My grandson is 10, for the last several months now he will not spend the night anywhere, not my house, his friends house, no where. If his mom leaves and goes somewhere he throws a fit and cry's. He doesn't want her going anywhere for very long periods of time, he will go to his friend house and play during the day and she can go while he is gone, but once he is ready to go home she has to be there or he starts crying. We thought that he was just going through a phase, but it hasn't changed. What is going on and why. I think he is manuplating his mom and dad. I say do the tough love thing, but they just talk to him. What advice do you have?
I'm not a "tough love" parent until I've exhausted all other options. Children can and do suffer from real anxiety. It can come on due to some traumatic event, or due to nothing at all. I would want to investigate that possibility, through a pediatrician and counselor, before treating this as a discipline need. It's not normal behavior, in my experience, at this age, so I would be looking for a cause before deciding on a treatment.
Did anything happen to him where he may have spent the night away from you?
Something maybe you don't know about?
I would take him to talk to a counselor (w/o you in the room) to see if they
can draw out of him the cause of his anxiety.
It could be anxiety.
It could be a fear of something that did happen.
Or
It could be an age and a stage of development.
Not sure that it is manipulation at this age.
Is this new behavior? Did he used to be able to spend the night with friends/family okay prior to this? If so, than I would worry that perhaps something happened to him that is causing this anxiety, whether it was a traumatic event, or something he perceives as traumatic and stressful.
I would suggest something is going on that you're unaware of.
Whether it's something 'simple'... like a urinary tract infection that has left him wetting the bed at night (common side effect that can last for a few months following a nasty infection)...
Or something complex... like problems at home (and these are myriad; from being afraid to leave one of his parents alone because they're being hurt by the other one all the way to simple transferance / aka nothing is happening in his home, but it is in a friend's and he's afraid that way), insomnia, medication, etc...
This isn't normal. Which usually means that there is SOMETHING abnormal at play. Whether that's medical or psychological... I have no idea.
Some kids don't like spending the night away from home.
My best friend in high school was like that, and my husband is the same, they like their OWN bed.
Me, I can sleep anywhere as long as it's safe and comfy!
If his mom and dad really need to go somewhere then they should of course, and he may be unhappy about it, but he'll be fine.
I doubt it's manipulation, he probably just really prefers mom and dad and his own bed, that's all.
My daughter is not as extreme as you describe. (crying when she is ready to come home, etc) BUT I will say, she just turned 10 a couple of weeks ago and about for the past year she does not like spending the night at peoples houses anymore.
Has he always been anxious about spending the night elsewhere or is this a new behavior?
My 10 yr old daughter has never liked spending the night somewhere without us. She finally started staying with my parents a couple of years ago, but the first few times we'd have to go and pick her up at 11:00 PM. She has declined offers for sleepovers even when it's been a big sleepover birthday party. I just had to sign up to chaperone the Girl Scout camping trip because she won't go without me, and I want her to have the experience even though I detest camping!!
So, if it's a new behavior, I'd want to get to the bottom of it and find out if something negative happened to him while he was at someone's house.
If it's new behavior I would wonder if something happened to him while he was spending the night somewhere. Maybe he had an accident, or couldn't go to sleep, or something to that effect. Who knows, kids freak out about stuff.
I wouldn't jump straight to tough love as the solution, you have no idea what's caused this behavior.
Take him to the pediatrician, he may be having anxiety issues or he may be manipulating his mom. BUT if it is anxiety his doctor can refer him to someone who can help him work through them or give his parents tools and resources to help him. Unfortuantely my son does have some anxiety issues, but is also good at manipulating me, it drives me bonkers because sometimes I cant figure ou which is which! Good luck to you and your family!
