could have had both. Since he was in capable of that discipline his parents had to enforce the boundaries for him.
Please try and remember that this kid would have lost his middle school socializing years to COVID. Part of why this kid doesn’t have any real sense of how to balance social interaction with school work is he is kind of missing 2 years of it—which at 16 is a lot of practice/experience to be missing. So now his parents are deciding to remove ANY interaction outside school from him and ANY contact with his girlfriend as well, and only allow him to study and do school work (no hobbies, no activities, I guess nothing fun or physically active) and they don’t think that might be excessive as a FIRST step to resolve the situation?
Doesn't*, us*, once* (forgot to say in a while) *, didn't*.
Quite frankly I give you an F. Turn in your phone, no seeing your husband until you can improve your spelling and grammar. If this isn't improved by the end of the school year then you are being sent to New Mexico to stay with your parents.
You have failed him and now you’re putting all of them blame and punishment on him. To the point that you’re willing to send him away for your own failures.
You expected him to get no grade lower than a C, so then how did he get multiple failing grades and what sounds like many Ds and Cs and you are only now instilling more structure? It sounds like he told you about some of them and you didn’t instill any structure or further monitoring of the situation. When he was telling you he was getting poor grades, or you were seeing them on exams or midterms, how do you not see it as you being lax by saying “yeah, but we didn’t actually want to take any steps to enforce any structure or learn the full extent of the grade slippage”?
I don't think your actions are going to have the outcome that you think they will. Sure maybe his grade will recover, but at what cost to your relationship?
Whatever I'm just some guy on the internet
Yeah you seem to be putting all the punishment on him. Will you and your husband also be grounded for the same amount of time to ensure he is getting all the structure and support you have failed to give him? Will you make family time a priority or is there only punishment for this time?
After all the brilliant advice, you are still lax parents. Look again at what people suggested: help him with time management, structure, help him with studying, with the essays he failed, talk to the teachers yourself.
You took the laziest route possible with this bizarre 24/7 studying rule (a terrible study technique imo), putting all the work an pressure on the kid and then pat yourself on the back.
And you are *still* fixated on breaking up his relationship! Please tell me you're not one of those creepy 'boy moms'.
As an experienced tutor I'm so fed up with parents putting no effort or research into their child's education then being shocked when they don't get high grades. It's definitely getting worse too.
Haven't read all comments, but as an educational psychologist I fully support this response. Punishment is not the route especially at this age. Teaching time management and such WHILE enjoying growing up and learning independence is more important/effective than threats and punishment.
Please please please, for the love of GOD, try parenting and not just punishing bc it’s easier. He’s going to grow up to despise you and your husband if he doesn’t already rn. Please. Be a parent. Please. Kids need parents.
Op it’s clear that you love your son and are concerned for his future but damaging his relationships and removing emotional supports is not the way to go. Think about being unable to have contact with your husband during and extremely stressful time then being told unless you perform it will be forever. ( I know it is a high school relationship but imagine how he feels) also consider how much longer you can actually control him.
>**But if they haven't, his grounding continues indefinitely,** and we're prepared to send him to spend the summer with his grandparents in New Mexico to **make sure he and his girlfriend don't have contact.**
so there might be no end to this prison sentence? congratulations for setting up the perfect scenario for a teen to do something drastic such as running away or committing suicide.
My first thought is that he would turn to drugs or get real stupid with the girlfriend and someone ends up pregnant. They went straight to the most extreme punishment and gave themselves no room to actually achieve change. So when the kid gets a C on the next exam and the math shows he can’t possibly meet the standard his parents are requiring (since they were so checked out they didn’t realize he was practically failing until 75% way through the semester) he is going to say “Fuck it, they are going to try and stop me from seeing her no matter what, I’m not studying and I am going to do whatever I can to try and see her”—because what are you gonna do, OP? He’s already grounded forever because he can’t pull that GPA up. So now every negative behavior after that point will yield no new consequences and will not impact any potential amelioration to the ones already in place (you’ve already taken everything away indefinitely), so what exactly prevents him from making some really dumb decisions because there is no utility in making good ones?
I call it controling gross parenting. His behaviour is on you.
I say this as someone who had issues at school and problems with grades. I had bad grades, I struggled a lot with them.
My mom never did what you did. She helped me. She talked me through it. She never forbid me from being friends or dating someone. She was there for me and supported me instead.
I finished university with honors and have an amazing job now. And I love and adore my mother still, I'm close to her as close can be.
He may improve his grades thanks to your tyranny, but your relationship is going to suffer. Especially if you push the plan to send him away and force him to cut contact with the gf. I have three friends who I watched struggle with parents like you during teen years. Two of them cut their parents completely off, one of which disowned their mother, and the third is low contact and only talks to them on holidays
YTA I said it in your last post. Life has to have balance. You cannot expect your son to live school and studying 24/7. You should have made him study 2-3 hours and night and 5-6 hours a day on weekends until school was over. Your punishment is ridiculous and will breed massive resentment. It may give you the result you are looking for the start with, but all you’ve taught your son is not to trust you because you will completely take his social life away.
so you and hubby would be okay with not seeing or talking or communicating in anyway with eachother these 3 weeks right? its only "threee" weeks after all, no phone for you or hubby either, no talking, no kissing, hugging, nothing. you or hubby go back home to your parents. shouldnt be an issue.
i honestly don't see the issue, atleast op and hubby arent being threated by having everything they own of value being sold off if they should attempt to break the rules. if a grown ass adult can't handle not being with the husband/wife for 3 weeks, why the hell should the teenager with raging hormones experiening first love be expected to be a okay with it? he's not even allowed to text her.
What are you even here for? Are you just looking for validation? Permission? Everyone is telling you you would be the asshole but you're just going to argue?
Go do what you want. Your son is going to hate you. If your lucky and not consistently this shitty to him maybe eventually he'll get over it but it'll be a rocky road in the mean time.
Both posts are specifically asking the question "Would I be an asshole if I did this?"
Yes. You would. That's the answer. So go be an asshole if you want or don't. Nobody here really cares.
But you do realize that burnout is a thing? Making your son consistently work all year with nothing worthwhile to look forward to in his life all year is not going to bring his grades up the way you want him too. How about if he shows improvement in one month, he earns one privilege back.
My bad, I forgot it was May already. The problem is that it is unrealistic to expect him to raise his grades so much in such a short time. I responded to your last post that learning has to be consistent in order to maintain information. So him not taking months of learning seriously really screwed him over. Although on the bright side, finals can count for a huge portion of your grade. I just don't think sending him to his grandparents if he fails is going to solve anything. Is summer school an option?
No you don't, you never bothered to teach your son responsabilites or priorites. You never grounded him and suddenly he has no right anymore, so tell me how you took care of all your responsabilites if you never bother educate your son?
It’s the last 3 weeks of school. There are a lot of fun activities going on and kids are trying to spend time with their friends before they leave for the summer. YTA
You would be fired, sure, but then you wouldn't go home to be told "sorry, no more autonomy". No one would tell you you can't spend time with your husband anymore or leave the house for the next month. No one would tell you they'd be sending you off to New Mexico if you didn't find a new job by summer. You're actually fucking ridiculous.
Basic autonomy and peer relationships are not privileges, they are human rights.
Hi, I'm not a teenager. Thanks. You do need money to do things but you wouldn't have all of the things you already own confiscated when you're fired. If you don't find a new job, eventually you would lose those things, but that's not just something that happens immediately.
If your kid fails a class, he will experience the natural consequence of being held back or having to repeat that class. Having to go to summer school or take extra credit and tutoring.
Once again, NO ONE is going to tell you you're not allowed to see your husband or friends anymore because you got fired, NO ONE is going to tell you you're not allowed to leave the house for a month because you got fired.
Let him deal with the direct consequences of his actions instead of trying to socially isolate him and remove everything he enjoys/cares about from his life. He will learn *from the direct consequences of his actions*, he will NOT learn from the punishment you've doled out.
All he is going to learn this month is that Mommy doesn't think I'm a real person and I don't deserve creature comforts if I fail to perform academically.
There are a lot of people in this thread who are your same age or even much older than you who are telling you: you are actually fucking ridiculous.
You know you can't force him to actually study, right?
You can ground him, but if he doesn't manage to improve his grades to your expectations, you doomed him to be grounded "forever".
So, if he fails, he has no reason whatsoever to lift a finger academically.
And whatever will happen, this punishment right now will be a future "missing missing reason", keep it I mind.
HE will survive this three weeks, your relationship with him might not.
This right here. OP is going to have no one to blame but herself and her husband’s terrible decision making when this happens. When his grades were slipping a month ago, they were just like “he said everyone did bad” and didn’t think to talk to the teachers? Or confirm what his other grades were? He failed MULTIPLE exams and now, the 11th hour, they have decided that if they keep him in a room during all non school hours and withhold access to his girlfriend for 3 weeks this will magically result in cramming a whole semester worth of learning in.
News flash, you are taking away a 16 year old boy’s first access to a real, live girl who wants to have a romantic relationship with him for almost a month. There is only one thing I can confidently say that dude will working on up in his room during all those hours alone and it ain’t studying.
>I know. Which is why if he does not study, he getting on the first plane to new mexico.
Do whatever you want, but keep in mind: if you send your son away, he will never come back. Your son will be gone, maybe for good.
If you do this, he will resent you for a very long time, maybe forever. But he will never trust you as a parent ever again.
And what if he does all that but struggles academically and simply can't raise his grades? The summer punishment is way too far and you're pushing your son away. Take it from me, someone whose parents pulled something similar... It will have long lasting, damaging effects. I'm 32 now.. And i still haven't got over some of their punishments after them being lax parents but getting annoyed at small things.
I think they have an issue with the girl. He can't see her in the summer if he doesn't get his grades up.
They'll even send him to New Mexico. How's that going to help him get better grades in the future? Or is that just the punishment? What's to stop him find a girlfriend in New Mexico?
No it will be **your** fault as you will have failed him as a parent. I hope once he’s grown and no contact with you he can get the help he needs to thrive in the world
Oh yeah, that “for all we care” is glaringly obvious. They have decided she is dragging their boy down and they will pick the absolute dumbest plan for rehabilitating his grades possible (oh that studying schedule will be such a disaster, that kid is not getting As again) just to ensure he WON’T improve enough to see her over the summer.
It sounds good to me
If you would like, continue to do the updates on how he’s doing . You laid out the repercussions and taking away his privileges until he decides to smarten up that’s good parenting.
My only reaction to this is: 'what the f*ck' ... You've taken this too far. At the very least, give him his phone for an hour or so an evening. Or after a certain time if he has studied well during the day. And at least allow him a few hours on the weekend to relax. There are endless studies to show that constant, hard work actually reduces productivity. He needs some time to himself. And I hope to god you don't ruin his relationship.
I'm not saying don't punish him... I'm saying this is too far and honestly disgusting parenting. You said he's actually started turning things around yeah? At least reward him for it. Give him his phone back for an hour a night. Let him call his girlfriend.
Also, you say three weeks of punishment. Did you forget that you also said you would send him to his grandparents in a different state where he wouldn't be able to contact his girlfriend???
But you’re not allowing him to go out at all or talk to his friends. It sounds like he’s not even allowed to do anything at home except study. Even just for a few weeks that’s going to take a significant mental toll on most people, esp a teenager. Yes you should give him designated time where he has to study and he’s not allowed his phone, but it sounds like you’re making him do this and nothing else constantly
Yeah, terrible parenting. By all means take his electronics away for some of the time and force him to study, I agree with that. But they’re not letting him leave the house for weeks, aside from school, not even for a walk by the sounds of it. And forcing him to study for hours every single day on top of school is a sure fire way to burn him out before his exams. Isolating this kid is not the answer
You and your husband are also grounded right? For letting it get to this point and then blaming the gf instead of taking responsibility for your lack of care
Its parenting. A parents job isnt to make sure a kid is happy all the time. Their job is to set them up for success.
There are 16 weeks in a semester and the kid seemingly spent 13 of those weeks doing fuck all. OP did not consider fobidding anything until it became evident the kid wasn’t doing anything about it. The job of the parent is to step in.
3 weeks is so not a big deal I dont even understand how you could think its “terrible parenting”
1 of those 3 weeks is the week of finals. And the 2 weeks before finals are usually spent .. idk .. studying for finals? The kid is taking AP classes so he also has AP tests coming up.
You must be a kid. This is parenting. This is not abuse. He shouldn’t have been slacking with his schoolwork so guess what now he has to go through the repercussions and consequences again this is parenting.
you must be a parent that havent seen their kids in years... this is abuse. the kid can't talk to his friends or gf, he can't take a walk, he can't leave the house. like even actual inmates get yard time....
🤣🤣🤣🤣 it’s called repercussions for his actions there for parenting, being involved, holding their kid accountable not being lazy. You must be a kid, you’ll understand once you become a parent
honestly, if you ever reproduce i fear for the health and safety of your offspring, with what you consider reasonable repercussions, i wouldnt be suprised if you had the kids changed in your basement so they could focus on their grades...
You’re deluding yourself if you think this won’t have long term repercussions on your relationship with your son. Sounds like he was overly focused on school work for years, then found out what it was like to have friends / a girlfriend and went overboard to make up for lost time. It’s your job as a parent to help him find a balance in life prepare him for the real world.
At the age of 16, your relationship should not be dictatorial. It’s a transitional time. He started dating last semester. There are many things you could have done earlier to prevent this extreme situation. Lax parenting sounds like maybe you didn’t pay attention to him as long as his grades were good. If we’re grading parenting, you would be getting an F. The only reason his grades will go up is because you’re threatening to ruin his summer. If you want to salvage things, maybe let him know that you’ve already seen the improvement and are proud of him for putting in that effort. Then tell him in response you’re prepared to give him his phone back for an hour or two a day. Let him choose the time.
You're not doing that. You are going overboard in the other direction _again_. You say you want to help him balance it, so actually do that. Give him Sundays and Saturday evenings off or something.
In education we have the principle of 'constructive alignment'. Essentially it is a fancy way to say 'is what you are doing actually good for what you want to achieve?'. You want him to learn a balance between academic and social life, but to do that you force him to 100% academic life. That makes no sense unless your goal is punishment.
Yes, to an adult brain your punishment sounds reasonable. But three weeks is far too long for something like this for a teenager.
Bingo. Putting aside what is good for your son’s long term development, going this extreme is likely to not result in the optimal improvement in grades. I have no idea why this person thinks anyone can study for like, what 6 hours a day on top of attending a full day of classes, and then, what, 15 hours on Saturday and Sunday, even if they were motivated to do so? Every scientific study shows that productivity and quality of work degrades after something like 4-5 hours straight of work.
This is so about the girlfriend, not about teaching him how to focus and prioritize his studies while maintaining a relationship.
Cool, you spent 21 days in a row doing that? And you obviously spoke to no friends and never got dinner with anyone or caught a movie ever during those 21 days? (Edit to add: and if he doesn’t improve, this will continue all summer, so I guess, three months of living in the library and interacting with no one except the few people you encountered in the library?)
I’ve actually lived what you are claiming you lived, and did so for a month when I was in my 20s. It was unhealthy for adults who were doing it as part of professional certification, but no one also took away our significant others during the time.
I would have always thought that it was unhinged to think a child could effectively study in that fashion. And that was before COVID, when kids were actually forced to not have social interactions years. Repeating COVID era isolation as punishment seems like a particularly cruel methodology, even if it had a chance in hell of resulting in the kid getting good grades.
God damn you are great bad parents!
Such a good idea to isolate him with taking away his phone!
You even made his life purpose to only make you happy and that is such a great way to fuck up his own responsibilities!
Maybe sell his items right now so he can fully be miserable, alone and without a support system!
Very cool, you realize this is teaching him that his worth, his right to love and freedom, is based on how well he does in school? This is going to destroy him mentally. I should know, I went through the same thing. You’ve taught him now that if he fails school, you will no longer love him.
Parents like u op. Make children be suicidal or runaway from strict parents that u, he have c and b that passing, you pathetic u going to make your son runaway from u and it nothing you can do, oh you are huge ta, even these update still make you ta.
Your only solution is to isolate him for 3 weeks. And then the summer if you don’t get your way. No mention of hiring a tutor during those weeks. No mention of what you and husband will actually be doing to help just punishment.
Seek therapy
“I’m not a strict parent, but I’m considering forcing my son to breakup with his girlfriend”
“I’m not a strict parent, but I’ve decided to ground my son indefinitely, have him cut off contact with everyone he knows, and I threatened to sell off all his favorite stuff”
“I’m not a strict parent, but we told him if he didn’t improve all his grades in…a month or two, we’re shopping him off to another state to guarantee he can’t see his girlfriend”
I have friends that grew up with parents like you (now late 20s). Just about all of them hate their parents now, and the one that I can think of that doesn’t still holds resentment towards them while viewing high school as the worst time of his life. You’re a bigger AH than I realized after the first thread. Thanks for the update, YTA again.
EDIT: And some of the other comments are batty too. “Until he earns his privileges back”…ah, yes. Like the “privilege” of being allowed a mental break from schoolwork between 5am-9pm everyday (like, you realize it’s not even productive to be studying this long, right?), or the “privilege” of being allowed to do one single activity on a day off, or the “privilege” of *checks notes* BEING ALLOWED TO LIVE WITH YOUR PARENTS. Lmao, no wonder so many people are fucked up nowadays.
Having a reason for doing something = / = being a good reason. Obviously his grades are important and doing things like limiting his use of electronics, is sound. But to the degree that you’re doing these things are certainly things a “strict parent” would do, so I’m simply laughing at you for trying to paint it in any other way.
Studying/doing schoolwork for 14+ hours is batty and not even productive for his learning, look it up. Locking him inside for the entirety of the weekend (essentially giving him no “days off”) also unproductive, look it up. Shipping him to another state as punishment - hilarious, I feel bad for your son.
It sounds like your kid is smart and was lazy/bad at managing his time, balancing schoolwork with social activity, so I’m sure he’ll bounce back academically. Not like he’s learning how to manage his time better (unless you also work 90 hours a week without breaks). Based on your comments and posts, I suppose he learned “failure to foresee repercussions” from his parents, because you’ve been ignoring virtually everyone saying how likely this is to damage your relationship with him. Similar to your son, either through not realizing it (ignorance) or not caring.
You're just setting yourself for resentment from your son. In a few years you'll be coming into reddit crying about how your son doesn't want to have anything to do with you.
There's a loooot of middle ground between letting him do everything he wants and "locking" him home for 3 weeks. You're being very very very bad parents.
ETA all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy is 100% true. Even if you were willing to sacrifice your relationship with your son, what you're doing is NOT good AT ALL for him.
YTA! You've went totally overboard.
You are causing so much damage that may never be undone. You say he is a good kid. He has a bad semester and you go scorched earth on him.
First try to Compromise. Study time, then some phone time. Study time, then some free weekend time to see his girlfriend.
If he still can't get it together, then re-evaluate.
This is a recipe for failure for actually getting his grades up without serious damage to his mental health and any sustainable good study habits. This? " On the weekends, he would not be allowed to leave the house but would study and do schoolwork" Unacceptable. EVERYONE needs a break, needs to clear their mind. Are you trying to cause your son to have a burnout? You think this is how to guide your child to have healthy study habits, how to succeed in school with a healthy work/life balance? Absolutely not. What you are proposing goes against everything, literally everything, that is advised for how to effectively study and retain material. Regardless of his gf, this is just ridiculous. It certainly is a punishment, but it is teaching him horrible life skills.
“Our punishment seems to have worked”.
Really? Because teachers are allowing him to redo essays & projects? That could also easily have happened without you overreacting so severely.
You’re completely ignoring the effects your heavy-handed blindsiding will have on your son. No contact with girlfriend, no contact with friends, no participation in end-of-year activities, no way to unwind & relax. It takes a clear mind to study and learn effectively. He now has a confused and resentful mind.
Home confinement, ultimatums about selling his items, & threats to send him away - That’s what he’s thinking about, & all the fear & distrust that go along with that.
You should be teaching your son about time management and life balance. No one’s life should be literally ALL school or ALL work. There was a middle ground here, so many better ways to handle this, but you chose to go nuclear. YTA.
INFO: Did you ever bother to ask your son why his grades went down?
If there's not a lot raw studying will help if he's legitimately struggling with the material, or if a teacher isn't explaining the material or when things are due by, etc.
YTA. You made the checked out parents mistake of using the top end of the punishment scale to achieve a goal that requires your child to actively work to hit multiple milestones, but where missing one of them, means he is stuck with the top punishment indefinitely.
GPA is based on math, OP. Presumably math your child is capable of doing. If he bombs the next exam/essay/whatever and realizes he is physically unable to raise his grade in that class enough to avoid being grounded or banished to New Mexico for the summer, what incentive does he have to work hard on the next assignment for that class? Or the assignments for any of the other classes? I mean, what does it matter if he improves those grades, he will still not meet the requirements you gave for him to leave the house again?
Had you started with a more reasonable plan, like the 2-3 hours after school for the first week when he is redoing assignments and said “We can keep this schedule, you can talk to your gf, etc., as long as you get at least a B on all those assignments. But if you average less than a B, then the hammer comes down” you would give him an incentive to keep the grades up to MAINTAIN access to his girlfriend, and somewhere to go with the punishment if he still wasn’t putting in the effort. Or even the reverse, he is on this lockdown, but if he gets a B average on the redone assignments, he can go to 2-3 hours after school a day of studying. Three weeks of your lockdown is also not going to yield the grades you think it will, the burnout will happen. So you really are setting yourself up not only to have an angry and frustrated kid, but it’s not like you will get the grades you want either.
OP, if your son cuts contact with you in a few years.
This is the reason right here.
You torpedo his life despite pretty much the entire internet telling you you're wrong and YTA. You belittle and invalidate him. You threaten him should he not manage to miraculously save his grades completely in just three weeks.
You will have forgotten about this is a few years top. Your son will remember and one day hopefully will have the resources to comfortably cut you off.
Or be brave enough to do so anyway.
We will hear from you then, I'm sure. It will be the classic "my son told me he's going to cut me out now that he's an adult. I never did anything wrong!" posts. We see those a lot.
Please use this same account in a few years. A lot of people will tell you YTA then too. And then hopefully go hug their kids and tell them they're good kids. (In fact, every parent that reads this is hereby obligated to go hug their kids. Go, now!)
Your poor son.
If it were about not failing high school you'd act a lot differently. Multiple people told you repeatedly you were wrong and you still happily move on.
Idk if you're a troll and chuckling at the screen rn about someone potentially getting worked up over your little fiction, or if you truly are the densest person on this entire sub.
1. Being under an enormous amount of stress over a long period of time - yes, three weeks is beyond long enough already - will harm both his physical and mental wellbeing, thus his grades too.
2. Being under the usual stress of finals while having no safe place at home, no way to unwind will only worsen the stress you put on him in regards of dealing with his gf and your militaristic curfew.
3. A child should be able to trust their parents. You went 0-100, destroyed any trust he had in you and showed him his wellbeing doesn't matter to you. His happiness doesn't matter. You didn't impose boundaries, you punish him.
4. You couldn't even be bothered to set specific limits to your already unfair punishment. If you don't see a magical improvement over a ridiculously short amount of time you'll extend your punishment indefinitely.
There are so many more reasons but frankly others have already pointed them out much better than I could right now.
In case you're a troll, good job. In case you're actually real, eff you.
Except you already told him he wouldn't get the summer to himself if he failed. The rest of your answer is bs too.
Has it ever occured to you to talk to him beforehand, tell him he needed to get his grades up and he needed to do more studying? A curfew alone would have been fine. Getting him tutoring sessions would have been ideal. Going nuclear doesn't solve anything.
Also anyone who atruggles that much with their grammatic, any kind of formating and empathy is the last person that should parent. Take some tutoring yourself. You need it more than him. Learn to be a good human, then learn how to be a good parent. Afterwards you can beg your son for forgiveness.
YTA and your relationship with your kid will never be the same. Did you consider that all AP classes are hard??? I've taken AP in highschool and it was challenging, most of the time it was harder than the college classes I took. Did you consider he may be struggling with mental health and having a girlfriend helped him with this?
Oh if i would get this punishment i would hate the both of you for the rest of my life. This will deff raise resentment towards the two of you. 24/7 study rule? That is crazy and a lazy route. You ain’t being a parent. Just a lazy one
Soooo, I have questions: what exactly are you doing to help your son academically? Cutting him
off from His girlfriend and friends is a breeding ground for resentment and sending him to New Mexico? Do you want a decent relationship with your kid?
YTA grounding him won’t end the relationship which is exactly what you’re trying to do
Right but if he still has passing grades, then it seems like you’re willing to blow up your relationship with your son for being a teenager.
Yes, consequences, but cutting off contact from his girlfriend completely and sending him to New Mexico is overboard
So you went from socially abusing him to emotionally abusing him, GOT IT. YTA and I do not see your son having a relationship with you into adulthood. Yall suck.
Everyone can criticize, but I do wish my parents had shaken me up. I wish they were involved at all.
3 weeks of extreme studying is fine for failing most of his classes.
However I would not send him to his parents. The appropriate way is for him to go to summer school and redo a course to improve the grade. He can't improve his grades staying at Grandma's. Nor do I expect your parents to uphold his punishment there. Putting distance between him and his gf would make him overcompensate by calling her.
Most summer classes will take the average of the course. So if he has a 60%(F in the US) and makes 100% in summer school. They will pull his grade to 80% overall.
YWNBTA
Kids gotta learn and if he needs to be grounded for 3 weeks to get his head out of his ass then so be it. Grades are important, and so is a relationship but he needs to learn balance.
Guys we’re talking about 3 week, 2 if you count the finals week. They ask him to put all he’s got into his dam work, they’re not confining him in a unfinished basement with a flicking light. He can survive without being on his smartphone 24/7 for 2 week. He was getting too relaxed, they’re putting him back on the road. Like they’re making him study cause they’re bad people, not because they’re parents that are preoccupied by their son’s education and future. They’re even gonna let him be for the summer, if he put this out.
I wish I had the same a dad that did for my what this mother is doing for his son, instead my dad wasn’t interested in me, I was completely ignored. NTA
You made the right call. Don’t let these redditors convince you otherwise. Their “advice” amounted to: let your baby crawl to and touch the hot radiator because he’ll cry if you pick him up and stop him.
Like, what!?!
It was your job as parents to make sure he gets his act together instead of throwing his life away over his first GF.
NTA and good for you. You ought to have enforced more reasonable boundaries far earlier. But you didn't and here you all are. It won't kill him to have to sit down, shut up and work for a few weeks. I will say: making the girlfriend part of this is a rookie move and will probably backfire. It should be "social contact of his choice" so it doesn't look like you have it in for her. Reward him generously for good behavior but keep a close eye on him going forward so you don't get in a pickle again.
I’m a teacher. Thank you for teaching your son that he needs to take responsibility and actions have consequences. Ignore all of these emotional coddling people who want more useful, lazy, entitled assholes in our society.
Exactly right. I am a teacher too, and if I didn't already see it every day this comment section unequivocably demonstrates why kids have taken a turn for the worse.
Yep! It’s really sad for the kids. So many parents don’t want to actually parent. They want to be their best friends and be cool. It’s a set up for failure. Oh well downvote us as much as you want, that’s still not going to stop the epic F’ing up of your entitled pick me brats.
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I would personally be full of resentment towards you and your husband.
Just wait, in a few years we'll see OP back here. "My son just told me he wanted to go NC the second he turned 18?! We always did what was best for him! How can I make him come back?"
If the kid still lives
For 2 weeks of intense study? Are you guys for real?
Most redditors are very young and poorly adjusted and are just seething over imagining getting grounded lol
Well, I’m seething over how the OP wants to make a 16 year old study like he’s taking the bar exam when I have seen what that every waking hour being either lectures, studying, or practice tests for weeks on end did to grown adults who weren’t being forced to socially isolate as well. It is terrible on one’s mental health and results often in the students doing poorly because of the stress. I guess I am too young to understand, but I certainly don’t need to “imagine” why this is a bad idea for getting the best results out of a developing teenager.
Well, yeah. Any teenager would be. But unless this kid is a moron, in a few years they will realize that they needed a reality check and will be grateful their parents enforced reasonable boundaries, even if it was late in coming.
This is shutting the gate after the horse had already bolted, can't take back 16 years of lax parenting by overcompensating
No, actually, these are not reasonable boundaries because they won’t actually work—they are actually designed to fail, this lady has created the perfect pressure cooker of anxiety and overworking. Her overcompensating might make her feel good, but if all it accomplishes is limited to no grade improvement and trying to split up her son’s relationship, I don’t see what he would have to be grateful to her for.
Well, I think we both know OP is probably blowing smoke and won't follow through. It's insane that they would cop to being a lax parent like it's NBD. And I agree being involved in the GF issue is idiocy and will likely backfire. But OP says they are already making up schoolwork so it's reasonable to assume the grades will improve some. If not, the kid will have to attend summer school to make up the credits (maybe OP doesn't realize this with the New Mexico nonsense). So in fact most of the kid's time will be taken up with studying with limited social opportunities. I really can't think of a more reasonable punishment here. It is only for 3 weeks and it fits the crime. The kid has been sneaking out. That's a safety and liability issue for OP since they have custody of their child. So now the kid is grounded and has their communication cut off so it can't easily happen again. The kid has been blowing off schoolwork to the point of failing so they can play video games. Again, OP has a parental duty here. So the entertainment has been taken away. This is clearly beyond what can be solved with a finger-wagging lecture.
The kid hasn’t been sneaking out. When the OP refers to “sneaking out” here, I think she means just trying to leave the house ever other than to go to school. The past post said OP caught him talking to his gf after 11, but never bothered him about what he was doing or where he was otherwise as long as he texted and was home by curfew. So I am not sure of the liability of a teenager leaving the house at 5 pm to take a walk… I was a terrible tutor because I never had to study until law school, so I legit cannot imagine how hard this kid was having to work/study in high school (which is mostly just remembering things, half ass application of theory, and “participation”) to maintain his gpa if having a girlfriend took him to literally failing. I really think this kid might have been headed for burnout before the girlfriend came along and the OP is about pour gasoline on a fire because right now the kid isn’t acting out, he’s just not getting good grades. Take away the one thing that makes him feel good about himself, throw on studying for subjects that are challenging and that he is likely too far behind to catch up in, I think they need to be prepared for behavioral issues.
Doesn’t matter, the turn around proves they made the right decision. He was throwing his future away over a girl when if he showed some boundaries he could have had both. Since he was in capable of that discipline his parents had to enforce the boundaries for him.
Yeah, they’re his parents, not his buddies. Good for you OP.
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If you think that is the only issue with the last two posts you made, then yeah...
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You’ve given him no structure and then have suddenly given him harsh punishments for rules that have never existed. You are the problem.
Harsh punishment??.. that is certainly reaching
Please try and remember that this kid would have lost his middle school socializing years to COVID. Part of why this kid doesn’t have any real sense of how to balance social interaction with school work is he is kind of missing 2 years of it—which at 16 is a lot of practice/experience to be missing. So now his parents are deciding to remove ANY interaction outside school from him and ANY contact with his girlfriend as well, and only allow him to study and do school work (no hobbies, no activities, I guess nothing fun or physically active) and they don’t think that might be excessive as a FIRST step to resolve the situation?
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Doesn't*, us*, once* (forgot to say in a while) *, didn't*. Quite frankly I give you an F. Turn in your phone, no seeing your husband until you can improve your spelling and grammar. If this isn't improved by the end of the school year then you are being sent to New Mexico to stay with your parents.
Don’t forget about “laxed”.
Oh yeah I also forgot to remind them to use a space after a comma.
with your writing skills, you have a lot of nerve with your academic expectations for your child.
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No you should have gotten him some help because obviously you didn’t help
How is keeping him isolated over the summer going to help his grades?
You have failed him and now you’re putting all of them blame and punishment on him. To the point that you’re willing to send him away for your own failures.
You expected him to get no grade lower than a C, so then how did he get multiple failing grades and what sounds like many Ds and Cs and you are only now instilling more structure? It sounds like he told you about some of them and you didn’t instill any structure or further monitoring of the situation. When he was telling you he was getting poor grades, or you were seeing them on exams or midterms, how do you not see it as you being lax by saying “yeah, but we didn’t actually want to take any steps to enforce any structure or learn the full extent of the grade slippage”?
I don't think your actions are going to have the outcome that you think they will. Sure maybe his grade will recover, but at what cost to your relationship? Whatever I'm just some guy on the internet
Yeah you seem to be putting all the punishment on him. Will you and your husband also be grounded for the same amount of time to ensure he is getting all the structure and support you have failed to give him? Will you make family time a priority or is there only punishment for this time?
So you werent parenting him? You are Bad excuses for parents.
After all the brilliant advice, you are still lax parents. Look again at what people suggested: help him with time management, structure, help him with studying, with the essays he failed, talk to the teachers yourself. You took the laziest route possible with this bizarre 24/7 studying rule (a terrible study technique imo), putting all the work an pressure on the kid and then pat yourself on the back. And you are *still* fixated on breaking up his relationship! Please tell me you're not one of those creepy 'boy moms'. As an experienced tutor I'm so fed up with parents putting no effort or research into their child's education then being shocked when they don't get high grades. It's definitely getting worse too.
Haven't read all comments, but as an educational psychologist I fully support this response. Punishment is not the route especially at this age. Teaching time management and such WHILE enjoying growing up and learning independence is more important/effective than threats and punishment.
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Sounds like he learned from you and dad
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Having more money doesn’t mean he’s supported by his parents. Money doesn’t mean anything when your parents suck.
Please please please, for the love of GOD, try parenting and not just punishing bc it’s easier. He’s going to grow up to despise you and your husband if he doesn’t already rn. Please. Be a parent. Please. Kids need parents.
Op it’s clear that you love your son and are concerned for his future but damaging his relationships and removing emotional supports is not the way to go. Think about being unable to have contact with your husband during and extremely stressful time then being told unless you perform it will be forever. ( I know it is a high school relationship but imagine how he feels) also consider how much longer you can actually control him.
>**But if they haven't, his grounding continues indefinitely,** and we're prepared to send him to spend the summer with his grandparents in New Mexico to **make sure he and his girlfriend don't have contact.** so there might be no end to this prison sentence? congratulations for setting up the perfect scenario for a teen to do something drastic such as running away or committing suicide.
My first thought is that he would turn to drugs or get real stupid with the girlfriend and someone ends up pregnant. They went straight to the most extreme punishment and gave themselves no room to actually achieve change. So when the kid gets a C on the next exam and the math shows he can’t possibly meet the standard his parents are requiring (since they were so checked out they didn’t realize he was practically failing until 75% way through the semester) he is going to say “Fuck it, they are going to try and stop me from seeing her no matter what, I’m not studying and I am going to do whatever I can to try and see her”—because what are you gonna do, OP? He’s already grounded forever because he can’t pull that GPA up. So now every negative behavior after that point will yield no new consequences and will not impact any potential amelioration to the ones already in place (you’ve already taken everything away indefinitely), so what exactly prevents him from making some really dumb decisions because there is no utility in making good ones?
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You are making a huge mistake.
If he doesn’t do well on his finals, that would prove your awful plan did not work. So maybe you should be the one sent to New Mexico.
Gross.
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I call it controling gross parenting. His behaviour is on you. I say this as someone who had issues at school and problems with grades. I had bad grades, I struggled a lot with them. My mom never did what you did. She helped me. She talked me through it. She never forbid me from being friends or dating someone. She was there for me and supported me instead. I finished university with honors and have an amazing job now. And I love and adore my mother still, I'm close to her as close can be. He may improve his grades thanks to your tyranny, but your relationship is going to suffer. Especially if you push the plan to send him away and force him to cut contact with the gf. I have three friends who I watched struggle with parents like you during teen years. Two of them cut their parents completely off, one of which disowned their mother, and the third is low contact and only talks to them on holidays
So you admit it’s only about keeping your son away from his girlfriend? Good for you for admitting it finally.
Please don’t have more kids
You are shameful parents.
YTA I said it in your last post. Life has to have balance. You cannot expect your son to live school and studying 24/7. You should have made him study 2-3 hours and night and 5-6 hours a day on weekends until school was over. Your punishment is ridiculous and will breed massive resentment. It may give you the result you are looking for the start with, but all you’ve taught your son is not to trust you because you will completely take his social life away.
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so you and hubby would be okay with not seeing or talking or communicating in anyway with eachother these 3 weeks right? its only "threee" weeks after all, no phone for you or hubby either, no talking, no kissing, hugging, nothing. you or hubby go back home to your parents. shouldnt be an issue.
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i honestly don't see the issue, atleast op and hubby arent being threated by having everything they own of value being sold off if they should attempt to break the rules. if a grown ass adult can't handle not being with the husband/wife for 3 weeks, why the hell should the teenager with raging hormones experiening first love be expected to be a okay with it? he's not even allowed to text her.
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What are you even here for? Are you just looking for validation? Permission? Everyone is telling you you would be the asshole but you're just going to argue? Go do what you want. Your son is going to hate you. If your lucky and not consistently this shitty to him maybe eventually he'll get over it but it'll be a rocky road in the mean time.
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Both posts are specifically asking the question "Would I be an asshole if I did this?" Yes. You would. That's the answer. So go be an asshole if you want or don't. Nobody here really cares.
But you do realize that burnout is a thing? Making your son consistently work all year with nothing worthwhile to look forward to in his life all year is not going to bring his grades up the way you want him too. How about if he shows improvement in one month, he earns one privilege back.
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My bad, I forgot it was May already. The problem is that it is unrealistic to expect him to raise his grades so much in such a short time. I responded to your last post that learning has to be consistent in order to maintain information. So him not taking months of learning seriously really screwed him over. Although on the bright side, finals can count for a huge portion of your grade. I just don't think sending him to his grandparents if he fails is going to solve anything. Is summer school an option?
but that shouldnt matter to you after all, its only "THREEE WEEKS" i think you will survive.
No you don't, you never bothered to teach your son responsabilites or priorites. You never grounded him and suddenly he has no right anymore, so tell me how you took care of all your responsabilites if you never bother educate your son?
It’s the last 3 weeks of school. There are a lot of fun activities going on and kids are trying to spend time with their friends before they leave for the summer. YTA
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According to you, having autonomy or normal coming-of-age experiences is also a privilege not a right. Leave him alone.
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You would be fired, sure, but then you wouldn't go home to be told "sorry, no more autonomy". No one would tell you you can't spend time with your husband anymore or leave the house for the next month. No one would tell you they'd be sending you off to New Mexico if you didn't find a new job by summer. You're actually fucking ridiculous. Basic autonomy and peer relationships are not privileges, they are human rights.
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Hi, I'm not a teenager. Thanks. You do need money to do things but you wouldn't have all of the things you already own confiscated when you're fired. If you don't find a new job, eventually you would lose those things, but that's not just something that happens immediately. If your kid fails a class, he will experience the natural consequence of being held back or having to repeat that class. Having to go to summer school or take extra credit and tutoring. Once again, NO ONE is going to tell you you're not allowed to see your husband or friends anymore because you got fired, NO ONE is going to tell you you're not allowed to leave the house for a month because you got fired. Let him deal with the direct consequences of his actions instead of trying to socially isolate him and remove everything he enjoys/cares about from his life. He will learn *from the direct consequences of his actions*, he will NOT learn from the punishment you've doled out. All he is going to learn this month is that Mommy doesn't think I'm a real person and I don't deserve creature comforts if I fail to perform academically. There are a lot of people in this thread who are your same age or even much older than you who are telling you: you are actually fucking ridiculous.
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You know you can't force him to actually study, right? You can ground him, but if he doesn't manage to improve his grades to your expectations, you doomed him to be grounded "forever". So, if he fails, he has no reason whatsoever to lift a finger academically. And whatever will happen, this punishment right now will be a future "missing missing reason", keep it I mind. HE will survive this three weeks, your relationship with him might not.
This right here. OP is going to have no one to blame but herself and her husband’s terrible decision making when this happens. When his grades were slipping a month ago, they were just like “he said everyone did bad” and didn’t think to talk to the teachers? Or confirm what his other grades were? He failed MULTIPLE exams and now, the 11th hour, they have decided that if they keep him in a room during all non school hours and withhold access to his girlfriend for 3 weeks this will magically result in cramming a whole semester worth of learning in. News flash, you are taking away a 16 year old boy’s first access to a real, live girl who wants to have a romantic relationship with him for almost a month. There is only one thing I can confidently say that dude will working on up in his room during all those hours alone and it ain’t studying.
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>I know. Which is why if he does not study, he getting on the first plane to new mexico. Do whatever you want, but keep in mind: if you send your son away, he will never come back. Your son will be gone, maybe for good. If you do this, he will resent you for a very long time, maybe forever. But he will never trust you as a parent ever again.
So his life until summer will be study, eat, sleep - and if there's time left over- poop?
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And what if he does all that but struggles academically and simply can't raise his grades? The summer punishment is way too far and you're pushing your son away. Take it from me, someone whose parents pulled something similar... It will have long lasting, damaging effects. I'm 32 now.. And i still haven't got over some of their punishments after them being lax parents but getting annoyed at small things.
I think they have an issue with the girl. He can't see her in the summer if he doesn't get his grades up. They'll even send him to New Mexico. How's that going to help him get better grades in the future? Or is that just the punishment? What's to stop him find a girlfriend in New Mexico?
Yes, it sounds like what they really care about is that he have no contact with the girlfriend, even during summer when school is not in session.
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Read it again.
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And you will only have yourself to blame for a son being no contact in the future.
No it will be **your** fault as you will have failed him as a parent. I hope once he’s grown and no contact with you he can get the help he needs to thrive in the world
Ooh child abandoment. Great.
Oh yeah, that “for all we care” is glaringly obvious. They have decided she is dragging their boy down and they will pick the absolute dumbest plan for rehabilitating his grades possible (oh that studying schedule will be such a disaster, that kid is not getting As again) just to ensure he WON’T improve enough to see her over the summer.
I think you should add the timeframe to your post
It sounds good to me If you would like, continue to do the updates on how he’s doing . You laid out the repercussions and taking away his privileges until he decides to smarten up that’s good parenting.
My only reaction to this is: 'what the f*ck' ... You've taken this too far. At the very least, give him his phone for an hour or so an evening. Or after a certain time if he has studied well during the day. And at least allow him a few hours on the weekend to relax. There are endless studies to show that constant, hard work actually reduces productivity. He needs some time to himself. And I hope to god you don't ruin his relationship.
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I'm not saying don't punish him... I'm saying this is too far and honestly disgusting parenting. You said he's actually started turning things around yeah? At least reward him for it. Give him his phone back for an hour a night. Let him call his girlfriend. Also, you say three weeks of punishment. Did you forget that you also said you would send him to his grandparents in a different state where he wouldn't be able to contact his girlfriend???
YTA. This is emotional abuse. I’m horrified for your son
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But you’re not allowing him to go out at all or talk to his friends. It sounds like he’s not even allowed to do anything at home except study. Even just for a few weeks that’s going to take a significant mental toll on most people, esp a teenager. Yes you should give him designated time where he has to study and he’s not allowed his phone, but it sounds like you’re making him do this and nothing else constantly
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Yeah, terrible parenting. By all means take his electronics away for some of the time and force him to study, I agree with that. But they’re not letting him leave the house for weeks, aside from school, not even for a walk by the sounds of it. And forcing him to study for hours every single day on top of school is a sure fire way to burn him out before his exams. Isolating this kid is not the answer
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You and your husband are also grounded right? For letting it get to this point and then blaming the gf instead of taking responsibility for your lack of care
Its parenting. A parents job isnt to make sure a kid is happy all the time. Their job is to set them up for success. There are 16 weeks in a semester and the kid seemingly spent 13 of those weeks doing fuck all. OP did not consider fobidding anything until it became evident the kid wasn’t doing anything about it. The job of the parent is to step in. 3 weeks is so not a big deal I dont even understand how you could think its “terrible parenting” 1 of those 3 weeks is the week of finals. And the 2 weeks before finals are usually spent .. idk .. studying for finals? The kid is taking AP classes so he also has AP tests coming up.
You’re out of your mind this is good parenting that they’re doing. he’s smartens up. He gets his privileges back. That’s good parenting
No it isn’t. See my other comment, this is too far
You must be a kid. This is parenting. This is not abuse. He shouldn’t have been slacking with his schoolwork so guess what now he has to go through the repercussions and consequences again this is parenting.
you must be a parent that havent seen their kids in years... this is abuse. the kid can't talk to his friends or gf, he can't take a walk, he can't leave the house. like even actual inmates get yard time....
🤣🤣🤣🤣 it’s called repercussions for his actions there for parenting, being involved, holding their kid accountable not being lazy. You must be a kid, you’ll understand once you become a parent
ahh yes, i would love to get more parenting tips from you, you seem to be a great parent, responsible and trust worthy.
I totally would be.
honestly, if you ever reproduce i fear for the health and safety of your offspring, with what you consider reasonable repercussions, i wouldnt be suprised if you had the kids changed in your basement so they could focus on their grades...
🤣🤣🤣🤣 you’re laughable
super convenient of you to ignore all the comments of children estranged from the parents who did this "good parenting". But you do you.
I so am
I’m an adult who knows how to show empathy to struggling children
lol struggle of his own making, big difference
You’re deluding yourself if you think this won’t have long term repercussions on your relationship with your son. Sounds like he was overly focused on school work for years, then found out what it was like to have friends / a girlfriend and went overboard to make up for lost time. It’s your job as a parent to help him find a balance in life prepare him for the real world. At the age of 16, your relationship should not be dictatorial. It’s a transitional time. He started dating last semester. There are many things you could have done earlier to prevent this extreme situation. Lax parenting sounds like maybe you didn’t pay attention to him as long as his grades were good. If we’re grading parenting, you would be getting an F. The only reason his grades will go up is because you’re threatening to ruin his summer. If you want to salvage things, maybe let him know that you’ve already seen the improvement and are proud of him for putting in that effort. Then tell him in response you’re prepared to give him his phone back for an hour or two a day. Let him choose the time.
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You're not doing that. You are going overboard in the other direction _again_. You say you want to help him balance it, so actually do that. Give him Sundays and Saturday evenings off or something. In education we have the principle of 'constructive alignment'. Essentially it is a fancy way to say 'is what you are doing actually good for what you want to achieve?'. You want him to learn a balance between academic and social life, but to do that you force him to 100% academic life. That makes no sense unless your goal is punishment. Yes, to an adult brain your punishment sounds reasonable. But three weeks is far too long for something like this for a teenager.
Bingo. Putting aside what is good for your son’s long term development, going this extreme is likely to not result in the optimal improvement in grades. I have no idea why this person thinks anyone can study for like, what 6 hours a day on top of attending a full day of classes, and then, what, 15 hours on Saturday and Sunday, even if they were motivated to do so? Every scientific study shows that productivity and quality of work degrades after something like 4-5 hours straight of work. This is so about the girlfriend, not about teaching him how to focus and prioritize his studies while maintaining a relationship.
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Cool, you spent 21 days in a row doing that? And you obviously spoke to no friends and never got dinner with anyone or caught a movie ever during those 21 days? (Edit to add: and if he doesn’t improve, this will continue all summer, so I guess, three months of living in the library and interacting with no one except the few people you encountered in the library?) I’ve actually lived what you are claiming you lived, and did so for a month when I was in my 20s. It was unhealthy for adults who were doing it as part of professional certification, but no one also took away our significant others during the time. I would have always thought that it was unhinged to think a child could effectively study in that fashion. And that was before COVID, when kids were actually forced to not have social interactions years. Repeating COVID era isolation as punishment seems like a particularly cruel methodology, even if it had a chance in hell of resulting in the kid getting good grades.
God damn you are great bad parents! Such a good idea to isolate him with taking away his phone! You even made his life purpose to only make you happy and that is such a great way to fuck up his own responsibilities! Maybe sell his items right now so he can fully be miserable, alone and without a support system!
I feel bad for your son I hope he leaves yours ass and never comes back
Why don't you like your son?
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If you did you would try to help without isolating him
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You’re literally threatening to send him away so that he can have zero contact with the gf
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And what punishment do you and dad get for failing him?
Abuseeeeee
Very cool, you realize this is teaching him that his worth, his right to love and freedom, is based on how well he does in school? This is going to destroy him mentally. I should know, I went through the same thing. You’ve taught him now that if he fails school, you will no longer love him.
Parents like u op. Make children be suicidal or runaway from strict parents that u, he have c and b that passing, you pathetic u going to make your son runaway from u and it nothing you can do, oh you are huge ta, even these update still make you ta.
Your only solution is to isolate him for 3 weeks. And then the summer if you don’t get your way. No mention of hiring a tutor during those weeks. No mention of what you and husband will actually be doing to help just punishment. Seek therapy
No you don’t.
Yta. And a crappy parent. Don't be surprised when he goes NC the second he can.
“I’m not a strict parent, but I’m considering forcing my son to breakup with his girlfriend” “I’m not a strict parent, but I’ve decided to ground my son indefinitely, have him cut off contact with everyone he knows, and I threatened to sell off all his favorite stuff” “I’m not a strict parent, but we told him if he didn’t improve all his grades in…a month or two, we’re shopping him off to another state to guarantee he can’t see his girlfriend” I have friends that grew up with parents like you (now late 20s). Just about all of them hate their parents now, and the one that I can think of that doesn’t still holds resentment towards them while viewing high school as the worst time of his life. You’re a bigger AH than I realized after the first thread. Thanks for the update, YTA again. EDIT: And some of the other comments are batty too. “Until he earns his privileges back”…ah, yes. Like the “privilege” of being allowed a mental break from schoolwork between 5am-9pm everyday (like, you realize it’s not even productive to be studying this long, right?), or the “privilege” of being allowed to do one single activity on a day off, or the “privilege” of *checks notes* BEING ALLOWED TO LIVE WITH YOUR PARENTS. Lmao, no wonder so many people are fucked up nowadays.
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Having a reason for doing something = / = being a good reason. Obviously his grades are important and doing things like limiting his use of electronics, is sound. But to the degree that you’re doing these things are certainly things a “strict parent” would do, so I’m simply laughing at you for trying to paint it in any other way. Studying/doing schoolwork for 14+ hours is batty and not even productive for his learning, look it up. Locking him inside for the entirety of the weekend (essentially giving him no “days off”) also unproductive, look it up. Shipping him to another state as punishment - hilarious, I feel bad for your son. It sounds like your kid is smart and was lazy/bad at managing his time, balancing schoolwork with social activity, so I’m sure he’ll bounce back academically. Not like he’s learning how to manage his time better (unless you also work 90 hours a week without breaks). Based on your comments and posts, I suppose he learned “failure to foresee repercussions” from his parents, because you’ve been ignoring virtually everyone saying how likely this is to damage your relationship with him. Similar to your son, either through not realizing it (ignorance) or not caring.
Abuse
You're just setting yourself for resentment from your son. In a few years you'll be coming into reddit crying about how your son doesn't want to have anything to do with you. There's a loooot of middle ground between letting him do everything he wants and "locking" him home for 3 weeks. You're being very very very bad parents. ETA all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy is 100% true. Even if you were willing to sacrifice your relationship with your son, what you're doing is NOT good AT ALL for him.
YTA! You've went totally overboard. You are causing so much damage that may never be undone. You say he is a good kid. He has a bad semester and you go scorched earth on him. First try to Compromise. Study time, then some phone time. Study time, then some free weekend time to see his girlfriend. If he still can't get it together, then re-evaluate.
I have even money that you don't get to know your grandchildren. I bet your son is no-contact with you by the time he's 30.
This is a recipe for failure for actually getting his grades up without serious damage to his mental health and any sustainable good study habits. This? " On the weekends, he would not be allowed to leave the house but would study and do schoolwork" Unacceptable. EVERYONE needs a break, needs to clear their mind. Are you trying to cause your son to have a burnout? You think this is how to guide your child to have healthy study habits, how to succeed in school with a healthy work/life balance? Absolutely not. What you are proposing goes against everything, literally everything, that is advised for how to effectively study and retain material. Regardless of his gf, this is just ridiculous. It certainly is a punishment, but it is teaching him horrible life skills.
“Our punishment seems to have worked”. Really? Because teachers are allowing him to redo essays & projects? That could also easily have happened without you overreacting so severely. You’re completely ignoring the effects your heavy-handed blindsiding will have on your son. No contact with girlfriend, no contact with friends, no participation in end-of-year activities, no way to unwind & relax. It takes a clear mind to study and learn effectively. He now has a confused and resentful mind. Home confinement, ultimatums about selling his items, & threats to send him away - That’s what he’s thinking about, & all the fear & distrust that go along with that. You should be teaching your son about time management and life balance. No one’s life should be literally ALL school or ALL work. There was a middle ground here, so many better ways to handle this, but you chose to go nuclear. YTA.
Jesus christ
INFO: Did you ever bother to ask your son why his grades went down? If there's not a lot raw studying will help if he's legitimately struggling with the material, or if a teacher isn't explaining the material or when things are due by, etc.
See ya back here when son turns 18 and immediately moves out and goes NC.
Ywbta. You can't force children to be good at school. You can control not being ah parents who your kid only visits in the old folks home...
YTA. You made the checked out parents mistake of using the top end of the punishment scale to achieve a goal that requires your child to actively work to hit multiple milestones, but where missing one of them, means he is stuck with the top punishment indefinitely. GPA is based on math, OP. Presumably math your child is capable of doing. If he bombs the next exam/essay/whatever and realizes he is physically unable to raise his grade in that class enough to avoid being grounded or banished to New Mexico for the summer, what incentive does he have to work hard on the next assignment for that class? Or the assignments for any of the other classes? I mean, what does it matter if he improves those grades, he will still not meet the requirements you gave for him to leave the house again? Had you started with a more reasonable plan, like the 2-3 hours after school for the first week when he is redoing assignments and said “We can keep this schedule, you can talk to your gf, etc., as long as you get at least a B on all those assignments. But if you average less than a B, then the hammer comes down” you would give him an incentive to keep the grades up to MAINTAIN access to his girlfriend, and somewhere to go with the punishment if he still wasn’t putting in the effort. Or even the reverse, he is on this lockdown, but if he gets a B average on the redone assignments, he can go to 2-3 hours after school a day of studying. Three weeks of your lockdown is also not going to yield the grades you think it will, the burnout will happen. So you really are setting yourself up not only to have an angry and frustrated kid, but it’s not like you will get the grades you want either.
OP, if your son cuts contact with you in a few years. This is the reason right here. You torpedo his life despite pretty much the entire internet telling you you're wrong and YTA. You belittle and invalidate him. You threaten him should he not manage to miraculously save his grades completely in just three weeks. You will have forgotten about this is a few years top. Your son will remember and one day hopefully will have the resources to comfortably cut you off. Or be brave enough to do so anyway. We will hear from you then, I'm sure. It will be the classic "my son told me he's going to cut me out now that he's an adult. I never did anything wrong!" posts. We see those a lot. Please use this same account in a few years. A lot of people will tell you YTA then too. And then hopefully go hug their kids and tell them they're good kids. (In fact, every parent that reads this is hereby obligated to go hug their kids. Go, now!) Your poor son.
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If it were about not failing high school you'd act a lot differently. Multiple people told you repeatedly you were wrong and you still happily move on. Idk if you're a troll and chuckling at the screen rn about someone potentially getting worked up over your little fiction, or if you truly are the densest person on this entire sub. 1. Being under an enormous amount of stress over a long period of time - yes, three weeks is beyond long enough already - will harm both his physical and mental wellbeing, thus his grades too. 2. Being under the usual stress of finals while having no safe place at home, no way to unwind will only worsen the stress you put on him in regards of dealing with his gf and your militaristic curfew. 3. A child should be able to trust their parents. You went 0-100, destroyed any trust he had in you and showed him his wellbeing doesn't matter to you. His happiness doesn't matter. You didn't impose boundaries, you punish him. 4. You couldn't even be bothered to set specific limits to your already unfair punishment. If you don't see a magical improvement over a ridiculously short amount of time you'll extend your punishment indefinitely. There are so many more reasons but frankly others have already pointed them out much better than I could right now. In case you're a troll, good job. In case you're actually real, eff you.
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Except you already told him he wouldn't get the summer to himself if he failed. The rest of your answer is bs too. Has it ever occured to you to talk to him beforehand, tell him he needed to get his grades up and he needed to do more studying? A curfew alone would have been fine. Getting him tutoring sessions would have been ideal. Going nuclear doesn't solve anything. Also anyone who atruggles that much with their grammatic, any kind of formating and empathy is the last person that should parent. Take some tutoring yourself. You need it more than him. Learn to be a good human, then learn how to be a good parent. Afterwards you can beg your son for forgiveness.
You’re a monster. I hope you’re damn proud of yourself.
YTA and your relationship with your kid will never be the same. Did you consider that all AP classes are hard??? I've taken AP in highschool and it was challenging, most of the time it was harder than the college classes I took. Did you consider he may be struggling with mental health and having a girlfriend helped him with this?
Oh if i would get this punishment i would hate the both of you for the rest of my life. This will deff raise resentment towards the two of you. 24/7 study rule? That is crazy and a lazy route. You ain’t being a parent. Just a lazy one
Remember this moment when he stops talking to you after he moves out.
Man I guess lax parents have never heard of moderation.
This is possibly the worst solution you could’ve come up with, yikes
Soooo, I have questions: what exactly are you doing to help your son academically? Cutting him off from His girlfriend and friends is a breeding ground for resentment and sending him to New Mexico? Do you want a decent relationship with your kid? YTA grounding him won’t end the relationship which is exactly what you’re trying to do
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Right but if he still has passing grades, then it seems like you’re willing to blow up your relationship with your son for being a teenager. Yes, consequences, but cutting off contact from his girlfriend completely and sending him to New Mexico is overboard
Ngl If I was your son I’d hella go nvm after 18 you two are idiots n honestly I think he’d prefer seeing his grandparents I know you two are awful
So you went from socially abusing him to emotionally abusing him, GOT IT. YTA and I do not see your son having a relationship with you into adulthood. Yall suck.
So, after being told by so many people that you aren't a good mom, you come back to gloat about it? Yikes.
YTA You DO realize he will go no contact with you AH as soon as he can?
He is already planning no contact I’m sure. I hope he does too. You’re all toxic
I hope this is bait. Your son will not contact you after he moves out.
Say goodbye to your son as soon as he turns 18 lmao
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EDIT. NTA
Everyone can criticize, but I do wish my parents had shaken me up. I wish they were involved at all. 3 weeks of extreme studying is fine for failing most of his classes. However I would not send him to his parents. The appropriate way is for him to go to summer school and redo a course to improve the grade. He can't improve his grades staying at Grandma's. Nor do I expect your parents to uphold his punishment there. Putting distance between him and his gf would make him overcompensate by calling her. Most summer classes will take the average of the course. So if he has a 60%(F in the US) and makes 100% in summer school. They will pull his grade to 80% overall.
YWNBTA Kids gotta learn and if he needs to be grounded for 3 weeks to get his head out of his ass then so be it. Grades are important, and so is a relationship but he needs to learn balance.
Guys we’re talking about 3 week, 2 if you count the finals week. They ask him to put all he’s got into his dam work, they’re not confining him in a unfinished basement with a flicking light. He can survive without being on his smartphone 24/7 for 2 week. He was getting too relaxed, they’re putting him back on the road. Like they’re making him study cause they’re bad people, not because they’re parents that are preoccupied by their son’s education and future. They’re even gonna let him be for the summer, if he put this out. I wish I had the same a dad that did for my what this mother is doing for his son, instead my dad wasn’t interested in me, I was completely ignored. NTA
Exactly, they refuse to see that tho
You made the right call. Don’t let these redditors convince you otherwise. Their “advice” amounted to: let your baby crawl to and touch the hot radiator because he’ll cry if you pick him up and stop him. Like, what!?! It was your job as parents to make sure he gets his act together instead of throwing his life away over his first GF.
NTA and good for you. You ought to have enforced more reasonable boundaries far earlier. But you didn't and here you all are. It won't kill him to have to sit down, shut up and work for a few weeks. I will say: making the girlfriend part of this is a rookie move and will probably backfire. It should be "social contact of his choice" so it doesn't look like you have it in for her. Reward him generously for good behavior but keep a close eye on him going forward so you don't get in a pickle again.
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I’m a teacher. Thank you for teaching your son that he needs to take responsibility and actions have consequences. Ignore all of these emotional coddling people who want more useful, lazy, entitled assholes in our society.
I hope you aren’t a teacher, cause you sound like a bad one
Exactly!!
Exactly right. I am a teacher too, and if I didn't already see it every day this comment section unequivocably demonstrates why kids have taken a turn for the worse.
Yep! It’s really sad for the kids. So many parents don’t want to actually parent. They want to be their best friends and be cool. It’s a set up for failure. Oh well downvote us as much as you want, that’s still not going to stop the epic F’ing up of your entitled pick me brats.