This is my first time posting, so I do not know how to start this. I (15F) am starting to really resent my parents for their weekly need to meet up with their friends. They are the kind of people who do not really have hobbies and are always stressed out, so I was really happy that they found a way to relax.
However, this year, as school gets more serious, I find myself really hating these weekly potluck things that I am forced to attend because my parents "don’t feel comfortable" leaving me alone that late at night. On the weekends, I work in the morning, and I try to dedicate at least 4-ish hours to studying, leaving time for breaks and stuff. My parents say that I have time between work (which I end at around 2 pm) and 6 pm, which is when we leave.
I rarely get to spend any time with my friends as a teenager, and I rarely go out or do anything that isnt studying. This may be a fault of my own time management, but at this point in my life, I don’t want to change my habits because this is a very crucial time for me.
Not to mention, my parents’ standards for my grades are very high. They expect a 95+ regularly, and for sciences and maths, anything below a 97 is not very impressive to them. I am aiming for a very competitive university program as well, and they know and encourage this. I have a test pretty much every week, and if I do not dedicate all my time to it, I won’t do as well as I want to, which stresses me out even more. I find myself cancelling even the little hangouts I have with my own friends, only for my parents to spring another event with their friends on me at the last minute. Or if i dont cancel before they tell me, I end up having to make time for studying.
I feel like all I’m doing is being dragged to my parents’ hangouts or studying. I am very stressed out, and my mental health has been very bad. I find myself withdrawing from everything, and my parents basically called me an antisocial weirdo and told me to "get over it". They get angry when I bring up how stressed I am and just tell me I should skip my free time, so I have enough time to attend. The kids there arent much better. They are constantly screaming and begging me to play with them, so I virtually get no time to myself.
When I bring this up, they get very angry and tell me that this is their only form of fun and that they do a lot for me, such as hosting my friends and driving me places. Which is true, but that happens barely once a month. They are not sacrificing 6 hours of sanity a week and having to sacrifice their own time. I am all for my parents having fun, but I feel like every week, dragging me along is excessive. So AITA?
INFO: what age are you?
INFO: how old are you?
NTA, your parents are being ridiculous and putting WAY too much pressure on your academic performance too.
Absolutely NTA. You’ve already done the right thing by expressing your feelings and concerns to your parents, but they’re not hearing you. It’s time to talk to a trusted adult, school counselor, aunt or uncle, even one of their friends if you feel comfortable enough, and see if they can get through to your parents. Sometimes hearing the same thing, but from a different source, makes all the difference.
Nta, this is a very valid crashout. They’re not comfortable leaving you by yourself but they’ll make you stay up late and potentially be exhausted for work or school (not sure what day the potlucks are) and risking your grades slipping while actively pushing for excellence is wild. If they dont want you to be alone, is there a family member who can stay with you or a friend you can stay with over night?
Okay, NTA. Your parents sound like nightmares. Rather than asking them to sacrifice their socializing time, push for you to be able to stay home by yourself.
If they won’t let you, sit down and refuse to go. What can they take away from you that they are not already doing? Don’t bargain with them. They can go if they want to, you’re not going too.
INFO: Are you an only child?
The issue isn’t that your parents have friends and want to see them often. Having friends is good for mental health generally. The issue is that your parents don’t want to leave you alone at home.
You’re of the age where hanging out with your parents’ friends would be a crashing bore, so I get it. I’m also GenX, which makes me reflect on how, at your age, I’d not only been spending a fair amount of time at home alone (after school while parents were at work), I was also babysitting a 3-year-old in her home while her parents were out for the evening – often 5-7 hours at a time.
Can you try again to tell them that you really need to spend time studying at home? Remind them that \*they\* are the ones keeping you to very high academic standards, and let them know your studies are more time-consuming than before, and you already have minimal social time of your own. The key (which can be hard to do) is to keep your cool – you can’t get emotional. Focus only on your need for success and not on your stress. Every time they want to go out, give them your schedule of exams, reports due, etc. to emphasize the point.
Also: do they not trust you? When have you ever betrayed their trust, that they don’t want to leave you alone?
NTA. What they’re expecting of you is unreasonable; 15 is definitely old enough to be home alone.
NTA.
You’re 15. 15 is old enough to be home alone. 15 is old enough to baby-sit, and to have a learner’s permit! They expect you to get 95+ in every subject, but cut into your studying time and your down time, and put their social time and fun above yours– that isn’t reasonable. When they decided to have a child, part of that was doing things like having your kid’s friends over sometimes and driving your kid places because they’re not old enough to drive. They either need to let you stay home alone or cut down on either how long or how frequently they got to these hangouts.
The fact that you are getting such good grades and putting studying over your own fun when you have to, as well as working, suggests that you are a very responsible and trustworthy 15 year old. It doesn’t sound like you have given them any real reason to be worried about leaving you home alone. If you are old enough to have a job you are old enough to be home by yourself at night. If they are worried about it being too late, they can come home early.
You only have a few years of being a kid and a teenager left. They can either bend on letting you stay home alone, or sacrifice *some* of the time/frequency of their outings (3-4 hours instead of six, every other week instead of every week) to give you time to study and sometimes have fun with your friends too.
Would they let you stay over at a friend’s house where you could study and hang out if the friend’s parents were home?
Take your school work with you to these things, and do nothing but eat and study. Tell the kids to leave you alone. When people ask you why you’re not socializing, tell them your parents are making you tag along after your job and they think that getting top tier grades is voodoo magic and that time stands still attending adult potlucks. Ignore your parents anger at you not making them look good. Absolutely ignore them. They’ll either decide to leave you at home because you’re embarrassing them, or they’ll look bad to their friends. It’s ridiculous that they won’t let you stay home and study.
I’m way more concerned about your mental health. Putting so much emphasis on high grades is not healthy. You are 15. What would you like to do to relax? You are heading to a massive burnout. You are missing out on being a kid. You won’t get this time back. I hope your parents cut you some slack and start allowing you to find yourself.
NTA. I suspect the real plan is for you to serve as a free babysitter for those noisy little kids. Bring your study materials and use them. Find a quiet spot, lock yourself in a bathroom, stay in the car, ignore the little kids. Or stay with the adults, embrace your snotty teen phase and complain that those kids are awful, why aren’t their parents correcting them? And when they mention YOU should watch them, either ask for payment in advance ($5/hr/kid and food provided for you and the kids seems fair). Or stay snotty and say they aren’t your kids, they aren’t your responsibility.
Will your parents be ticked off? Sure! But you’ll either get paid, left at home, or the visits will be less frequent because their lazy friends don’t want you around.
NTA
With 15 you can easily stay at home by yourself. If your parents are uncomfortable with that than that’s their problem and they should stay at home with you instead of dragging you along. However I don’t think them being so overbearing is good for you, but it could be a cultural thing.
Also if they want you to work AND study that much, they should at least ensure you get enough time for yourself and with YOUR friends not theirs. Also if you’re coming with them, you should definitely not be expected to entertain other people’s kids there as a free babysitter, and their parents should tell them to leave you alone if you don’t want to play. It should be your downtime as well at a minimum.
As a compromise they could cut it to maybe once or twice a month if they really can’t let you stay by yourself even though you’re old enough. The best solution would be However they let you stay at home and go by themselves. This way both parties get what they need.
NTA.
The other kids screaming and asking you to play with them sounds like they are much younger than you are. Are your parents providing you as a free babysitter for their friends’ kids so that they can have more fun? And risking your grades in the process??