Teenagers are little sh@tes - spy software recommendation?

[northernladuk]

Oh yes the good old school hols problem. Can guarantee my lad also thinks it means 16 hours of playing games and 8 hours of sleep for the next x many weeks.

Trouble is his 16 hours tends to mean 12pm till 4am next day. Not going to happen. Especially with the noise he makes.

Trouble is it really is 16 hours in his head. Therefore, not one second for things like washing, eating, etc.

Time settings on the router make sure no Internet usage at unsociable times happens at our house. Works a treat.

[Old Greg]

Yes an option..... BUT we do try to treat him with a bit of respect and trust if we can.....

Yes he has issues which doesn't help. Out big problem is determining what is caused by his "issues" and what is just bad behaviour. Its the $64K question to be honest.

I don't think spying is the way to go, particularly if he has mental health problems. Be parents and act transparently. Set the boundaries and enforce them. Removing the screens is the enforcement. Explain clearly and calmly what you are doing and why.

[Yorkie62]

Time settings on the router make sure no Internet usage at unsociable times happens at our house. Works a treat.

What he said.

I had the same problem with mine years back (he's now 28 in a couple of months). Eventually they will grow out of it, around the same time they discover beer and women which gives you a whole new load of problems to deal with and an excessively large (mobile/landline) phone bill to deal with when they are phoning the latest facilitation of their male hormones.

A hobby can help. Find out what makes him tick. With mine it was always cars, so I bought a Rover 220 Turbo Tomcat from a car auction which needed some rudimentary mechanical restoration (headgasket, drive shaft rubber boots, brakes, etc.) and we did that together. Actually he did most of the work following instructions I left him, e.g. follow sections 2.14 of the hayes manual to the letter to fix bit Y.

Eventually buy them a one way ticket to Australia. Worked for mine. Far more opportunities out there for a youngster than there are in this country. He now earns more than I do and far more than he ever would back here.

[psychocandy]

I don't think spying is the way to go, particularly if he has mental health problems. Be parents and act transparently. Set the boundaries and enforce them. Removing the screens is the enforcement. Explain clearly and calmly what you are doing and why.

Not planning to do it behind his back. Just going to tell him I will know when hes been on.

Easier than physically removing desktop PC

[northernladuk]

Not planning to do it behind his back. Just going to tell him I will know when hes been on.

Easier than physically removing desktop PC

That's it. Take the easy line when dealing with the problem. That'll work.

Don't want to spoilt it for you but even though he knows you can tell he'll still do it. The draw is too strong.

[Willapp]

Don't want to spoilt it for you but even though he knows you can tell he'll still do it. The draw is too strong.

Not to mention that if he's got any tech savvy and you tell him what you've done, he'll find a way around it. Kids are amazingly resourceful when there's a barrier to them doing what they want.

For the cost of a new router, I'd be buying one which has better controls for blocking access on a schedule. Providing he can't get onto the router interface to undo it, it's the surest way of stopping the internet from working.

[NotAllThere]

After about a million warnings/benefit of the doubt I've had enough of my teenager and his PC usage.

After multiple times where he can't get out of bed for school in the morning, it became obvious he was back on the PC in his bedroom until late at night playing games..

Home school him. Lessons begin in the afternoon. Problem solved.

[GJABS]

If the machine is running Windows 10, then you can set up a child's account as explained here:

https://www.howtogeek.com/225323/how...in-windows-10/

and set the hours when they can use the computer:

[Old Greg]

Not planning to do it behind his back. Just going to tell him I will know when hes been on.

Easier than physically removing desktop PC

How much effort is it really to remove the PC?

[Jog On]

You could find out what game he's playing, if it's an MMO create your own account then grief/gank him till he logs off.