A parent’s first obligation to their child is to raise them to living in society. Nobody in society is going to accept the behavior of your child. He is heading for serious trouble down the road.
A good parent is one that is useless when the child is an adult. Your son is past the age when he should be surviving without your bailing him out. Give youself a chance to become the useless good parent.
I guess I wasn’t “obligated” but he didn’t have the money and was an only child. And believe me, I am far from “independently wealthy”.
I will be repaid for the funeral out of the estate after probate. The point of mentioning it was my son knew I was having to handle all of this stuff and still assumed I had money to cover his desires as well.
My (ex) husband also thinks I am a wuss not to throw his ass out.
Sometimes I do think it would be easier to take if he WERE on drugs. He simply is not. You all don’t know us so you will simply have to take my word that I would know. Not to say that he is an angel and hasn’t come home high a couple of times but an addiction? Nope. Let me just add that my son spends 90% of his time at home, at work or at his Grandmother’s helping her and suckering her to cook for him. Apparently the other ten percent was spent at restaurants and game stop on my dime.
Central Florida, goes to school and lives at home, wealthy friends…
…could he go to Stetson?
I have personal experience with lots of folks from that school, and unless it’s changed since I was also in college, there’s tons of drugs there. There was at my very similar type of college as well, (over-priviledged kids, smaller private school, very clique-y), and let me say that getting good grades had precious little to do with whether or not you were doing them. I got good grades and did drugs like a comet was on its way to destroy the Earth at any second.
In my case it was probably the same type of culture shock that your son is experiencing - suddenly everyone has way more income at their disposal than you, and you want to fit in.
I didn’t have the option of stealing money from my parents, (since they were far away and didn’t really have any), but I sure as hell tried to maintain that wealthy facade just the same. I just worked a lot. (I’m not saying that to sound superior, more to say that I wouldn’t have worked that much if I had other options, but one of them was not appearing less well-off than my friends).
Eventually I found friends who didn’t define themselves by lording their over-priviledged status over everyone else. Sounds like he’s running with the wrong types. Check the drugs first, then check his friends.
Amen. I tell my daughter all the time that the point of parenting is not to produce perfectly happy children, but reasonably competent, self-sufficient, and productive adults.
“Come home high a couple of times”? That’s not OK. I was a good teenager and I managed to hide LOTS of shenanigans. If you caught him a few times, chances are good there were PLENTY of times you DIDN’T catch him.
Are you SURE he’s been at Grandma’s?
Is he stealing from her, too?
Even simpler than that, looks like he’s conning Grandma too, even if is just for eats, which says a lot.
So as not to seem have so little to add, Foxy, please do a little more due diligence. I hope you’re not hesitant because you’re scared of what you might actually find. Whatever truths that need to be faced up to to in order to fix this, it’s better done none than later.
Yup, he is at his grandmother’s house.
My mother (his grandma) is SO unbelievably pissed at him. When she said he had better NEVER steal from her, he looked so hurt and horrified that she thinks he would ever consider such a thing. THAT in his privledged mind would be stealing. HE JUST DOESN’T GET THAT HE STOLE FROM ME. (sorry to shout but it is so frustrating).
And I have no problem with my 19 year old son smoking a little pot so it *IS * ok. I didn’t “catch him”. I just knew that he was stoned just as I would know if he was doing anything harder. I hid a hell of a lot from my folks too and know all the tricks.
I was thinking Rollins
Foxy40, you sound like my mother talking about my brother 10 years ago. Best of luck to you. You’re going to need it.*
BTW, make sure he’s actually attending school. My brother was on academic probation for quite a while before my mother finally caught on, or rather, got the mail before he did.
*No snark intended. You’re in for a rocky road for a while, regardless.
That made me LOL. It doesn’t take much “conning” for him to get his italian grandma to cook for him. It was just a joke.
“Oh, Grandma, there is nothing to eat at our house”
“Ok.” sigh, “I will fix you a plate.” as she take out the pots and pans. She *lives * for that.
Ladies and gents we HAVE a winner.
Ah. Doesn’t change much from my post, unfortunately.
I’m glad I could make you laugh in the midst of your troubles. I hope everything works out.
My mom went through something similar with my next older brother (stealing, drugs, belligerence) and ended up kicking him out of the house a while. It was quite stressful.
You have, indeed, created a monster. And I know tons of well-meaning parents who are also raising self-centered brats. Somehow in this culture we’ve twisted the idea of parenting into “Give them everything they want and ask them for nothing.” We’ve forgotten that a huge part of parenting is preparing our kids for INDEPENDENCE.
I know parents who still pack their teenage kids lunches every day, as if a 15 year old is incapable of throwing together a pb & j sandwich. I know parents who come home from an 8 hour shift, are simultaenously cooking dinner and folding clothes while their son sits ten feet away on a couch playing video games, where he has planted himself all freaking day. He is asked to do nothing. He evens hollers “Hey, mom, can you get me a soda?” and she interrupts her cooking to bring it to him, like he’s some prince.
Forget stealing. What kind of miserable husband is this kid going to make? He can’t cook, he doesn’t know how to sort a load of laundry let alone know how to repair a leaky faucet. He’s never cooked a hot meal for himself. The only thing the kid can do well is: a) school work and b) video games. Well, there’s a recipe for a successful adult.
Listen, you have a 19 year kid who’s never been made to pay the price for his mistakes. If you continue to protect and coddle him, he’s going to keep pushing the limit. That’s what kids do. You’ve made mistakes parenting him. Now you either can learn from those mistakes and CHANGE the way you treat him, or you can continue on with status quo.
You need to make a list of everything he’s stolen from you and present him with a re-payment plan. If he fails, pack his bags (because he most certainly doesn’t know how to do this on his own) and put them on the front doorstep. If he was 17, you’d be in a pickle. But he’s of age now and you have no legal right to keep him under your roof. You most certainly have no ethical reason to keep a thief in your home.
From what you’ve told us over time here, your husband (ex, current, whatever he is now) takes advantage of you, your employees take advantage of you, and your son takes advantage of you (I guess your daughter isn’t old enough to take advantage of you yet, or we just haven’t heard about it yet). Have you considered the possibility that the problem isn’t with everyone else? I am very sorry that your son is a criminal, but if you want him to change, I think the change starts with you.
< total inappropriate hijack >
This line made me almost immediately start singing in my head “Man in the Mirror” by Michael Jackson. 
</ total inappropriate hijack >
I am a dad of a 19 y.o. son. He doesn’t steal, but he begs for a twenty now and then, but I do make him do SOMETHING to get the $20. He is somewhat spoiled by his mom, but she is beginning to see the smugness of his attitude brought on by the cushiness of his current situation. In other words, his days are numbered.
One thing I do realize is that no one else picked up on was his girlfriend. I can hazard a guess that your son may be stuck in an escalating pattern of impressing the girlfriend with restaurants, gifts and other activities that require the money. My son went through that phase with his first girlfriend when he was 16-17 y.o. and she was 18-19 y.o. that was already a high maintenance nutjob that wanted to be wined and dined and entertained. My son started spending his savings account till it went dry, and then started begging for money. She was not nice to him at all, money or no money…but she did dump him when he went broke…and we were all better off for it. What did my kid get in return? A kitty named Johnny, who will remind him of her for the next 10+ years. 
Heh.
Foxy, ask your son if he his spending a great deal of money on the girlfriend and if he feels obligated (read: pressure) to keep it up. That in itself might be the addiction that you may not privvy to, but other posters here are expecting. Good Luck.
And guys, don’t be too harsh on Foxy…she already realizes the hole she dug, she’s looking for a ladder and shovel…she didn’t ask to be beat up with them.
When I graduated high school (late, since I had to make up an English class in summer school due to excessive slacking), my single mom made it quite plain that I had 3 options:
I quit my job as a night janitor after a few months and she was quite displeased. She made me keep track of places I applied at until I got a job at McDonalds. If I had sat around doing nothing I would have been kicked out. And if I had ever stolen anything from her or heard that I was getting stoned she probably would have bodily thrown me and all my stuff out on the street. So I worked at McDonalds until I got tired of slinging fries and going hoarse on the drive-thru, then I went back to school.
On the other hand there’s my mom’s youngest brother, who was allowed to run amok. She never put up with him at her house, so he mooched off his other sisters. He started stealing from them and got into a lot of drugs, even going so low as to steal one of my cousin’s bikes or something and sell it. Last I heard he was doing jail time for drug possession.
Jeebus. Sorry about your troubles,** Foxy**.
Where to start? There’s good advice here. I am not so sure I would be willing to call the cops on my own flesh and blood, either. Having been there (as a spectator) when my parents did so with one of my sisters, I can say that the cops didin’t help anything at all. This sister stole her twin’s identity and ran up credit cards etc. Both twins are now deceased, but the bitterness of what one did to the other remained with the surviving twin until she died herself.
IF I were to allow my son to live with me after all this, it would ONLY be under very strict rules.
All the stuff–the Wii etc gets auctioned off on ebay–the money goes to the Debt.
He gets a job slinging hash or whatever. You get half his paycheck, automatically deposited into your account. (I do hope you have closed accounts and cards etc and put them in a safe place).
Since he has not acted in a trustworthy manner, he cannot be trusted. He must re-earn your trust. This means he must tell you where and with whom he is going, how long he will be gone, how much money he plans on spending–HIS money, btw, not yours, and he must be back at the agreed upon time. No excuses, no explanations. (this is an attempt to teach him the lessons he should have learned at 12-13). He doesn’t like this? He can move out-and make it on a minimum wage etc.
If he borrows your car, he puts gas in it. He also pays into the insurance/maintenance–at 19, he should be able to do this. This will leave him very little spending money.
He must keep his grades up–and you need to be in contact with the school.
Professional help or some kind of support group. This you will pay for (he won’t be able to afford it).
If he ever steals from you again–I don’t care if it’s a stick of gum–out he goes.
Draw up a contract stipulating the above, and have you both sign it.
This is not as harsh as some here would like, and in several ways it is NOT treating your son like an adult. But, IMO, he is NOT an adult. He is an overgrown kid who needs a crash course in responsibility and maturity.
This is what I was coming back to suggest. Collect all the stuff and make HIM sell it on ebay (supervise it, so you know he’s doing it), and set up your own PayPal account to collect the cash.
(Your entire post was great, eleanor!)