Reply to Are older parents more relaxed about leaving kids home alone in 2025?

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[quote=Anonymous]My kid is the same age as yours. She's very conscientious and responsible.

I would never take her to a playdate where I didn't know for certain the parents would be there the whole time.

However, I do leave her home alone for 15-20 minutes while I walk to market for milk or other items. I generally let our neighbor know I'm going and DD has instructions to go to the neighbors if something goes wrong (like I don't come back by a certain time) but nothing ever does and that's honestly an excess of caution -- the market is three blocks away along quiet residential streets.

We are also pushing her to be more independent in public. She uses public restrooms on her own many places now, she can make purchases independently (we are there, we just don't accompany her to the counter).

This year we are going to start teaching her how to ride her bike to school on her own, since the school allows 4th graders to leave school without a parent as long as there is prior permission granted. So over the course of the year, we will start following her from greater distances and making sure she's staying safe, so that by next summer (fingers crossed) she could ride there and back on her own. Our plan is to get her one of those watches that can text next summer and that way we can use it to make sure she arrived okay or she can let us know she's on her way home. It won't be every day. Maybe one day a week. We might let her go with a friend who lives nearby if he and his parents are ready for it as well.

I don't think you're being overly cautious (a lot of parents are in the same place as you) but this is the age where people start giving more independence in this way. I definitely feel like my kid is ready for it, and I think starting now and giving it slowly will make the transition easier. By middle school kids should be able to be home alone for extended periods of time, even with a friend over, in my opinion. But that can't happen overnight, they need to work up to it. So it starts now.[/quote]

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