It's a little pathetic the number of mommies on here that are obsessed with their daughter's social lives. Get your own lives, sweethearts.


*OP - you can get your daughter a smartwatch, gabb, or bark so she can text with her friends, which is what she really wants to do.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here.

We got her older sister a phone at 14, but the situation was different. She was walking to school alone and DD gets dropped of through car line with younger sibling at school, and picked up.

Pause. Dropped off through what? With who? Did you see the post about the Uber driver rapes teen?

Is there something wrong with your reading comprehension? Kiss and ride, dipshit.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Take the heat and don't cave in. Too many kids are turning into phone zombies. She'll thank you when she's older.

Lol or it becomes a lifelong point of contention that it ruined her social life and was unfair the rules were different for her sister.

100% this. If you think for a second that she will ever forget how she was treated unfairly from her sister, you are mistaken.

For this and several other reasons, not providing a phone to an 8th-grade, 14-year-old when you have the means is a very bad decision. it feels like you want to deprive her just because you can.

It's a weird power play and I see this a lot on DCUM especially with the teens.

Because a lot of educated, wealthy parents on here became that way thanks to perfectionist, hyper-controlling traits. Sadly that can translate into control-freak parenting where perfect becomes the enemy of good. My husband is like this. I temper his control-freak tendencies and that's how our kids are growing up relatively normally. If he was the only parent, they'd have run away by now.

GET THE DAMM PHONE.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Take the heat and don't cave in. Too many kids are turning into phone zombies. She'll thank you when she's older.

Lol or it becomes a lifelong point of contention that it ruined her social life and was unfair the rules were different for her sister.

100% this. If you think for a second that she will ever forget how she was treated unfairly from her sister, you are mistaken.

For this and several other reasons, not providing a phone to an 8th-grade, 14-year-old when you have the means is a very bad decision. it feels like you want to deprive her just because you can.

It's a weird power play and I see this a lot on DCUM especially with the teens.

Why not get it for the beginning of summer so she can make plans with friends? Also so you can observe her use and set rules and boundaries as needed before school starts?

When I was 13/14 I spent a lot of time giggling on our landline with my best friends and listening to music on a boom box in my bedroom.

A phone serves both those purposes for my kid. We don't have physical media for music anymore, it's all streaming. We don't have landlines. She texts and actually has phone calls with her friends. She listens to music via her phone. I do think it's mean to cut them off from that. (If they have a tablet or watch that works for that, then sure.)

My kid did get a smart phone--because she inherited one of our old iPhones. Which also makes it very easy to monitor and control because it's all linked to our accounts and on the same platform. It basically becomes a brick at 7pm--she can text but that's about it. She can't add any apps without permission and when she first got it, we didn't even allow her to have a browser to avoid her accessing social media that way.

Anonymous wrote:I have to disagree with the previous posters. I got my DD a phone at age 12. By that age, she was gaining more independence. Giving her the phone to text her friends allowed her to begin making plans with her friends herself, tracking her own calendar with practices, tutoring sessions and get-togethers, and allowed her to text me to pick her up when necessary. I think that a phone is necessary for a teenager to function in modern-day society.

Agree. My phone is my second brain and I couldn’t function without it. Seems mean and unnecessary to deprive a kid of such an essential tool.

Wow--step into the 21st century and get her the phone. This is how teens communicate these days. This would be like if you parents told you that you couldn't use your house phone. Your daughter IS missing out and you ARE impacting her social life. Let her have the phone and if you're that concerned about it, set limits. Poor kid.

I have to agree with your DD

OP- how does your daughter contact friends outside of school?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here's something I realized with my kid, every time they are trying to make their point heard, I say they are whining or complaining. They are at the age where they are entitled to have opinions. You are objectively ruining her social life.

Inability to text is not the end of the world for kids who see each other on school and presumably the child can be reached through some other means. Facetime on iPad? Parent's phone for emergencies?

It's good for kids to understand first world problems are not ruining their lives.

Maybe not the end of the world, but the inability to text at age 14 definitely means social isolation and that she won’t be included in group chats. For a 14 year old, that kind of thing is pretty devastating.

Yes. Plus the disparate treatment. It’s a whole lot easier to transition to HS if you start with some friends and how can you have friends if you have no means of communication.

Honestly unless it’s a financial burden or there were previous problems, I don’t get the decision to hold off getting the phone.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here's something I realized with my kid, every time they are trying to make their point heard, I say they are whining or complaining. They are at the age where they are entitled to have opinions. You are objectively ruining her social life.

Inability to text is not the end of the world for kids who see each other on school and presumably the child can be reached through some other means. Facetime on iPad? Parent's phone for emergencies?

It's good for kids to understand first world problems are not ruining their lives.

Maybe not the end of the world, but the inability to text at age 14 definitely means social isolation and that she won’t be included in group chats. For a 14 year old, that kind of thing is pretty devastating.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Take the heat and don't cave in. Too many kids are turning into phone zombies. She'll thank you when she's older.

Lol or it becomes a lifelong point of contention that it ruined her social life and was unfair the rules were different for her sister.

100% this. If you think for a second that she will ever forget how she was treated unfairly from her sister, you are mistaken.

For this and several other reasons, not providing a phone to an 8th-grade, 14-year-old when you have the means is a very bad decision. it feels like you want to deprive her just because you can.

A 14 year old who can’t text is limited in their social life. Because almost all the other 14 year olds communicate and plan activities independently via text.

You can make that decision as a parent that it is more important to delay the phone than to allow your 8th grader to participate in the social life with her age/classmates.

But don’t lie to yourself that you aren’t making that choice.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Take the heat and don't cave in. Too many kids are turning into phone zombies. She'll thank you when she's older.

Lol or it becomes a lifelong point of contention that it ruined her social life and was unfair the rules were different for her sister.

100% this. If you think for a second that she will ever forget how she was treated unfairly from her sister, you are mistaken.