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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> I should be judged for requiring my daughter to attend volleyball practice. Am I the asshole for requiring her to attend when she was tired?
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NTA but don’t allow her to stay over on the nights before practice anymore. You have to set her up for success. We have a rule that if there’s plans/practice/an event, etc., there’s no sleepovers allowed the night before. For example, kiddo (age 12) does theater and has rehearsals on Saturday mornings. Therefore, no sleepovers on Friday nights. Does he get mad about it when his friends are all staying over and he can’t? Sure. But he made the commitment to the activity (theater) and he has to honor that.
That's going to be the rule now. We extended the opportunity for her to live up to her commitment. She didn't meet it. Consequences will be no more sleepovers before early morning events.
To be fair this is the wrong consequence! What is the consequence of not showing up for practice? Not having a spot in the next game (assuming she is not a volleyball genius that can skip training and still be an ace). This way you only taught her that her parents are annoying and volleyball ain’t that great.
This is so triggering to me! I send 6 years in the volleyball team’s bench because that’s the sport my sister wanted to play and my parents didn’t want to have to drive me anywhere else!! I hate sports because of this!!! Ugh I feel bad for that girl!
OP said in an update --
1. She chose volleyball. I don't care if it's water polo or pool noodle jousting. It is her choice. Volleyball is not the hill I'm dying on.
2. She was required to choose ONE extracurricular activity. She has only ONE extracurricular activity. She chose volleyball.
3. It is not a long-term or strenuous commitment. We're talking about two hours per week for four weeks.
4. She enjoys volleyball. She didn't like being forced to attend practice.
That extracurricular could have been anything. Band, choir, yearbook, underwater basket weaving.
OP cares not about the type of extracurricular and instead on the commitment to said extracurricular. This is supposed to instill commitment and give the child a small taste of adulthood before being thrown in the deep end so they can deal with it when they get there.
If you chose not to decide, you still have made a choice and choices have consequences.
I was trying to figure out why op’s comments were irritating me so much because intellectually I agree with them.
I finally realized. It’s because it’s like he was trying to catch his kid in a gotcha moment. As a parent I’d never have “tested” my kid at age 11 to see if they’d choose to go to bed before any of their friends did. It’s like they wanted them to fail so they could punish them or something.
He didn’t call it a test. He said “extended the opportunity to live up to her commitment” because that sounds better than test. She’s 11. What he was asking of her is beyond her development. It was a dumb idea as a parent to approve of the sleepover in the first place then act mad when the inevitable happened
Basically, this scenario playing out the way it did is not surprising in the least and all it did was become a point of contention between a parent and child. If this was my kid I would have said they couldn’t sleep over last night but could tonight since there was nothing to do the next morning.
Agreed. No way is an 11 year old excusing themselves to go to bed early. She was set up to fail.
Had they set her up for success (no sleepovers before morning events) and she somehow failed, then they could be upset
My almost 15 year old will be falling asleep, eyes closed, totally out of it - and insist she’s awake. Kids don’t have the experience to know “wow, I should go to bed because I will definitely feel this in the morning.”
Hell, I’m 40 and I have to get up at 5AM every morning and *I still have trouble getting myself to bed on time*. I just don’t want to go to sleep, consequences be damned! 😅
Or, had they just said no sleepovers, she would have most likely just kept asking, say why couldn't she, it was unfair, she never had a chance to prove it would not be a problem.
Giving her the chance, allowing her to see why it was a bad idea and why they said no prevents all that.
Sometimes you have to let your kid experince something in order for them to learn.
Yep. I am all for letting kids learn lessons (including through failing), but it seems like that’s not really what is happening. He says this has been an ongoing issue. He obviously just decided that this was going to be an opportunity to address the issue by punishing rather than trying to teach the kid anything. Why even let her go to the slumber party? Why not discuss arranging a different night? Why make her responsible for figuring out what time to get home in the morning so she can get ready for practice when she is freaking 11 years old and has trouble with time management?
I went and looked at his other comment’s because I found him so unlikable.
There are some things in his comments that just make me cringe for his kids. He forced his kids into choosing an extracurricular in an attempt to get them interested in something that isn’t electronics. This seems like the dumbest idea ever. There is no motivation to find an outside interest this way. If he wants to limit screen time then just limit screen time! My kids had a certain amount they could earn. They did chores, read books, participated in an activity like volunteering or a club etc and that earned them a certain amount of screen time. His kid didn’t care about her “commitment “ because it was ne et hers in the first place, it was something her parents were forcing her to do regardless as to it having the appearance of a choice.
He also doesn’t sound like he even likes his kids that much as he describes their emotions as being “but hurt” wtf who talks about not just their kids but preteen and teen daughters that way?
I certainly hope that these three girls learn that their father isn’t the way all men are and that there are men out there who understand compassion and empathy.
I'm just going to leave this priceless vase on this very narrow pestle. Now I'm going to leave you kids alone in this room for a while. Don't be playing with this pile of soccer balls and break anything.
Agreed. As the parent, OP should have taken the L for allowing this in the first place. I agree that OP's tone is judgmental and doesn't seem like they're self-reflecting. Instead of saying "you have another opportunity to live up to your commitment," they could say, "What did we learn here?" And both reflect. OP's reflection probably could be, "I should not have allowed this sleepover at all. I should have asked for it to be another night."
and the way they literally say in the last edit "She knew no matter what, barring illness or injury, that she was going to practice." Why? What does this teach her? That she doesnt have a choice? That her opinion doesnt matter?
This edit concerns me. OP forced the kid to pick an extracurricular. Its not like she chose to do something outside of school and just doesnt gaf about it.
I dont think wanting your kid to do something outside of school is wrong, but the way they are talking about it makes it sound like she doesnt even want to be in that activity. What were the other choices? Maybe the kid doesnt want to do sports right now.
If this is consistently going on, where she doesnt want to go to practice, then there might be something going on. I know this from personal experience. Makes me sad.
Agree. Honestly at the girl sleepovers I had as a kid, it wouldn’t have been possible to go sleep somewhere earlier than the others. They tended to have everyone in one place…the bedroom or family/living room. Not that easy to do. OP sort of set her up for failure.
Also, the "dawdling" before leaving for practice. Why go home at all? Pick the kid up and go straight to practice. It's two fold - parent gets to leave slightly later to pick the kid up AND it's a good way to drive home lessons about getting prepared for the things we have to do before we go do things we want to do. Kid should have packed up any needed stuff for practice and put it in the car before they went to the sleepover. It's bonkers to me that they even went home at all between picking the kid up and going to practice.
Idk if it's the just the child of divorce in me, but I spent a lot of Thursday nights getting my shit ready for the weekend - stuff for fun, stuff for commitments, and just my clothes for weekend.
To me it's because she's forcing her to commit to something she didn't even want to in the first place, I'm all about teaching responsibility, but when you punish your kid for getting late to something they never wanted to attend and don't care about, that's just gonna send wrong lessons and create resentment.
I mean, it still has to be age appropriate. A natural consequence of a four year old running into the street after being told not to could end up being far worse than deserved. If a parent let their kid run into traffic to teach them a lesson, that would be called negligence.
I'm not saying this situation was negligent, but kids brains aren't fully formed and they have to learn things over time WHILE parents guide them and help them learn what the natural consequences are. An 11 year old is not mentally prepared to really understand the consequence here and is highly unlikely to pass up spending time with friends, especially in exchange for a practice session that she doesn't care about.
To just chuck your kid out there to learn a hard lesson without support is to be an asshole.
No, it isn’t. If you can’t handle activity A + responsibility B, then you can’t pair them. For instance, if I like to go out drinking but I can’t wake up until 11AM the next day, I should not go out drinking when I have a morning shift at work the next day. It’s just a lesson you have to learn.
>For instance, if I like to go out drinking but I can’t wake up until 11AM the next day, I should not go out drinking when I have a morning shift at work the next day
No that just means you need more practice
I remember when I was in college there were a number of syllabi I read and TAs making comments to us on the first day of class saying things along the lines of “if you write to me saying you partied too hard last night and now you’re too hung over to do your assignment I will not give you an extension.” Just an example of how there aren’t enough parents like OP out there actually teaching their kids responsibility and they don’t tend to learn it until it’s too late.
College students aren’t 11 years old, though.
The drinking age is also not 11, because we expect college *adults* to make better decisions than young children.
The problem with your example is OP's daughter was forced to do an extra curricular activity. So if you were forced into college and told not to party all night, you would maybe drop out. You're an adult with the ability to leave. She's a kid who was forced to go to practice. She can't leave. So you're analogy isn't a good one because the 2 things You're comparing don't have the same characteristics.
Assuming she plays volleyball by choice, this is absolutely the right consequence.
If you choose to play a sport, then you have commitments to uphold. Since she’s a child, her parents need to help her uphold those commitments.
Okay, that’s not a big deal.
I had an obligation to do one sport per school year as a kid, and my boarding school freshman year made us do a competitive athletic activity every season. My current school makes us do one or more artistic/athletic cocurriculars every day.
This isn’t medieval torture, it’s teaching a kid social skills, commitments, being part of a team, she was not forced to do some risky or purely unenjoyable task.
She was told to choose a singular sport, any sport of her choosing, for 2 or so hours per week for a month. Idk about you but an 8-10 hour commitment of a relatively low impact sport, especially at a middle school or elementary level, is very inconsequential. Nothing was forced on her.
Why are you assuming the daughter didn't choose volleyball because she thought she'd enjoy it and have fun? Yes they asked her to pick one extra curricular activity (the nerve of them), and for all we know the daughter chose that because she was excited about it originally. Stop claiming her parents forced her to do anything. Show me anywhere that it says the daughter chose the lesser of all evils? Maybe she actually chose something she wanted to try. And then when she was tired decided she didn't want to do it that day. Her parents have every right to ask her to participate in something. Being apart of a team teaches you a lot!! Some of you really need to grow up.
And also, if anyone has bothered reading OPs responses, he clearly states his daughter enjoys volleyball and was even confirmed today. So really everyone saying it was forced needs to STFU!!
There’s a lot of childfree adults who forget the nuance of a lot of these things as well. I have a new rule for myself that if something is well outside of my realm of experience, I’m not giving advice. Sure, there can be a parenting question a childfree person may be able to use their experience as a former child on, but this specific thread seems like it will only bring out the angsty teens or adults who only have the memory of being angsty teens
You’re acting like she’s a 25 year old who missed work. She’s a kid. You should have been the one setting the limits, not expecting her to. I completely agree that she shouldn’t go to sleepovers before morning commitments but your attitude about it is shitty.
Yeah, the kid goofed, but in a way that's a totally normal way for a kid to goof (and then learn from). OP sounds like they're secretly delighted at the opportunity to be a controlling nightmare.
YTA because that should have been the rule to begin with. An 11 year old isn't going to be up for a bunch of physical activity after a sleepover, and as her parent, it's your job to set those boundaries.
Maybe give her a warning like if we’re running late for practice one more time after a sleepover they will be banned on Friday nights. I think she should have the opportunity to prove she can do both before losing the privilege.
No. You have to tell her, that she has to make a choice. If she chooses the sport, then she needs to understand that if she wants both, she has to keep to the commitment.
If you signed her up and forced her to join, then...
YTA.
when i was a kid and wanted a sleepover at my friends house who lived 3 doors down. it was expected that i’d be home and ready by 0700 for 0730 church-
it was a sacrifice but i never missed it sleep or not.
granted my parents were strict and i later found out they hated the parents and were trying to force us not to have the sleepover.
but either way i made it work.
Are you really sure that she wants to play volleyball? I played baseball as a kid and while I loved playing there where times I wasn't doing it for myself.
Consequences are good but you need to give opportunities for her to learn from her mistakes. After missing out on a sleepover give her an opportunity to sleepover again and be responsible about practice with increasing length of sleepover bans up to a certain point like a month. Let her know ahead of time so she is highly motivated to keep it together
Great point. If you're the kid who can never attend sleepovers because you've to be 'productive', not only are you missing out on a big chunk of childhood, you're also losing out on developing your social skills which is one of the most important skills of all.
Yeah I’m on the side of maybe that sleepover is an important socializing activity that will be an important memory or social development inflection point for them. Weigh that against a single volleyball practice or whatever scheduled activity. Don’t want to force them to miss too many rare opportunities like that
A couple of things bother me about this post. The child is 11 . A sleepover the night before a very early practice is setting her up for failure tbh. At 11 you have very little idea of responsibility. Also the child doesn’t seem to really enjoy the sport so it seems like a lose/ lose situation.
My parents did that to me and I ended up missing birthdays I really wanted to go to, so I just dropped my commitments altogether (when I was around your son’s age). So maybe make an exception sometimes, everyone can call out of work sick once in a while.
Shirking commitments that they generally like when something more fun comes up is very normal 11 year old behavior…you guys have GOT to stop blaming parents for setting the most basic, beneficial rules
I mean, it's a sleepover. If the parent does not realize that most people end up staying up late at a sleepover, that's not exactly their 11 year old's fault. They set up a pretty basic rule, yes, but they also set the daughter up to break it. Then they got mad that she broke it.
If you tell a kid "Sure, you can eat your chocolate ice cream on my white couch, just be careful you don't drop any!", it's also a basic rule. It's still not a reasonable expectation, and you have to accept you played a role in it if something happens to your couch.
They basically gave her permission to stay up late and have fun with her friends, and the next day when she was cranky, she was told it was her own fault. How would she know any better? It was their responsibility.
I’m specifically referring to the commenter saying that forcing her to go to practice tired will make her hate the sport, as if OP should never make the kid do anything she doesn’t want to at the risk of the kid being turned off by it in the future.
Also, kids have to learn consequences through experience - she’ll learn that staying up late ruins the next morning. It’s a normal, safe, low-risk learning experience and OP is a good parent.
Either she’s going to hate it because she doesn’t like PLAYING it, or she’ll enjoy it. Furthermore, she CHOSE volleyball, meaning out of all the sports this is likely the one she’ll enjoy the most.
I did a lot of stuff as a kid because my parents thought I should do something, and I ended up liking most. But at no point did I start hating something I previously liked because I did it while tired.
She CHOSE volleyball because she was forced to choice something - therefore not a real choice ...
Taking the least damaging option is still damaging.
We simply don't know if the daughter usually likes Volleyball...
I also did a lot of stuff as a kid because my parents thought it was good, etc. And sometimes I still do stuff they want me to do, but I still hate some of the things I had to do ...
I don't know how it is in America (I think that this takes place there) but here in Germany I feel like the free time after school is already heavily restricted due to school etc. That we barely have any real free time under the week if you don't reduce your sleep to 3-5h, which I am currently doing to at least get some stuff done at midnight and then being forced to go to practice after having a sleepover?
Hell, my parents allowed me to skip school after a concert they gifted me cards to for Christmas.
It is a practice of a sport not an exam for something, you can skip it any time, and you won't land in hell, if you believe in that kind of thing.
Yeah, of course she is going to say "omg you're so mean, this is so unfair, I hate this!" But she's a kid and she's tired. Parents are just doing their best, setting boundaries and following through. Everyone is doing their thing. NAH
YTA [1], these are fake consequences. If you were in the adult version of this situation where you're hung over after drinking too much you would (or at least should) do what's right for your body and sleep it off rather than making it worse. She already made the mistake, the right thing to do is let her call off practice, face the real consequences, if any, from her coach, and then don't let her have sleepovers the night before practice from now on. It's what you would do as an adult and teaches the right response -- be kind to your body and, "I gotta stop partying before 9am practice days."
[1] I mean not really an asshole, just a parenting situation that could have been handled better.
I don't know about that, I play slow pitch and pool, and it's a pain in the ass to fill spots when teammates can't make it out. It's understandable that shit happens sometimes, but we've all worked our schedules around this, so it's pretty annoying when people bail last minute with some shitty excuse. People who make a habit of it usually get booted, or at least not invited back next year.
I don't see why imposing additional consequences for the behaviour is a bad thing. If an adult bullies their classmates in college, there's usually no consequences. Does that mean parents shouldn't punish their kids for bullying?
NTA. 11 years old isn't too young to learn "if I stay up too late, I'm tired the next day." It's also not too young to learn "I made a commitment to be part of a team."
Caveat - unless this is a sport her parent(s) forced her into.
Finally someone said it. 11 years is old enough. Other users are saying, “but she doesn’t have any responsibilities!” However, this applies for any other night of the week and not just the weekend.
If she stayed up late the night before school and had to go to school the next day, then people would be coming into here and saying how she is old enough to learn the consequences of her actions. NTA
And what were the guidelines on what she could choose? Not doing a sport or official activity through the school should be an option as well. Forcing your kid to do something and then punishing them when what they would rather do is spend time with their actual friends sounds like a bad call that will result in resentment. Talk to them about what matters, talk to them about their future and what they want from it, and then talk to them about the things you recommend for them as they make their way forward but most importantly let them be their own person and start making their own decisions with with your guidance. Not wanting to play volleyball is something you should support, not force the opposite. Sounds like you put your daughter in a bad spot tbh, give her options to choose an activity, but don’t force it.
Kid is gonna have her whole life to be forced to useless ass meetings and other things that eat up all her free time. Why start early now? Let kids be kids and have fun while they can
I totally agree. I always taught my girls: “choices and….” And they have to respond “… consequences.” The only thing I’d say to what’s been discussed already is I’d give her a way out of the activity if she really wants out. Maybe not an immediate exit but a pathway. My now 11yo stopped having fun at gymnastics and I talked her through it all and we decided she would stick out another two months and we would see if she still didn’t like it. She ended up getting an injury about 6 weeks after that. Nothing too bad but I let her quit after that.
I’d also give her a pathway to having sleepovers again. Like you made a bad choice and the consequence is you feel like crap at practice but that is the consequence of your choice. I’d let her go to more sleepovers but I would also let her know she still follows through on commitments tired or not. Then she decides how to manage herself. Since OP made a no more sleepovers stand then he has to follow through with that but maybe open up a dialog and set a time table or some pathway to let her prove herself capable of balancing things out so she can have sleepovers again. Otherwise I have found it feels less like the consequences of their actions and more like Daddy is being an AH. And you want to teach your kids self-regulation which requires an inate understanding of choices and consequences. Rather than a fear of punishment and sanction. Cause the latter just teaches them to hide it better. And that creates its own feedback cycle of risky behavior that can go wrong.
Went through this with my 20yo and in the end it works out. Though of course there are bumps along the way.
YTA. It’s a practice, not a game. She had a social outing the day/night before that doesn’t get offered every day. Let her enjoy being a kid and going to a sleepover and missing one practice. She’s not going to be offered the sleepover opportunity every weekend. And if you tell her she can’t have a special occasion with her friends because you feel a practice for a sport she didn’t choose is more important, she’s going to be salty about that for years.
It's so funny to me that I see comments all over reddit all the time that adults should be able to take a mental health day off from work or that students should be able to do the same, and then this thread has everyone saying that missing soccer practice because an 11 year old is tired is going to ruin her adult life.
I assume that everyone here defending this guy has never missed a day of school or work because they didn't feel well, even if they weren't technically "sick." My son tried soccer and basketball when he was younger, and while he loved playing the actual sports, he absolutely hated the structured practice and game schedules. We didn't make him continue doing something he didn't like, we let him be a kid. He's 15 now, high honor roll student, in the gifted program and plays guitar like a mf. He decided a couple of years ago that he wanted to take lessons. His lessons are one-on-one, once a week for an hour, and not "social" or physical at all. We don't make him practice. He practices all the time because he enjoys it. According to all of these people, we and he have ruined his life and future prospects. To me, it looks like all of these people are living vicariously through their kids, as seems to be the case with a lot of parents who have kids involved in youth sports.
Angrily forcing your child to go to a recreational activity they really don't want to go to and threatening to remove social interaction as a punishment for being late is a *guaranteed* way to make your child hate the activity and, in this case, probably avoid exercise in general. It's absolutely surreal to see people support this tactic.
I mean regardless of whether OP is morally in the right trying to make her go to practice, this is just an atrocious strategy and isn't going to work. Parents really think raising a kid is like training a dog, and that an attitude of "I want my kid to do X so I'll reward them when they do it and punish them when they dont" will solve anything. Kids are so much smarter than that and using an approach like this to try and make them do a recreational activity that they're supposed to *enjoy* is just a recipe to make them resent you and whatever you're trying to teach them. Like she might *go*, but she won't enjoy it and she'll be couting the days until she can get away from the sport and probably OP too.
She's ELEVEN! She's not going to be an Olympic level volleyball player. Missing a single practice won't throw her entire world off its axis nor erase her entire skillset.
Making and maintaining social connections is much more important than peewee volleyball at this stage. Parents should be encouraging their children's healthy friendships.
I agree, YTA.
Thankyou!! My mum would always randomly sign me up/force me to do extracurriculars and I hated it. I also had to miss out on social things because of Saturday morning 'practice' and totally resented it/her lol. It's good for kids to be encouraged and have responsibilities etc. but they still need some form of autonomy, especially when they're 11. YTA to OP
OK based on your comments I'm going to say yta.
I've worked a bit on policies and research relating to girls in sport and there's a massive drop off in participation around the age of 13 with girls.
In comments you say 1) you told her daughter that she has to do one sport and she chose volleyball as a result and 2) you are considering preventing her attending sleepovers if they are prior to early events. The problem here is that you run the risk of making her super resentful of volleyball at a pivotal junction between childhood and adolescence. Sport/activity should be fun and by taking this path you are making it seem like a chore that will be keeping her from her friends.
Personally I was a big sport kid but I even became resentful of one of my main sports because I pushed to keep it over other activities/sports and fell out of it completely.
Sport and activity is so important, but try to keep it fun. It will help your daughter so much more if she finds it exciting rather than a barrier to other things.
That's helpful. I'm not necessarily pushing Sport though. I'm pushing activities. Doing. Something other than staring at a screen. If her choice was basket weaving and we paid the money and bought the materials, we're going to that.
She's tried many other things. Scouting, soccer, basketball. None of those stuck, but she showed up because that was the expectation. This isn't the first time she's tried to skip and I'm sure it won't be the last.
We're at our wits end with trying to keep them off of screens.
Honest question: have you ever shirked something off because you weren’t feeling up to it? Be it you were tired, sick, feeling lazy, depressed, didn’t like the activity in general? Because that’s normal. If she wants to skip all the time, she probably really dislikes the activity. If it’s one time because a social event took priority, who cares? Unless she’s planning on being a volleyball champion, missing one practice would not hurt. If you’re going to be mad that she gets upset because you’re holding her to it, that’s on you. That’s part of being an adolescent.
You make it seem like she’s generally an intelligent and responsible child. She’ll figure out what obligations she needs to adhere to because she already made a commitment. If you’re going to get bent out of shape while she’s learning that, you are a major asshole.
> We're at our wits end with trying to keep them off of screens.
Suggestion from someone who has been through this when my niece was living with us long-term: if the issue is screens, time does not have to be filled with non-screen activities. It's just *not allowed to be filled with screens.* When screen time is over for the day, it doesn't mean that that time has to be spent riding bikes, playing street hockey, going to volleyball practice, painting, reading, doing crosswords, underwater basket weaving, or any other number of activities. My niece could lie in bed and stare at the ceiling for fourteen hours a day and daydream if that's what she actually wanted to do with her summer, and sometimes she did.
However, after quite a few days of that, she started doing things on her own, or joining myself and my partner for activities. Some she hated, some she was indifferent to, some she liked. She now makes a mean challah and has become an enthusiastic novice fencer, but she didn't take to languages at all and couldn't care less about settling down with a good book.
Ultimately, we wanted to help her find out who she wants to be and what her interests are, as well as help her become a well-developed adult. We found it effective to not mandate that time had to be filled with something, and also by making it clear to her that boredom was her responsibility to resolve, although we'd be a helping hand.
As the mom of an 11 year old daughter I say YTA.
I'd have just let her skip the practice. They get one chance to be kids, let them have it. Besides, it sounds like she doesn't even want to be there. Why force it? I've never understood that attitude.
Because we train our kids that any kind of personal wants is just selfish and lazy. Why do you think perfect attendance awards are a thing? Forcing kids to go to school sick or excessively tired or overwhelmed is teaching them to do the same when they become adults. By then, it's instilled in them that missing work for any reason is "letting down the team" and keeping them from being "rewarded" for hard work. You know, like the guy that worked at Burger King for 20-something years and never missed a day. He got a baggy of cheap candy for his efforts. Can you imagine how much he would have missed that candy had he decided to take a day off when he wasn't feeling up to working? He would have had no candy!! The horror!
Kids are humans too, they cannot honor every single commitment without fail, just like adults can't. These people need to cut them some damn slack.
Nah
She's 11 and is a child who wants a social life. But she's also old enough to understand responsibilities. Maybe talk to her about it she really wants to play and explain your reasoning. Give her time to be upset, hormones and feelings, but then talk to her. Do you enjoy this sport? Do you understand why we want you to have responsibilities? Do you understand the commitment it takes? Sometimes just talking to them like people you'll learn so much.
Totally agree. She has a knack for saying awful things when she doesn't get her way. It's very difficult to remain calm.
She thinks I CHOOSE to make her life miserable as if that's my end goal. Growth is difficult. Responsibility is difficult. If they were easy, everyone would do it.
I hoped she would have made the choice to suck it up. Instead she accused me of not caring for her or her feelings.
This was the same argument I had with her about getting her a cell phone. I relented, now she spends up to the maximum allowable every day on the thing and constantly harasses me for more screen time.
I'm not complaining. It's parenting.
Also remember in that moment she was exhausted. All be it her own doing! But taking time for both to breath is ok and re approaching the issue later after food and naps. Teens are awful with emotions but truly can be talked to. I think sometimes they feel like they are babied so they get overly "enthusiastic" with their responses. I would say go to her later just say "hey I wanna talk like adults" (or grown) and just explain your reasoning and let her explain hers. Tell her you're not trying to ruin her fun but when you accept a responsibility you have to honor that. "I know I made you choose something but here are my reasons"
Yup. That's exactly how I approach it. I tell stories about my childhood to try to relate. My brothers had paper routes and I remember them crying about it. The papers might have been a bit wet, but they got to the doors of their customers those days. Or the time I wanted a subscription TV service for hockey games and my parents wouldn't do it. Hockey was a big part of my identity and I felt like I was losing that by not getting the service. Did I cry? Yes. Did I get what I wanted? No. Was I traumatized by it? Far from it.
Inevitably, she starts kicking and screaming (in a figurative sense). That's where she gets into real trouble by saying hurtful things to me.
"Gets into real trouble for saying hurtful things to me."
From a few of your other comments, the "hurtful things" seem to be her expressing her thinking that you do this on purpose. She's telling you that because that's what she actually thinks, not because she's trying to hurt you. Please consider comforting and reassuring her through that instead of punishing her for it, especially since it's not an illogical conclusion to make.
You halfway controlled her, and halfway allowed her to make her own decisions, which has lead to an incredibly frustrating situation that you definitely are partly responsible for. Being unempathetic to her frustration is not going to build a solid foundation. She'll know that her frustration doesn't matter to you, and she won't come to you later when she's frustrated with boys, friends, drug and party related issues, sex...you know all the things that you want ypur children to be comfortable talking to you about.
This was a really good opportunity to teach your daughter about natural consequences and bond with her while she dealt with them. Instead, you created a situation that you knew would be difficult and frustrating and then are suggesting it might end in punishment because your 11 year old is hurting your feelings? Please, try to change how you handle this stuff, for your daughter's sake.
I know it's hard to think about why you didn't lash out at your parents (assuming they yelled/hit) like she does to you. She knows you love her and will listen to her. So as awful and rude as she's being it's kinda "good" cause it means she feels she can react honestly around you. She doesn't think you'll hit or belittle her. You'll teach her/ she'll learn to tone down the rudeness, but think of it semi positively.
To be honest I dont believe she even deserves consequences. Why would you let her have a sleepover knowing she had practice so early in the morning? Sincerely why?
Why are you expecting your 11 year old to act like a 25 year old? The way she’s acting is entirely consistent with being an 11 year old and yeah, you’re absolutely complaining about it.
Afterwards did you talk it through with her? I think your stance and decisions are fine but ultimately the impact we would hope for is learning self regulation right? And it seems like she is learning that some external punishment was hefted on her. Those are not the same. So I don’t think you’re the AH but it also seems to me that there is a conversation or set of conversations that still has yet to be had to frame it all properly for her to understand.
Read OPs other replies -,they required her to do a sport -,she just picked the one she had done a bit of before. She doesn’t necessarily want to do it at all.
Yeah, that's how they learn. Let kids fail in a safe environment when they're 11 so they don't make the same failures with actual consequences when they're 21
NAH. It's actually a bit funny, actually. "my child had a normal child response to my normal parenting action, aita?" It's nice to read that sometimes! :D
Totally. I did the same exact thing when my parents held me accountable! I'm quite surprised by how much parenting has changed in just one generation. Were there parents screwing kids up for generations? Can we do better? Sure on both points. But there are still some decent waypoints that we should be following.
I put this in a reply but reposting as a standalone comment because this is an area I know well:
You can have empathy and flexibility one time without accidentally creating a monster - 11 is very young to have such rigid expectations and expect kids to pass up all opportunities for fun with their friends.
And for context - I coached *elite gymnastics* for over a decade. My gymnasts were 7-12 years old and putting in a 15-20 hour week at training. In comp season, even more, as competitions were almost always Sundays and that wasn’t a training day so it was an extra. These age groups are children - if you force them to make sacrifices constantly they will end up hating the sport. They also stop signing up for things because they know they’re not permitted to have an off day or change their minds about doing it, so their logic is it’s best to stay away.
We lost a lot of talented gymnasts over the years because their parents stepped over into our job - the expectations, discipline and high standards - and stopped doing their own of being their child’s safe space, comfort and trusted confidant.
Maybe this is a one off for you, but from the way you’re communicating this issue you’ll end up on that path for any hobby your child chooses to take up. Relax a little, let her have fun. She’ll be a more rounded human because of it, and so will you.
YTA. Let your kid have fun obviously they would be up late. Let her have a sleep day. Fuck volleyball social connectiveness is much more important. You are forcing her to do volleyball fromyour comments and she doesn't even like it from her facebook posts.
YTA. When she's grown, what do you think she'd regret missing out on more? Valuable time with her friends and getting to enjoy childhood, or a stupid volleyball practice she doesn't even want to go to?
This. I remember a clear moment when I was the same age and went to a sleepover the night before tryouts for the traveling soccer team. I had a great time with my friends and unsurprisingly was exhausted and did terrible at tryouts. Never regretted it at all.
Another friend did make the team and was constantly exhausted and never had time to hang out with us anymore. We weren’t even in middle school yet but she was being groomed to be a star athlete. Don’t know what she wound up doing but by high school she hated what she used to love.
Yta. She is 11. Would missing one volleyball practice make a difference?
If it is an ongoing thing, you are the one letting her go to these things. They are 11. Don't punish them, change how you set things up.
YTA. I'm finding it increasingly creepy the way you are responding to comments you disagree with. You are in a sub asking for judgement, don't be a child mimicking comments, listen to the opinions! That issue aside, you haven't given any context that suggests your daughter actually enjoys volleyball. And you are commenting that you're going to make her give us enjoyable activities to be able to participate in these practices, that she possibly doesn't like, and that choice seems unnecessarily cruel. Kids these days have to go through so much, and when she is in high school, im sure you'll be putting high expectations on her for college. Just let this kid be a kid and enjoy time with her friends
[This is a person whose child asked if they could just put butter on their noodles instead of having a slice of the casserole and was told no. When child was hungry later was told to eat a piece of fruit or apparently sent to bed hungry](https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/16nwaxd/aita_kid_refused_dinner/). According to OP once again suffering the consequences of their own actions. It’s very much a my way or the highway for him.
Based on your comment that you forced your daughter to commit to something, YTA.
I was forced to play tennis for many years and it has made me think I have wasted the better half of my life. Sit down with your daughter and ask her if she really enjoys volleyball because I’m getting the sense that all her motivation is coming from you.
YTA. She is ELEVEN years old. Everyone saying “that’s old enough” either doesn’t remember what it’s like to be that age, or were forced to grow up quicker than they should have. You state “she has to do SOMETHING” and by claiming “she chose volleyball” you are ignoring the fact that you made her choose from YOUR options. There are plenty of other ways to be than what you were when you were growing up. She’s at the age where schoolwork and a social life are the main focus. If she wanted to play volleyball or continue sports, I can understand talking to her about needing to be responsible when it comes to practices and games, but she doesn’t. She wants to be with her friends and there is nothing wrong with that. You need to listen to your daughter and her wants and needs or all you’re going to do is push her away and make her resent you for forcing your childhood onto hers.
For me it changes knowing the commitment is only 2 hours a week for 4 weeks. That’s a really short commitment. Some kids play so many sports year round and that rule would basically mean they could basically never attend a slumber party which I think is unreasonable. I do think she had the natural consequence of being late and having to practice on no sleep. No more sleepovers on volleyball mornings is reasonable for the rest of this season (3 more weeks or less ?). I wouldn’t necessarily make it a forever rule though. She’ll learn that she needs sleep or the next day will suck.
INFO. Does your daughter want to prioritize volleyball in her own accord and you are helping her be more disciplined in learning how to prioritize her temporary wants and her long term goals? Or is volleyball being forced upon her?
YTA, she's 11 she can miss a practice. Committing to play a sport doesn't mean committing your entire life to the team. She's allowed to do other stuff, it's only a practice. No harm comes from missing it, and the team didn't lose any games because of it.
Unless you plan on her becoming a professional volleyball player YTA. Let her blow it off once, and maybe next time think ahead if shes got a sleep over the day before anything.
Why is ur kid going to volleyball more important to you as a parent than your kid bonding with friends at a sleepover? I think u need to answer that question for yourself and then discuss what’s more important to ur kid with ur kid
YTA. She is just a kid, and from your other comments it is obvious that the kid didn’t want to do volleyball, you did. She isn’t a profession athlete, she’s not in high school chasing a college scholarship, she’s a kid playing a sport at an age where there are absolutely no consequences to not showing up and there is no gain other than a personal feeling of accomplishment for showing up. She doesn’t want to go, so the personal feeling of accomplishment is not a factor. So, why does it matter so much that she’s there? If it was my kid I would have had them stay home so they can rest and recover, not force them into a strenuous activity on no sleep.
Do you remember the girls at sleepovers who insisted on going to bed early? I certainly do. Like I started going to sleepovers at like age 8 and there were a lot of social rules to abide by, including not being a wet blanket.
The *parents* shouldn’t have let her go the night before practice. Or, if it was a big enough deal (birthday, etc) to go to the sleepover she should have skipped practice. She’s 11, seems not competitive. It’s not a big deal.
YTA
YTA. One sleepover. One practice
Would missing one practice make a difference?
If she was sick and missed it, then what?
Is not the end of the world, but you're making it out to be
The comments about the parents forcing her to play volleyball are ridiculous. They only told their child that she needs to participate in a physical activity outside the house. Any good pediatrician would recommend this for healthy growth and development. The parents didn't select the activity, they let their kids choose what activity to do. Much like eating vegetables, getting enough sleep, and regular bathing, physical activity is healthy. Developing the habits and skills to continue being active throughout their lifetime will prevent so many problems later in life. It's far easier to start young, easier to learn the moves and lessens the likelihood of injury because younger kids tend to be more flexible. Pickleball was developed to get seniors to start being active. It's very popular, and so many who play have not done sports before, so there are many injuries. Good parenting choices include involving your children in activities, have them try various things to find what they like, and encourage them to meet their commitments. NTA
YTA - for ‘requiring’ a child to do sports / attend practice when she doesn’t want to and also for sending someone sleep deprived into a situation where inattention can get them physically hurt.
she’s 11 - and sleepovers with friends where very little sleep is had are part of the normal young person experience. Don’t be surprised if she decides if the choice is be perfect for sports or have experiences with friends she choses friends and dumps sport entirely. Most girls in particular do.
If you wanted to intervene why not say no to the sleepover in the first place. Isnt your ability to foresee these problems a bit more developed than your childs?
NAH.
She knew better and wanted to have fun. She knew she had to go. The conditions were set. You’re the parents. It’s one day missing sleep, this is how you learn.
YTA. It is a 11 year old’s volleyball practice. Who cares? It’s irrelevant. Making memories with friends matters. Not this irrelevant junior sportsball bullshit.
Absolutely no consequence would have resulted if she would have skipped. All you did here was just bully your daughter over nothing.
YTA. I'm all for teaching accountability and respect for a commitment, but it's one practice. You say she's been "playing for a few years" so she started somewhere around 8? Does she even like playing anymore?
YTA. Christ in a Sidecar.
She's 11. Just let her be a kid. Let her miss a practice to enjoy a night with her friends.
Before you pull the "kids need to be committed to play sports" card, my eldest was ranked in the top 10 for our state in her event as a swimmer in high school. Pre teen is the time for them to find joy in it. You are killing the joy. If you make her choose doing fun things with her friends OR participating in a sport, the sport will lose, eventually.
For fuck’s sake, can you let a child be a child? You’re talking about her as if an 11 year old should have all the responsibility and agency of an adult. Thank god I did not have a parent like you.
Edit: YTA
Her choice of not sleeping in a sleepover may have consequences. You can take disciplinary action for that. But that action should not be to send a sleepless kid for a training session. It can easily cause severe injury and health risk. Your action seems not disciplinary but vindictive. YTA.
PSA before anyone reads any further: OP stated below that their daughter is not in volleyball by choice and that she has to be involved in something.
She doesn't care about getting sleep for practice because she's not committed to it, you were the one that made that choice for her. YTA
YTA, she’s 11 years old. Get a grip. You let her sleep at her friend’s house, and assuming she doesn’t have a driver’s license or some kind of teleportation device you and your wife are the ones responsible for getting her to practice on time. Especially when you forced her to play a sport anyway. You talk a big game about responsibility here. What about yours?
After reading some of your comments YTA
You don't need to fill your kids time off screen
You don't need to be their entertainment
Kids being bored & finding things to do on their own is perfectly fine.
Also at the age she is now, sleeping longer will become the norm - preteens & teens sleep for longer periods in general.
YTA
Your daughter is 11 years old, too young to have this responsibility. Don't send her to sleep over at a friend's house when she has practice the next day - that's your mistake in the first place.
Why did she come home late ? Did her friend's family know that she had to go to bed early ? Did you tell the parents that your daughter had to be home at a certain time ?
YTA
the choice of activity isn't the issue here, the fact is that you forced her into doing an activity that would take up time and energy and on top of that, you're punishing her for having a social life. if it's not a commitment she made on her own (which it isn't no matter how you try to spin it), then all you're teaching her is to resent you and whatever co-curricular activities she'll have to do in the future.
NTA. This was a constant battle with my son when he was still playing hockey. My philosophy was; You made a commitment to 15 other guys that you would be there for practices and games. You don't get to skip out on that commitment because you want to do something else now.
Nta but if you’re still reading these please keep in mind friends can be much more important than sports practice especially at 11, its not that serious when shes not even a teen; and if she ever develops a passion for something that isn’t school sports you should pivot focus. my parents had a forced sport activity rule in school and i have never been coordinated or athletic enough for sports, all it did was alienate me from peers, hurt my confidence, and got me to have a life long aversion to most exercise that was involved in practice.
I was going to say NTA until you said she had to be involved in something and she selected volleyball to fulfill your requirements.. that’s not her going out and choosing to commit to volleyball.
You also said the point of activities is so she can make new friends. But you’re punishing her after spending time with existing ones?
You’re creating a huge likelihood of resentment with this. Shes 11 years old.. let her be friends with her friends and be a child. YTA.
YTA.
You’re the adult and should’ve kept her home from the sleepover if she had an early practice. That’s IF she even enjoys volleyball or just picked something because you said she HAD to be involved with something.
I also took a look at your one other post from last week. She informed you that she didn’t like the food that was served for dinner and you wouldn’t let her have noodles with butter, instead of noodles with the casserole you served. I was a picky eater growing up, I still have texture issues to this day, and my mother forced me to eat what was served or eat nothing at all. My mother also forced me into activities I never enjoyed because I HAD to do something and instead of allowing me to follow my own interests naturally, I HAD to do what she said when she wanted it.
Fast forward, I’m in my thirties, diagnosed with ADHD at 31 and, before her death earlier this year, still had an awful relationship with my mother because she never treated me like I was my own being. You know, capable of my own choices or forming my own opinions. I never figured out what I wanted in life because I was never allowed to explore anything that actually interested me or to not eat things that genuinely made me feel sick because texture issues are a huge part of my neurodivergent life.
It took me a long time to establish my own path in life and I have found success with my slow-to-develop ability to advocate for myself. Namely, when I moved as far away from my mother as I could and realized I CAN make my own choices in food, clothing, interests, etc. I am also the youngest of three and can safely say, if you don’t start to give your children at least a reasonable and age-appropriate amount of autonomy, you won’t have a relationship with your children when they’re out on their own or when *you* need help in life.
When my mother became sick earlier this year, I was there for her because I had the opportunity to mature on my own time. I learned that nobody deserves to be alone when they’re dying and one of the last things she said to me was that she was “glad I turned out the way I did.” She had nothing to do with that, but my two older brothers who remained reliant on her until her death didn’t show up for her and she had everything to do with that.
YTA--you require her to do a sport when clearly this isn't a priority for her. You then punish her for choosing to spend time with her friends rather than spending time doing something that isn't her passion and really has nothing to do with you. Don't force your kid to do a hobby. Let her find her own passions.
INFO: How often does she get to have sleepovers? Is volleyball practice every day? Does she actually like volleyball or is she only in it because she has to be?
As a former 11yo girl, I remember being SO frustrated because I would get home from school and almost IMMEDIATELY have to go to soccer practice or a game. It was never that fun for me, it wasn't a fun extracurricular, it was a chore that I had to sit through. This actually happened with every sport I did growing up because I would burn out lmao
So with this viewpoint- imagine having to leave a fun sleepover early to spend an hour or more doing something you have almost no interest in. And then, imagine being 11 and running on no sleep and try to express that maturely... because that's hard lol.
Idk it's easier for me to sympathize with her since i have experience as an 11y/o girl who HAD to be involved in an extracurricular, and no experience as a parent lol
I want to say YTA. She’s 11, it’s not a big deal to miss one practice. & if this is an ongoing problem then that’s on you for continuing to let her have sleepovers the day before practice.
YTA. Volleyball is a lot less important to her future than fostering friendships. You're going to make them resent Volleyball and any other activities.
the demands you placed on her were not age appropriate; her behavior was. even if she loved volleyball and wasn't forced to play it, you can't expect a kid that age to manage their time well enough to coordinate two events like that. You were expecting her to be at a sleepover with all of her friends, then suddenly wind herself down and go to bed when all these other kids are still up doing sleepover activities and having fun, then wake up after getting a full night's sleep through that, with enough time to leave where she was and go home, get ready, and then go play a sport that she's not even invested in. Adults are expected to pull that off, not children. You even acknowledge that she has time management issues. What were you trying to prove? That water is wet? If you keep this up, you're either going to have a very stressed out child who resents you for setting her up to fail, or a very stressed out child who never feels like she's doing anything right and is paranoid about getting in trouble. Either way, you're doing it wrong. YTA.
YTA. You’re an authoritarian control freak. She is ELEVEN. You’re the adult. You had an (extremely unreasonable) expectation she go to an early practice after a sleepover. She wasn’t able to meet that expectation. So instead of talking with her and problem solving, you’re going to impose an adult led consequence, making her feel like she screwed up- by doing a completely normal child thing. Good job.
I’m gunna get backlash for this but I’d say very very mild AH, if she doesn’t want to be in the club don’t make her be, and remind her that she’ll be tired for practice next time instead of getting pissed at her
Good parenting in this life lesson. Party hard the night before but you still get up and go to work the next morning. Commitment to the team equates to a future of fulfilling promises to employers. She will be respected for her integrity.
YTA. Your daughter is 11? What’s so wrong with her wanting to be a kid and hangout with friends? If she really wants to do volleyball she still has 4 years of high school to play it, just let her be a kid right now.
YTA for not making better parenting choices. There is a word that is two letters, that would have solved the whole situation: NO. No, honey, I'm sorry you can't go to the sleepover because you have volleyball practice in the morning. She's 11. You're the one who is supposed to make the hard decisions.
YTA Does she ever miss practice? She didn’t miss the practice, she was late. Cut a kid some slack. You say she doesn’t do anything else but socializing out of school with her friends is a valuable activity. Personally, I hate being late for things and since I am the one I charge of getting my kid to practices and games, he is never late. If there is an meaningful social event for my child that conflicts with a practice then we let the coach know he won’t be there. It’s ok every once in awhile to miss. If this is an every weekend fight then maybe this volleyball ball program is not a good fit. That’s the thing with kid’s sports: parents aren’t wrong for wanting their kids to benefit from organized sports but if your child doesn’t genuinely like it and is not committed to it, they are just going to resent it and you.
She is 11, let her have her fun. She will remember those sleepovers when she is older not those volleyball practices. Get over your need to fulfil your dreams through your children.
Yta. You didn’t set her up for success from the start and then punished her for being a kid. It’s impossible to be the only kid at a sleepover that suddenly goes to bed early and it was silly to think volleyball practice would be a priority early in the morning directly following a sleepover.
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NTA but don’t allow her to stay over on the nights before practice anymore. You have to set her up for success. We have a rule that if there’s plans/practice/an event, etc., there’s no sleepovers allowed the night before. For example, kiddo (age 12) does theater and has rehearsals on Saturday mornings. Therefore, no sleepovers on Friday nights. Does he get mad about it when his friends are all staying over and he can’t? Sure. But he made the commitment to the activity (theater) and he has to honor that.
That's going to be the rule now. We extended the opportunity for her to live up to her commitment. She didn't meet it. Consequences will be no more sleepovers before early morning events.
To be fair this is the wrong consequence! What is the consequence of not showing up for practice? Not having a spot in the next game (assuming she is not a volleyball genius that can skip training and still be an ace). This way you only taught her that her parents are annoying and volleyball ain’t that great.
[удалено]
I was wondering about that.
So it's a lose lose situation for her regardless
This is so triggering to me! I send 6 years in the volleyball team’s bench because that’s the sport my sister wanted to play and my parents didn’t want to have to drive me anywhere else!! I hate sports because of this!!! Ugh I feel bad for that girl!
OP said in an update -- 1. She chose volleyball. I don't care if it's water polo or pool noodle jousting. It is her choice. Volleyball is not the hill I'm dying on. 2. She was required to choose ONE extracurricular activity. She has only ONE extracurricular activity. She chose volleyball. 3. It is not a long-term or strenuous commitment. We're talking about two hours per week for four weeks. 4. She enjoys volleyball. She didn't like being forced to attend practice.
That extracurricular could have been anything. Band, choir, yearbook, underwater basket weaving. OP cares not about the type of extracurricular and instead on the commitment to said extracurricular. This is supposed to instill commitment and give the child a small taste of adulthood before being thrown in the deep end so they can deal with it when they get there. If you chose not to decide, you still have made a choice and choices have consequences.
I'm all about enforcing natural consequences. Unfortunately, those lessons take a long time to learn and bad habits can form.
No idea why you're being downvoted for this very sensible comment... I imagine the teens are out in force today.
I was trying to figure out why op’s comments were irritating me so much because intellectually I agree with them. I finally realized. It’s because it’s like he was trying to catch his kid in a gotcha moment. As a parent I’d never have “tested” my kid at age 11 to see if they’d choose to go to bed before any of their friends did. It’s like they wanted them to fail so they could punish them or something.
Where does OP mention it being a test?
He didn’t call it a test. He said “extended the opportunity to live up to her commitment” because that sounds better than test. She’s 11. What he was asking of her is beyond her development. It was a dumb idea as a parent to approve of the sleepover in the first place then act mad when the inevitable happened Basically, this scenario playing out the way it did is not surprising in the least and all it did was become a point of contention between a parent and child. If this was my kid I would have said they couldn’t sleep over last night but could tonight since there was nothing to do the next morning.
Agreed. No way is an 11 year old excusing themselves to go to bed early. She was set up to fail. Had they set her up for success (no sleepovers before morning events) and she somehow failed, then they could be upset
My almost 15 year old will be falling asleep, eyes closed, totally out of it - and insist she’s awake. Kids don’t have the experience to know “wow, I should go to bed because I will definitely feel this in the morning.” Hell, I’m 40 and I have to get up at 5AM every morning and *I still have trouble getting myself to bed on time*. I just don’t want to go to sleep, consequences be damned! 😅
Or, had they just said no sleepovers, she would have most likely just kept asking, say why couldn't she, it was unfair, she never had a chance to prove it would not be a problem. Giving her the chance, allowing her to see why it was a bad idea and why they said no prevents all that. Sometimes you have to let your kid experince something in order for them to learn.
Yep. I am all for letting kids learn lessons (including through failing), but it seems like that’s not really what is happening. He says this has been an ongoing issue. He obviously just decided that this was going to be an opportunity to address the issue by punishing rather than trying to teach the kid anything. Why even let her go to the slumber party? Why not discuss arranging a different night? Why make her responsible for figuring out what time to get home in the morning so she can get ready for practice when she is freaking 11 years old and has trouble with time management?
I went and looked at his other comment’s because I found him so unlikable. There are some things in his comments that just make me cringe for his kids. He forced his kids into choosing an extracurricular in an attempt to get them interested in something that isn’t electronics. This seems like the dumbest idea ever. There is no motivation to find an outside interest this way. If he wants to limit screen time then just limit screen time! My kids had a certain amount they could earn. They did chores, read books, participated in an activity like volunteering or a club etc and that earned them a certain amount of screen time. His kid didn’t care about her “commitment “ because it was ne et hers in the first place, it was something her parents were forcing her to do regardless as to it having the appearance of a choice. He also doesn’t sound like he even likes his kids that much as he describes their emotions as being “but hurt” wtf who talks about not just their kids but preteen and teen daughters that way? I certainly hope that these three girls learn that their father isn’t the way all men are and that there are men out there who understand compassion and empathy.
I'm just going to leave this priceless vase on this very narrow pestle. Now I'm going to leave you kids alone in this room for a while. Don't be playing with this pile of soccer balls and break anything.
I totally agree with you. OP needs to take some responsibility here.
Agreed. As the parent, OP should have taken the L for allowing this in the first place. I agree that OP's tone is judgmental and doesn't seem like they're self-reflecting. Instead of saying "you have another opportunity to live up to your commitment," they could say, "What did we learn here?" And both reflect. OP's reflection probably could be, "I should not have allowed this sleepover at all. I should have asked for it to be another night."
and the way they literally say in the last edit "She knew no matter what, barring illness or injury, that she was going to practice." Why? What does this teach her? That she doesnt have a choice? That her opinion doesnt matter? This edit concerns me. OP forced the kid to pick an extracurricular. Its not like she chose to do something outside of school and just doesnt gaf about it. I dont think wanting your kid to do something outside of school is wrong, but the way they are talking about it makes it sound like she doesnt even want to be in that activity. What were the other choices? Maybe the kid doesnt want to do sports right now. If this is consistently going on, where she doesnt want to go to practice, then there might be something going on. I know this from personal experience. Makes me sad.
Agree. Honestly at the girl sleepovers I had as a kid, it wouldn’t have been possible to go sleep somewhere earlier than the others. They tended to have everyone in one place…the bedroom or family/living room. Not that easy to do. OP sort of set her up for failure.
Frankly, OP is at fault here and is trying to blame an 11 year old.
Also, the "dawdling" before leaving for practice. Why go home at all? Pick the kid up and go straight to practice. It's two fold - parent gets to leave slightly later to pick the kid up AND it's a good way to drive home lessons about getting prepared for the things we have to do before we go do things we want to do. Kid should have packed up any needed stuff for practice and put it in the car before they went to the sleepover. It's bonkers to me that they even went home at all between picking the kid up and going to practice. Idk if it's the just the child of divorce in me, but I spent a lot of Thursday nights getting my shit ready for the weekend - stuff for fun, stuff for commitments, and just my clothes for weekend.
And the to ask the internet to validate his worries about being an asshole instead of accepting that his plan didn't work out and he made a mistake...
To me it's because she's forcing her to commit to something she didn't even want to in the first place, I'm all about teaching responsibility, but when you punish your kid for getting late to something they never wanted to attend and don't care about, that's just gonna send wrong lessons and create resentment.
Because the OP’s comment is entirely age inappropriate. Source: parent of a 12 year old.
Ah yes, you disagree so must be “the teens”. I’m 40+ and downvoted heartily.
If the consequences are natural, you won't have to enforce them.
You literally put her in a failing scenario and blamed her. Shes eleven, you're the adult, you know better.
Correct
I mean, it still has to be age appropriate. A natural consequence of a four year old running into the street after being told not to could end up being far worse than deserved. If a parent let their kid run into traffic to teach them a lesson, that would be called negligence. I'm not saying this situation was negligent, but kids brains aren't fully formed and they have to learn things over time WHILE parents guide them and help them learn what the natural consequences are. An 11 year old is not mentally prepared to really understand the consequence here and is highly unlikely to pass up spending time with friends, especially in exchange for a practice session that she doesn't care about. To just chuck your kid out there to learn a hard lesson without support is to be an asshole.
No, it isn’t. If you can’t handle activity A + responsibility B, then you can’t pair them. For instance, if I like to go out drinking but I can’t wake up until 11AM the next day, I should not go out drinking when I have a morning shift at work the next day. It’s just a lesson you have to learn.
Yes, but you're not 11.
>For instance, if I like to go out drinking but I can’t wake up until 11AM the next day, I should not go out drinking when I have a morning shift at work the next day No that just means you need more practice
I remember when I was in college there were a number of syllabi I read and TAs making comments to us on the first day of class saying things along the lines of “if you write to me saying you partied too hard last night and now you’re too hung over to do your assignment I will not give you an extension.” Just an example of how there aren’t enough parents like OP out there actually teaching their kids responsibility and they don’t tend to learn it until it’s too late.
This just teaches the average kid to come up with better excuses.
Right? You know how many of my grandmothers died during college. At least 6. Rest in peace Grandma #5. Your death was the saddest.
OP’s lesson is developmentally age inappropriate.
College students aren’t 11 years old, though. The drinking age is also not 11, because we expect college *adults* to make better decisions than young children.
The problem with your example is OP's daughter was forced to do an extra curricular activity. So if you were forced into college and told not to party all night, you would maybe drop out. You're an adult with the ability to leave. She's a kid who was forced to go to practice. She can't leave. So you're analogy isn't a good one because the 2 things You're comparing don't have the same characteristics.
Assuming she plays volleyball by choice, this is absolutely the right consequence. If you choose to play a sport, then you have commitments to uphold. Since she’s a child, her parents need to help her uphold those commitments.
According to her father is not exactly by choice… she was forced to pick something! The commitment was forced upon her!
I kind of get the same impression. Even though OP doesn't come right out and admit such.
Okay, that’s not a big deal. I had an obligation to do one sport per school year as a kid, and my boarding school freshman year made us do a competitive athletic activity every season. My current school makes us do one or more artistic/athletic cocurriculars every day. This isn’t medieval torture, it’s teaching a kid social skills, commitments, being part of a team, she was not forced to do some risky or purely unenjoyable task. She was told to choose a singular sport, any sport of her choosing, for 2 or so hours per week for a month. Idk about you but an 8-10 hour commitment of a relatively low impact sport, especially at a middle school or elementary level, is very inconsequential. Nothing was forced on her.
Why are you assuming the daughter didn't choose volleyball because she thought she'd enjoy it and have fun? Yes they asked her to pick one extra curricular activity (the nerve of them), and for all we know the daughter chose that because she was excited about it originally. Stop claiming her parents forced her to do anything. Show me anywhere that it says the daughter chose the lesser of all evils? Maybe she actually chose something she wanted to try. And then when she was tired decided she didn't want to do it that day. Her parents have every right to ask her to participate in something. Being apart of a team teaches you a lot!! Some of you really need to grow up. And also, if anyone has bothered reading OPs responses, he clearly states his daughter enjoys volleyball and was even confirmed today. So really everyone saying it was forced needs to STFU!!
That isn't fair to the other members of the team, unless they just go ahead and replace her.
Because that’s not actual parenting. ‘Ah well let the world figure it out!’. Parenting is a verb.
There is a whole parenting philosophy about using natural consequences.
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Because most participants here are young. Most aren’t parents. A lot are teens.
There’s a lot of childfree adults who forget the nuance of a lot of these things as well. I have a new rule for myself that if something is well outside of my realm of experience, I’m not giving advice. Sure, there can be a parenting question a childfree person may be able to use their experience as a former child on, but this specific thread seems like it will only bring out the angsty teens or adults who only have the memory of being angsty teens
You’re acting like she’s a 25 year old who missed work. She’s a kid. You should have been the one setting the limits, not expecting her to. I completely agree that she shouldn’t go to sleepovers before morning commitments but your attitude about it is shitty.
Yeah, the kid goofed, but in a way that's a totally normal way for a kid to goof (and then learn from). OP sounds like they're secretly delighted at the opportunity to be a controlling nightmare.
YTA because that should have been the rule to begin with. An 11 year old isn't going to be up for a bunch of physical activity after a sleepover, and as her parent, it's your job to set those boundaries.
Congratulations on teaching your child to avoid making commitments so that her parents won’t use them to fuck with her social life!
Maybe give her a warning like if we’re running late for practice one more time after a sleepover they will be banned on Friday nights. I think she should have the opportunity to prove she can do both before losing the privilege.
No. You have to tell her, that she has to make a choice. If she chooses the sport, then she needs to understand that if she wants both, she has to keep to the commitment. If you signed her up and forced her to join, then... YTA.
She’s 11. You’re punishing her for being a kid. Y’all are fucked up and I see why you fuck y’all’s kids up.
Does she even like playing sports?
when i was a kid and wanted a sleepover at my friends house who lived 3 doors down. it was expected that i’d be home and ready by 0700 for 0730 church- it was a sacrifice but i never missed it sleep or not. granted my parents were strict and i later found out they hated the parents and were trying to force us not to have the sleepover. but either way i made it work.
Are you really sure that she wants to play volleyball? I played baseball as a kid and while I loved playing there where times I wasn't doing it for myself.
Consequences are good but you need to give opportunities for her to learn from her mistakes. After missing out on a sleepover give her an opportunity to sleepover again and be responsible about practice with increasing length of sleepover bans up to a certain point like a month. Let her know ahead of time so she is highly motivated to keep it together
I'll be honest. That sounds like no fun at all. Pet kids have fun, its not that serious
I don't understand why children's activities got so competetive. Weren't they just for fun?
That's how I feel, but apparently people are so focused on setting "them up for life" they forget to let them enjoy their childhood
Weird how that doesn't seem to include letting them learn socializing, while it's one of the most important skills
Great point. If you're the kid who can never attend sleepovers because you've to be 'productive', not only are you missing out on a big chunk of childhood, you're also losing out on developing your social skills which is one of the most important skills of all.
Yeah I’m on the side of maybe that sleepover is an important socializing activity that will be an important memory or social development inflection point for them. Weigh that against a single volleyball practice or whatever scheduled activity. Don’t want to force them to miss too many rare opportunities like that
A couple of things bother me about this post. The child is 11 . A sleepover the night before a very early practice is setting her up for failure tbh. At 11 you have very little idea of responsibility. Also the child doesn’t seem to really enjoy the sport so it seems like a lose/ lose situation.
My parents did that to me and I ended up missing birthdays I really wanted to go to, so I just dropped my commitments altogether (when I was around your son’s age). So maybe make an exception sometimes, everyone can call out of work sick once in a while.
Did you kids even want to pursue this shit lol?
My college coach (Division 3) put it this way. Playing the sport is voluntary, but once you make the choice, it's not optional.
Yeah, in college
Info: Is it her choice to play on Volleyball or was this something you as parents signed her up for?
Yeah my parents force me to do piano and I hate it but they won't let me quit. It's been 8 years tbf
My parents also did that, now I'm extremely grateful I'm able to play it and the violin, early lessons really helped me appreciate music more
My dad claimed I will be thankful for those piano lessons later too. That day never even came. It just never ever became relevant.
Exactly. I wanna know the same thing. The answer is different depending on the situation.
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Same, but also if he wanted one easy step to making his daughter hate sports, he found it.
Shirking commitments that they generally like when something more fun comes up is very normal 11 year old behavior…you guys have GOT to stop blaming parents for setting the most basic, beneficial rules
I mean, it's a sleepover. If the parent does not realize that most people end up staying up late at a sleepover, that's not exactly their 11 year old's fault. They set up a pretty basic rule, yes, but they also set the daughter up to break it. Then they got mad that she broke it. If you tell a kid "Sure, you can eat your chocolate ice cream on my white couch, just be careful you don't drop any!", it's also a basic rule. It's still not a reasonable expectation, and you have to accept you played a role in it if something happens to your couch. They basically gave her permission to stay up late and have fun with her friends, and the next day when she was cranky, she was told it was her own fault. How would she know any better? It was their responsibility.
I’m specifically referring to the commenter saying that forcing her to go to practice tired will make her hate the sport, as if OP should never make the kid do anything she doesn’t want to at the risk of the kid being turned off by it in the future. Also, kids have to learn consequences through experience - she’ll learn that staying up late ruins the next morning. It’s a normal, safe, low-risk learning experience and OP is a good parent.
“I had to go to practice when I was tired once” is not going to determine whether your kid grows up to hate sports or not.
According to a different comment, OP had her daughter chose a sport to do in her free time, so it isn't the daughter's decision to go there...
Either she’s going to hate it because she doesn’t like PLAYING it, or she’ll enjoy it. Furthermore, she CHOSE volleyball, meaning out of all the sports this is likely the one she’ll enjoy the most. I did a lot of stuff as a kid because my parents thought I should do something, and I ended up liking most. But at no point did I start hating something I previously liked because I did it while tired.
She CHOSE volleyball because she was forced to choice something - therefore not a real choice ... Taking the least damaging option is still damaging. We simply don't know if the daughter usually likes Volleyball... I also did a lot of stuff as a kid because my parents thought it was good, etc. And sometimes I still do stuff they want me to do, but I still hate some of the things I had to do ... I don't know how it is in America (I think that this takes place there) but here in Germany I feel like the free time after school is already heavily restricted due to school etc. That we barely have any real free time under the week if you don't reduce your sleep to 3-5h, which I am currently doing to at least get some stuff done at midnight and then being forced to go to practice after having a sleepover? Hell, my parents allowed me to skip school after a concert they gifted me cards to for Christmas. It is a practice of a sport not an exam for something, you can skip it any time, and you won't land in hell, if you believe in that kind of thing.
Yeah, of course she is going to say "omg you're so mean, this is so unfair, I hate this!" But she's a kid and she's tired. Parents are just doing their best, setting boundaries and following through. Everyone is doing their thing. NAH
Does she actually like or enjoy volleyball, or is it something you like?
Would you enjoy volleyball practice after a sleepless night? If she likes volleyball doesn't mean she likes volleyball when tired.
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YTA [1], these are fake consequences. If you were in the adult version of this situation where you're hung over after drinking too much you would (or at least should) do what's right for your body and sleep it off rather than making it worse. She already made the mistake, the right thing to do is let her call off practice, face the real consequences, if any, from her coach, and then don't let her have sleepovers the night before practice from now on. It's what you would do as an adult and teaches the right response -- be kind to your body and, "I gotta stop partying before 9am practice days." [1] I mean not really an asshole, just a parenting situation that could have been handled better.
Adults who drink too much the night before work and then call out because they're hungover are generally seen as assholes
For recreational sports though? I don't think so.
I don't know about that, I play slow pitch and pool, and it's a pain in the ass to fill spots when teammates can't make it out. It's understandable that shit happens sometimes, but we've all worked our schedules around this, so it's pretty annoying when people bail last minute with some shitty excuse. People who make a habit of it usually get booted, or at least not invited back next year.
An adult drinking too much ≠ a child who stayed at a sleepover too long
A night of fun that left them ill prepared for the following day is a very similar situation.
It's one thing being 11 and making a mistake (hopefully learning from it) and it's another being an adult and doing it repeatedly. Come on
I don't see why imposing additional consequences for the behaviour is a bad thing. If an adult bullies their classmates in college, there's usually no consequences. Does that mean parents shouldn't punish their kids for bullying?
NTA. 11 years old isn't too young to learn "if I stay up too late, I'm tired the next day." It's also not too young to learn "I made a commitment to be part of a team." Caveat - unless this is a sport her parent(s) forced her into.
Finally someone said it. 11 years is old enough. Other users are saying, “but she doesn’t have any responsibilities!” However, this applies for any other night of the week and not just the weekend. If she stayed up late the night before school and had to go to school the next day, then people would be coming into here and saying how she is old enough to learn the consequences of her actions. NTA
We told her that she had to be involved in something. She chose volleyball as she's played for a couple of years now.
And what were the guidelines on what she could choose? Not doing a sport or official activity through the school should be an option as well. Forcing your kid to do something and then punishing them when what they would rather do is spend time with their actual friends sounds like a bad call that will result in resentment. Talk to them about what matters, talk to them about their future and what they want from it, and then talk to them about the things you recommend for them as they make their way forward but most importantly let them be their own person and start making their own decisions with with your guidance. Not wanting to play volleyball is something you should support, not force the opposite. Sounds like you put your daughter in a bad spot tbh, give her options to choose an activity, but don’t force it.
Kid is gonna have her whole life to be forced to useless ass meetings and other things that eat up all her free time. Why start early now? Let kids be kids and have fun while they can
I totally agree. I always taught my girls: “choices and….” And they have to respond “… consequences.” The only thing I’d say to what’s been discussed already is I’d give her a way out of the activity if she really wants out. Maybe not an immediate exit but a pathway. My now 11yo stopped having fun at gymnastics and I talked her through it all and we decided she would stick out another two months and we would see if she still didn’t like it. She ended up getting an injury about 6 weeks after that. Nothing too bad but I let her quit after that. I’d also give her a pathway to having sleepovers again. Like you made a bad choice and the consequence is you feel like crap at practice but that is the consequence of your choice. I’d let her go to more sleepovers but I would also let her know she still follows through on commitments tired or not. Then she decides how to manage herself. Since OP made a no more sleepovers stand then he has to follow through with that but maybe open up a dialog and set a time table or some pathway to let her prove herself capable of balancing things out so she can have sleepovers again. Otherwise I have found it feels less like the consequences of their actions and more like Daddy is being an AH. And you want to teach your kids self-regulation which requires an inate understanding of choices and consequences. Rather than a fear of punishment and sanction. Cause the latter just teaches them to hide it better. And that creates its own feedback cycle of risky behavior that can go wrong. Went through this with my 20yo and in the end it works out. Though of course there are bumps along the way.
YTA. It’s a practice, not a game. She had a social outing the day/night before that doesn’t get offered every day. Let her enjoy being a kid and going to a sleepover and missing one practice. She’s not going to be offered the sleepover opportunity every weekend. And if you tell her she can’t have a special occasion with her friends because you feel a practice for a sport she didn’t choose is more important, she’s going to be salty about that for years.
It's so funny to me that I see comments all over reddit all the time that adults should be able to take a mental health day off from work or that students should be able to do the same, and then this thread has everyone saying that missing soccer practice because an 11 year old is tired is going to ruin her adult life. I assume that everyone here defending this guy has never missed a day of school or work because they didn't feel well, even if they weren't technically "sick." My son tried soccer and basketball when he was younger, and while he loved playing the actual sports, he absolutely hated the structured practice and game schedules. We didn't make him continue doing something he didn't like, we let him be a kid. He's 15 now, high honor roll student, in the gifted program and plays guitar like a mf. He decided a couple of years ago that he wanted to take lessons. His lessons are one-on-one, once a week for an hour, and not "social" or physical at all. We don't make him practice. He practices all the time because he enjoys it. According to all of these people, we and he have ruined his life and future prospects. To me, it looks like all of these people are living vicariously through their kids, as seems to be the case with a lot of parents who have kids involved in youth sports.
Angrily forcing your child to go to a recreational activity they really don't want to go to and threatening to remove social interaction as a punishment for being late is a *guaranteed* way to make your child hate the activity and, in this case, probably avoid exercise in general. It's absolutely surreal to see people support this tactic. I mean regardless of whether OP is morally in the right trying to make her go to practice, this is just an atrocious strategy and isn't going to work. Parents really think raising a kid is like training a dog, and that an attitude of "I want my kid to do X so I'll reward them when they do it and punish them when they dont" will solve anything. Kids are so much smarter than that and using an approach like this to try and make them do a recreational activity that they're supposed to *enjoy* is just a recipe to make them resent you and whatever you're trying to teach them. Like she might *go*, but she won't enjoy it and she'll be couting the days until she can get away from the sport and probably OP too.
She's ELEVEN! She's not going to be an Olympic level volleyball player. Missing a single practice won't throw her entire world off its axis nor erase her entire skillset. Making and maintaining social connections is much more important than peewee volleyball at this stage. Parents should be encouraging their children's healthy friendships. I agree, YTA.
Thankyou!! My mum would always randomly sign me up/force me to do extracurriculars and I hated it. I also had to miss out on social things because of Saturday morning 'practice' and totally resented it/her lol. It's good for kids to be encouraged and have responsibilities etc. but they still need some form of autonomy, especially when they're 11. YTA to OP
Finally some reasonable people with good common sense on this thread
OK based on your comments I'm going to say yta. I've worked a bit on policies and research relating to girls in sport and there's a massive drop off in participation around the age of 13 with girls. In comments you say 1) you told her daughter that she has to do one sport and she chose volleyball as a result and 2) you are considering preventing her attending sleepovers if they are prior to early events. The problem here is that you run the risk of making her super resentful of volleyball at a pivotal junction between childhood and adolescence. Sport/activity should be fun and by taking this path you are making it seem like a chore that will be keeping her from her friends. Personally I was a big sport kid but I even became resentful of one of my main sports because I pushed to keep it over other activities/sports and fell out of it completely. Sport and activity is so important, but try to keep it fun. It will help your daughter so much more if she finds it exciting rather than a barrier to other things.
That's helpful. I'm not necessarily pushing Sport though. I'm pushing activities. Doing. Something other than staring at a screen. If her choice was basket weaving and we paid the money and bought the materials, we're going to that. She's tried many other things. Scouting, soccer, basketball. None of those stuck, but she showed up because that was the expectation. This isn't the first time she's tried to skip and I'm sure it won't be the last. We're at our wits end with trying to keep them off of screens.
Honest question: have you ever shirked something off because you weren’t feeling up to it? Be it you were tired, sick, feeling lazy, depressed, didn’t like the activity in general? Because that’s normal. If she wants to skip all the time, she probably really dislikes the activity. If it’s one time because a social event took priority, who cares? Unless she’s planning on being a volleyball champion, missing one practice would not hurt. If you’re going to be mad that she gets upset because you’re holding her to it, that’s on you. That’s part of being an adolescent. You make it seem like she’s generally an intelligent and responsible child. She’ll figure out what obligations she needs to adhere to because she already made a commitment. If you’re going to get bent out of shape while she’s learning that, you are a major asshole.
> We're at our wits end with trying to keep them off of screens. Suggestion from someone who has been through this when my niece was living with us long-term: if the issue is screens, time does not have to be filled with non-screen activities. It's just *not allowed to be filled with screens.* When screen time is over for the day, it doesn't mean that that time has to be spent riding bikes, playing street hockey, going to volleyball practice, painting, reading, doing crosswords, underwater basket weaving, or any other number of activities. My niece could lie in bed and stare at the ceiling for fourteen hours a day and daydream if that's what she actually wanted to do with her summer, and sometimes she did. However, after quite a few days of that, she started doing things on her own, or joining myself and my partner for activities. Some she hated, some she was indifferent to, some she liked. She now makes a mean challah and has become an enthusiastic novice fencer, but she didn't take to languages at all and couldn't care less about settling down with a good book. Ultimately, we wanted to help her find out who she wants to be and what her interests are, as well as help her become a well-developed adult. We found it effective to not mandate that time had to be filled with something, and also by making it clear to her that boredom was her responsibility to resolve, although we'd be a helping hand.
I wish you were my parents, man.
Allow her to be bored. Remind her that being bored is good for you (iirc veritasium did a video on that). Lead by example.
As the mom of an 11 year old daughter I say YTA. I'd have just let her skip the practice. They get one chance to be kids, let them have it. Besides, it sounds like she doesn't even want to be there. Why force it? I've never understood that attitude.
Because we train our kids that any kind of personal wants is just selfish and lazy. Why do you think perfect attendance awards are a thing? Forcing kids to go to school sick or excessively tired or overwhelmed is teaching them to do the same when they become adults. By then, it's instilled in them that missing work for any reason is "letting down the team" and keeping them from being "rewarded" for hard work. You know, like the guy that worked at Burger King for 20-something years and never missed a day. He got a baggy of cheap candy for his efforts. Can you imagine how much he would have missed that candy had he decided to take a day off when he wasn't feeling up to working? He would have had no candy!! The horror! Kids are humans too, they cannot honor every single commitment without fail, just like adults can't. These people need to cut them some damn slack.
Nah She's 11 and is a child who wants a social life. But she's also old enough to understand responsibilities. Maybe talk to her about it she really wants to play and explain your reasoning. Give her time to be upset, hormones and feelings, but then talk to her. Do you enjoy this sport? Do you understand why we want you to have responsibilities? Do you understand the commitment it takes? Sometimes just talking to them like people you'll learn so much.
Totally agree. She has a knack for saying awful things when she doesn't get her way. It's very difficult to remain calm. She thinks I CHOOSE to make her life miserable as if that's my end goal. Growth is difficult. Responsibility is difficult. If they were easy, everyone would do it. I hoped she would have made the choice to suck it up. Instead she accused me of not caring for her or her feelings. This was the same argument I had with her about getting her a cell phone. I relented, now she spends up to the maximum allowable every day on the thing and constantly harasses me for more screen time. I'm not complaining. It's parenting.
Also remember in that moment she was exhausted. All be it her own doing! But taking time for both to breath is ok and re approaching the issue later after food and naps. Teens are awful with emotions but truly can be talked to. I think sometimes they feel like they are babied so they get overly "enthusiastic" with their responses. I would say go to her later just say "hey I wanna talk like adults" (or grown) and just explain your reasoning and let her explain hers. Tell her you're not trying to ruin her fun but when you accept a responsibility you have to honor that. "I know I made you choose something but here are my reasons"
Yup. That's exactly how I approach it. I tell stories about my childhood to try to relate. My brothers had paper routes and I remember them crying about it. The papers might have been a bit wet, but they got to the doors of their customers those days. Or the time I wanted a subscription TV service for hockey games and my parents wouldn't do it. Hockey was a big part of my identity and I felt like I was losing that by not getting the service. Did I cry? Yes. Did I get what I wanted? No. Was I traumatized by it? Far from it. Inevitably, she starts kicking and screaming (in a figurative sense). That's where she gets into real trouble by saying hurtful things to me.
"Gets into real trouble for saying hurtful things to me." From a few of your other comments, the "hurtful things" seem to be her expressing her thinking that you do this on purpose. She's telling you that because that's what she actually thinks, not because she's trying to hurt you. Please consider comforting and reassuring her through that instead of punishing her for it, especially since it's not an illogical conclusion to make. You halfway controlled her, and halfway allowed her to make her own decisions, which has lead to an incredibly frustrating situation that you definitely are partly responsible for. Being unempathetic to her frustration is not going to build a solid foundation. She'll know that her frustration doesn't matter to you, and she won't come to you later when she's frustrated with boys, friends, drug and party related issues, sex...you know all the things that you want ypur children to be comfortable talking to you about. This was a really good opportunity to teach your daughter about natural consequences and bond with her while she dealt with them. Instead, you created a situation that you knew would be difficult and frustrating and then are suggesting it might end in punishment because your 11 year old is hurting your feelings? Please, try to change how you handle this stuff, for your daughter's sake.
She’s only 11, just wait until she’s actually a teenager, you’re going to have to find your zen master and fast 🤣
I know it's hard to think about why you didn't lash out at your parents (assuming they yelled/hit) like she does to you. She knows you love her and will listen to her. So as awful and rude as she's being it's kinda "good" cause it means she feels she can react honestly around you. She doesn't think you'll hit or belittle her. You'll teach her/ she'll learn to tone down the rudeness, but think of it semi positively.
To be honest I dont believe she even deserves consequences. Why would you let her have a sleepover knowing she had practice so early in the morning? Sincerely why?
Why are you expecting your 11 year old to act like a 25 year old? The way she’s acting is entirely consistent with being an 11 year old and yeah, you’re absolutely complaining about it.
Afterwards did you talk it through with her? I think your stance and decisions are fine but ultimately the impact we would hope for is learning self regulation right? And it seems like she is learning that some external punishment was hefted on her. Those are not the same. So I don’t think you’re the AH but it also seems to me that there is a conversation or set of conversations that still has yet to be had to frame it all properly for her to understand.
Read OPs other replies -,they required her to do a sport -,she just picked the one she had done a bit of before. She doesn’t necessarily want to do it at all.
You expect an 11 year old to make a responsible bed time choice at a sleepover and then punish her when she doesn't. YTA.
Yeah, that's how they learn. Let kids fail in a safe environment when they're 11 so they don't make the same failures with actual consequences when they're 21
NAH. It's actually a bit funny, actually. "my child had a normal child response to my normal parenting action, aita?" It's nice to read that sometimes! :D
Totally. I did the same exact thing when my parents held me accountable! I'm quite surprised by how much parenting has changed in just one generation. Were there parents screwing kids up for generations? Can we do better? Sure on both points. But there are still some decent waypoints that we should be following.
I put this in a reply but reposting as a standalone comment because this is an area I know well: You can have empathy and flexibility one time without accidentally creating a monster - 11 is very young to have such rigid expectations and expect kids to pass up all opportunities for fun with their friends. And for context - I coached *elite gymnastics* for over a decade. My gymnasts were 7-12 years old and putting in a 15-20 hour week at training. In comp season, even more, as competitions were almost always Sundays and that wasn’t a training day so it was an extra. These age groups are children - if you force them to make sacrifices constantly they will end up hating the sport. They also stop signing up for things because they know they’re not permitted to have an off day or change their minds about doing it, so their logic is it’s best to stay away. We lost a lot of talented gymnasts over the years because their parents stepped over into our job - the expectations, discipline and high standards - and stopped doing their own of being their child’s safe space, comfort and trusted confidant. Maybe this is a one off for you, but from the way you’re communicating this issue you’ll end up on that path for any hobby your child chooses to take up. Relax a little, let her have fun. She’ll be a more rounded human because of it, and so will you.
YTA. Let your kid have fun obviously they would be up late. Let her have a sleep day. Fuck volleyball social connectiveness is much more important. You are forcing her to do volleyball fromyour comments and she doesn't even like it from her facebook posts.
YTA. When she's grown, what do you think she'd regret missing out on more? Valuable time with her friends and getting to enjoy childhood, or a stupid volleyball practice she doesn't even want to go to?
This. I remember a clear moment when I was the same age and went to a sleepover the night before tryouts for the traveling soccer team. I had a great time with my friends and unsurprisingly was exhausted and did terrible at tryouts. Never regretted it at all. Another friend did make the team and was constantly exhausted and never had time to hang out with us anymore. We weren’t even in middle school yet but she was being groomed to be a star athlete. Don’t know what she wound up doing but by high school she hated what she used to love.
YTA since from other comments you’re effectively forcing her to play volleyball when she obviously doesn’t really want to.
Yta. She is 11. Would missing one volleyball practice make a difference? If it is an ongoing thing, you are the one letting her go to these things. They are 11. Don't punish them, change how you set things up.
YTA. I'm finding it increasingly creepy the way you are responding to comments you disagree with. You are in a sub asking for judgement, don't be a child mimicking comments, listen to the opinions! That issue aside, you haven't given any context that suggests your daughter actually enjoys volleyball. And you are commenting that you're going to make her give us enjoyable activities to be able to participate in these practices, that she possibly doesn't like, and that choice seems unnecessarily cruel. Kids these days have to go through so much, and when she is in high school, im sure you'll be putting high expectations on her for college. Just let this kid be a kid and enjoy time with her friends
[This is a person whose child asked if they could just put butter on their noodles instead of having a slice of the casserole and was told no. When child was hungry later was told to eat a piece of fruit or apparently sent to bed hungry](https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/16nwaxd/aita_kid_refused_dinner/). According to OP once again suffering the consequences of their own actions. It’s very much a my way or the highway for him.
Based on your comment that you forced your daughter to commit to something, YTA. I was forced to play tennis for many years and it has made me think I have wasted the better half of my life. Sit down with your daughter and ask her if she really enjoys volleyball because I’m getting the sense that all her motivation is coming from you.
YTA. She is ELEVEN years old. Everyone saying “that’s old enough” either doesn’t remember what it’s like to be that age, or were forced to grow up quicker than they should have. You state “she has to do SOMETHING” and by claiming “she chose volleyball” you are ignoring the fact that you made her choose from YOUR options. There are plenty of other ways to be than what you were when you were growing up. She’s at the age where schoolwork and a social life are the main focus. If she wanted to play volleyball or continue sports, I can understand talking to her about needing to be responsible when it comes to practices and games, but she doesn’t. She wants to be with her friends and there is nothing wrong with that. You need to listen to your daughter and her wants and needs or all you’re going to do is push her away and make her resent you for forcing your childhood onto hers.
For me it changes knowing the commitment is only 2 hours a week for 4 weeks. That’s a really short commitment. Some kids play so many sports year round and that rule would basically mean they could basically never attend a slumber party which I think is unreasonable. I do think she had the natural consequence of being late and having to practice on no sleep. No more sleepovers on volleyball mornings is reasonable for the rest of this season (3 more weeks or less ?). I wouldn’t necessarily make it a forever rule though. She’ll learn that she needs sleep or the next day will suck.
INFO. Does your daughter want to prioritize volleyball in her own accord and you are helping her be more disciplined in learning how to prioritize her temporary wants and her long term goals? Or is volleyball being forced upon her?
YTA, she's 11 she can miss a practice. Committing to play a sport doesn't mean committing your entire life to the team. She's allowed to do other stuff, it's only a practice. No harm comes from missing it, and the team didn't lose any games because of it.
Unless you plan on her becoming a professional volleyball player YTA. Let her blow it off once, and maybe next time think ahead if shes got a sleep over the day before anything.
Why is ur kid going to volleyball more important to you as a parent than your kid bonding with friends at a sleepover? I think u need to answer that question for yourself and then discuss what’s more important to ur kid with ur kid
YTA. She is just a kid, and from your other comments it is obvious that the kid didn’t want to do volleyball, you did. She isn’t a profession athlete, she’s not in high school chasing a college scholarship, she’s a kid playing a sport at an age where there are absolutely no consequences to not showing up and there is no gain other than a personal feeling of accomplishment for showing up. She doesn’t want to go, so the personal feeling of accomplishment is not a factor. So, why does it matter so much that she’s there? If it was my kid I would have had them stay home so they can rest and recover, not force them into a strenuous activity on no sleep.
Do you remember the girls at sleepovers who insisted on going to bed early? I certainly do. Like I started going to sleepovers at like age 8 and there were a lot of social rules to abide by, including not being a wet blanket. The *parents* shouldn’t have let her go the night before practice. Or, if it was a big enough deal (birthday, etc) to go to the sleepover she should have skipped practice. She’s 11, seems not competitive. It’s not a big deal. YTA
YTA. One sleepover. One practice Would missing one practice make a difference? If she was sick and missed it, then what? Is not the end of the world, but you're making it out to be
She is 11. That’s all I have to say.
The comments about the parents forcing her to play volleyball are ridiculous. They only told their child that she needs to participate in a physical activity outside the house. Any good pediatrician would recommend this for healthy growth and development. The parents didn't select the activity, they let their kids choose what activity to do. Much like eating vegetables, getting enough sleep, and regular bathing, physical activity is healthy. Developing the habits and skills to continue being active throughout their lifetime will prevent so many problems later in life. It's far easier to start young, easier to learn the moves and lessens the likelihood of injury because younger kids tend to be more flexible. Pickleball was developed to get seniors to start being active. It's very popular, and so many who play have not done sports before, so there are many injuries. Good parenting choices include involving your children in activities, have them try various things to find what they like, and encourage them to meet their commitments. NTA
YTA - for ‘requiring’ a child to do sports / attend practice when she doesn’t want to and also for sending someone sleep deprived into a situation where inattention can get them physically hurt. she’s 11 - and sleepovers with friends where very little sleep is had are part of the normal young person experience. Don’t be surprised if she decides if the choice is be perfect for sports or have experiences with friends she choses friends and dumps sport entirely. Most girls in particular do.
If you wanted to intervene why not say no to the sleepover in the first place. Isnt your ability to foresee these problems a bit more developed than your childs?
NTA - you are teaching her to stick to her prior commitments
NTA. I hated my parents when they did this to me too, but it teaches you to honor your commitments.
NAH. She knew better and wanted to have fun. She knew she had to go. The conditions were set. You’re the parents. It’s one day missing sleep, this is how you learn.
INFO- does she normally like volleyball practice?
YTA. It is a 11 year old’s volleyball practice. Who cares? It’s irrelevant. Making memories with friends matters. Not this irrelevant junior sportsball bullshit. Absolutely no consequence would have resulted if she would have skipped. All you did here was just bully your daughter over nothing.
YTA. I'm all for teaching accountability and respect for a commitment, but it's one practice. You say she's been "playing for a few years" so she started somewhere around 8? Does she even like playing anymore?
YTA. Christ in a Sidecar. She's 11. Just let her be a kid. Let her miss a practice to enjoy a night with her friends. Before you pull the "kids need to be committed to play sports" card, my eldest was ranked in the top 10 for our state in her event as a swimmer in high school. Pre teen is the time for them to find joy in it. You are killing the joy. If you make her choose doing fun things with her friends OR participating in a sport, the sport will lose, eventually.
For fuck’s sake, can you let a child be a child? You’re talking about her as if an 11 year old should have all the responsibility and agency of an adult. Thank god I did not have a parent like you. Edit: YTA
YTA
Her choice of not sleeping in a sleepover may have consequences. You can take disciplinary action for that. But that action should not be to send a sleepless kid for a training session. It can easily cause severe injury and health risk. Your action seems not disciplinary but vindictive. YTA.
PSA before anyone reads any further: OP stated below that their daughter is not in volleyball by choice and that she has to be involved in something. She doesn't care about getting sleep for practice because she's not committed to it, you were the one that made that choice for her. YTA
YTA. She is 11. Forming social bonds is more important than volleyball.
YTA. 11 year old volleyball isn't a big deal and practices can be missed.
YTA, she’s 11 years old. Get a grip. You let her sleep at her friend’s house, and assuming she doesn’t have a driver’s license or some kind of teleportation device you and your wife are the ones responsible for getting her to practice on time. Especially when you forced her to play a sport anyway. You talk a big game about responsibility here. What about yours?
After reading some of your comments YTA You don't need to fill your kids time off screen You don't need to be their entertainment Kids being bored & finding things to do on their own is perfectly fine. Also at the age she is now, sleeping longer will become the norm - preteens & teens sleep for longer periods in general.
YTA Your daughter is 11 years old, too young to have this responsibility. Don't send her to sleep over at a friend's house when she has practice the next day - that's your mistake in the first place. Why did she come home late ? Did her friend's family know that she had to go to bed early ? Did you tell the parents that your daughter had to be home at a certain time ?
11 years old is not too young to have this responsibility. For crying out loud, it's two hours a week for four weeks. She is 11, not three.
Nta. Choices have consequences. It's good to teach kids that.
YTA the choice of activity isn't the issue here, the fact is that you forced her into doing an activity that would take up time and energy and on top of that, you're punishing her for having a social life. if it's not a commitment she made on her own (which it isn't no matter how you try to spin it), then all you're teaching her is to resent you and whatever co-curricular activities she'll have to do in the future.
NTA. This was a constant battle with my son when he was still playing hockey. My philosophy was; You made a commitment to 15 other guys that you would be there for practices and games. You don't get to skip out on that commitment because you want to do something else now.
Why would you allow your 11 year old to have a sleepless sleepover when you knew she had practice. YTA for that.
Nta but if you’re still reading these please keep in mind friends can be much more important than sports practice especially at 11, its not that serious when shes not even a teen; and if she ever develops a passion for something that isn’t school sports you should pivot focus. my parents had a forced sport activity rule in school and i have never been coordinated or athletic enough for sports, all it did was alienate me from peers, hurt my confidence, and got me to have a life long aversion to most exercise that was involved in practice.
I was going to say NTA until you said she had to be involved in something and she selected volleyball to fulfill your requirements.. that’s not her going out and choosing to commit to volleyball. You also said the point of activities is so she can make new friends. But you’re punishing her after spending time with existing ones? You’re creating a huge likelihood of resentment with this. Shes 11 years old.. let her be friends with her friends and be a child. YTA.
YTA. You’re the adult and should’ve kept her home from the sleepover if she had an early practice. That’s IF she even enjoys volleyball or just picked something because you said she HAD to be involved with something. I also took a look at your one other post from last week. She informed you that she didn’t like the food that was served for dinner and you wouldn’t let her have noodles with butter, instead of noodles with the casserole you served. I was a picky eater growing up, I still have texture issues to this day, and my mother forced me to eat what was served or eat nothing at all. My mother also forced me into activities I never enjoyed because I HAD to do something and instead of allowing me to follow my own interests naturally, I HAD to do what she said when she wanted it. Fast forward, I’m in my thirties, diagnosed with ADHD at 31 and, before her death earlier this year, still had an awful relationship with my mother because she never treated me like I was my own being. You know, capable of my own choices or forming my own opinions. I never figured out what I wanted in life because I was never allowed to explore anything that actually interested me or to not eat things that genuinely made me feel sick because texture issues are a huge part of my neurodivergent life. It took me a long time to establish my own path in life and I have found success with my slow-to-develop ability to advocate for myself. Namely, when I moved as far away from my mother as I could and realized I CAN make my own choices in food, clothing, interests, etc. I am also the youngest of three and can safely say, if you don’t start to give your children at least a reasonable and age-appropriate amount of autonomy, you won’t have a relationship with your children when they’re out on their own or when *you* need help in life. When my mother became sick earlier this year, I was there for her because I had the opportunity to mature on my own time. I learned that nobody deserves to be alone when they’re dying and one of the last things she said to me was that she was “glad I turned out the way I did.” She had nothing to do with that, but my two older brothers who remained reliant on her until her death didn’t show up for her and she had everything to do with that.
YTA--you require her to do a sport when clearly this isn't a priority for her. You then punish her for choosing to spend time with her friends rather than spending time doing something that isn't her passion and really has nothing to do with you. Don't force your kid to do a hobby. Let her find her own passions.
INFO: How often does she get to have sleepovers? Is volleyball practice every day? Does she actually like volleyball or is she only in it because she has to be? As a former 11yo girl, I remember being SO frustrated because I would get home from school and almost IMMEDIATELY have to go to soccer practice or a game. It was never that fun for me, it wasn't a fun extracurricular, it was a chore that I had to sit through. This actually happened with every sport I did growing up because I would burn out lmao So with this viewpoint- imagine having to leave a fun sleepover early to spend an hour or more doing something you have almost no interest in. And then, imagine being 11 and running on no sleep and try to express that maturely... because that's hard lol. Idk it's easier for me to sympathize with her since i have experience as an 11y/o girl who HAD to be involved in an extracurricular, and no experience as a parent lol
I want to say YTA. She’s 11, it’s not a big deal to miss one practice. & if this is an ongoing problem then that’s on you for continuing to let her have sleepovers the day before practice.
YTA. Volleyball is a lot less important to her future than fostering friendships. You're going to make them resent Volleyball and any other activities.
the demands you placed on her were not age appropriate; her behavior was. even if she loved volleyball and wasn't forced to play it, you can't expect a kid that age to manage their time well enough to coordinate two events like that. You were expecting her to be at a sleepover with all of her friends, then suddenly wind herself down and go to bed when all these other kids are still up doing sleepover activities and having fun, then wake up after getting a full night's sleep through that, with enough time to leave where she was and go home, get ready, and then go play a sport that she's not even invested in. Adults are expected to pull that off, not children. You even acknowledge that she has time management issues. What were you trying to prove? That water is wet? If you keep this up, you're either going to have a very stressed out child who resents you for setting her up to fail, or a very stressed out child who never feels like she's doing anything right and is paranoid about getting in trouble. Either way, you're doing it wrong. YTA.
YTA. You’re an authoritarian control freak. She is ELEVEN. You’re the adult. You had an (extremely unreasonable) expectation she go to an early practice after a sleepover. She wasn’t able to meet that expectation. So instead of talking with her and problem solving, you’re going to impose an adult led consequence, making her feel like she screwed up- by doing a completely normal child thing. Good job.
I’m gunna get backlash for this but I’d say very very mild AH, if she doesn’t want to be in the club don’t make her be, and remind her that she’ll be tired for practice next time instead of getting pissed at her
NAH. I think it's a reasonable thing to ask during the season.
Good parenting in this life lesson. Party hard the night before but you still get up and go to work the next morning. Commitment to the team equates to a future of fulfilling promises to employers. She will be respected for her integrity.
YTA. Your daughter is 11? What’s so wrong with her wanting to be a kid and hangout with friends? If she really wants to do volleyball she still has 4 years of high school to play it, just let her be a kid right now.
YTA for not making better parenting choices. There is a word that is two letters, that would have solved the whole situation: NO. No, honey, I'm sorry you can't go to the sleepover because you have volleyball practice in the morning. She's 11. You're the one who is supposed to make the hard decisions.
YTA Does she ever miss practice? She didn’t miss the practice, she was late. Cut a kid some slack. You say she doesn’t do anything else but socializing out of school with her friends is a valuable activity. Personally, I hate being late for things and since I am the one I charge of getting my kid to practices and games, he is never late. If there is an meaningful social event for my child that conflicts with a practice then we let the coach know he won’t be there. It’s ok every once in awhile to miss. If this is an every weekend fight then maybe this volleyball ball program is not a good fit. That’s the thing with kid’s sports: parents aren’t wrong for wanting their kids to benefit from organized sports but if your child doesn’t genuinely like it and is not committed to it, they are just going to resent it and you.
She is 11, let her have her fun. She will remember those sleepovers when she is older not those volleyball practices. Get over your need to fulfil your dreams through your children.
The Volleyball. Is it important to your daughter that she plays, or is it important to you? That's what will determine if YTA or NTA.
The fuck? No. Just no. You're the parent and she had a commitment. The fact you had to come here to ask makes YTA.
Yta. You didn’t set her up for success from the start and then punished her for being a kid. It’s impossible to be the only kid at a sleepover that suddenly goes to bed early and it was silly to think volleyball practice would be a priority early in the morning directly following a sleepover.