Lost all trust with DS age 15. How do I deal with this? I can’t keep him in forever.

[sunshinehappydays]

I’ve name changed for this as it’s quite outing. I’ll keep this as brief as I can but would love some advice for others that have dealt with this as the situation is getting all of us down.
My DS age 15 has always been easygoing, not moody and did well at school. These past 6 months have been a challenge.
Around Christmas I found a box of nicotine pouches in his bedroom when I was tidying. I didn’t even know what these things are but they look pretty awful! When we confronted him he said he was sorry, just doing it to fit in with his friends etc etc.
I had a bad feeling so I snooped on his phone. Maybe I shouldn’t have but it’s done now! I saw videos of him-
•taking nicotine pouches in school two days after we caught him with a box at home
• vaping at a pal’s sleepover
•drinking Maddog 20/20 at a pal’s sleepover
•drinking Buckfast at a pal’s sleepover
•taking nicotine pouches while away for a two night holiday with another friend.
It was awful seeing my DS do all of this. We all
spoke about it. He was crying, said he was sorry and after a long time speaking we said he would have to work very hard to regain our trust. He didn’t meet up with friends for months after that.
He asked to meet friends in town last weekend and we finally relented making sure we tracked him on his phone. While he was away my DH found two more boxes of nicotine pouches in his room with a manufacturing date of Feb this year so obviously bought recently.
How do we deal with this? I have no problems coming down hard on him but I wonder if he’ll just work harder to cover up anything he gets up to. I can’t ground him forever. He’s also right in the middle of his exams so I’m reluctant to so anything that will affect him studying.
The situation is really getting me down. I’m spiralling and thinking he’s going to end up getting in real trouble. He’s really grumpy too as if it’s our fault!

I’m impressed you managed to find a way to snoop on his phone!

He got a new phone and I still had his old phone in a drawer. I knew his passcode so just had a look. He’s changed his passcode now!

He's trying to fit in with his pals. He could be doing a lot worse. At some stage you need to let him go. He will make mistakes, do stupid things etc. Trust him and let him go.

@JacknDianehow can I trust him when he continually lies? To be honest I did the same at his age but phones weren’t invented yet so my parents didn’t know. Thank God!

He's had a few drinks with friends - so? That's pretty harmless. And he's got a nicotine addiction, many of us 90s teens had them by that age too. No point punishing him for getting addicted to nicotine, the stupid act is done and in the past, now he's just doing it because he's addicted. He needs help with that, not grounding.

So you lied at that age??? We all did!!!

So you also lied to your parents but expect him to be better than you / why?

Have you met his friends?

I mean what he’s doing is pretty standard stuff for teens isn’t it? I wouldn’t love it either but what’s the expectation? That he never sees his friends or has a drink?

I think you need to accept some of this is normal teen stuff and think really carefully about picking your battles tbh.

He sounds a decent boy. Pick your battles.

His friends and their parents are really nice. OK maybe I’m being over the top. Thanks for the reality check everyone.

Lying is an important human skill.

I was never where I said I was at 15 and 20/20 was a feature as were cigarettes. The only difference now is that teenagers have trackable phones. (I don’t have tracking on my 15 year old DD’s phone.)

If he told uou to fuck off when confronted I'd be saying something different. But he didn't. He doesn't want to upset you but hes desperate to keep his friends. That's so important at 15.
And chances are they'll change soon anyway as some leave school early, some go to uni etcetc

I love him seeing his friends but feel he’s too young to be drinking. A few of his other friends are into fitness/rugby etc and aren’t interested in drinking. I was kind of hoping DS would be the same.

He’s lying because you’re overreacting. He’s just being a typical teenager. Didn’t you ever try alcohol or cigarettes? Stop reacting so much. That’ll make it seem less alluring to him.

I think you've handled this really badly, particularly with snooping on his phone. He will have lost all trust in you, never mind you with him. You risk alienating him entirely if you continue.

He's not done anything other than the minor daft stuff that teens do. I was certainly smoking at his age, and having the odd drink at parties/with mates.

If I were you I would tell him that I was sorry I'd looked at his phone, which is a massive invasion of his privacy. I would say I was wrong, but that I'd done it because I was worried about him and would go on to say that you are disappointed to find that he's using nicotine/vapes and that you hope that he's going to stop. That' it's a poor choice to make.

And then leave him to it. You can't control him for ever.

I think you're coming down too hard on him, OP, and you're going to make it difficult for him to ask for help if he ever needs to. I know it's a huge shock when they seem to change overnight, but you have to get some perspective. It's not good that he's not seeing his friends. I know the nicotine thing is crap and I'd have a really hard word about that. The drinking isn't surprising really - have you spoken to him about it without getting angry?

@Hatty65 that was absolutely how we dealt with it. No shouting. I just told him I was disappointed and thought he would make better choices.

If it were me I’d come up with an embarrassing nickname such as “Gummy” and then maybe print out a couple of government style pictures of mouth diseases you can get from it and pop one of them on the fridge. Next time he’s got a couple of mates over just make fun of it like it’s something really oddball that he’s doing and just make the general vibes uncool. I feel like this response would completely blow away the elastic response of telling him he can’t do it and just make him think it’s a bit of a weird thing to do in general.

@TFImBackInwe’ve never got angry about it. No raised voices at all. Just big disappointment.

All teenagers lie.

honestly, this is not major stuff. He’s done a bit of drinking and some tobacco.

you need to let go.

We all get scared. Sometimes too much knowledge is a bad thing. Can you imagine your mum being able to track your every move and even worse, read your private messages to your equally daft pals 🙄 😒

Id have died . You should have a word and say sorry, you trust him and you wont go near his phone again. And tell him the dangers of nicotine, although he will know that.

All pretty normal teen stuff. I thought I was going to read about proper drugs or something serious. Agree that you will totally alienate him if you carry on, much better to have a good relationship and him feel he can talk to you if anything serious does crop up. Youll also upset his exams if you carry on with this over the top reaction.

Ok you’re all making me feel better. I should have posted sooner.

Disappointment is a million times worse than anger.
Would you rather he sat in every night with you watching The One Show

Yes but what does his father think?