Children can sometimes be a terror, so raising them can be challenging. With play dates and new friends, relationships can often be tested. There's always that one friend that no parent likes and for good reason. In this piece, parents reveal why their kid's friend is banned from their home forever. Keep in mind, stories were edited for clarity.
A Spray Bottle Of What?
“He was a complete prick with no respect for adults.
I should emphasize this kid is also 5, and slightly younger than ours. This child’s mother let my son and hers go in the backyard with her 13-year-old to watch them. He filled the spray bottle up with bleach secretly without anyone knowing apparently and took my son behind a shed, held him down, and sprayed him.
When my son started screaming, that’s when the 13-year-old sister realized something was up. He was drenched in bleach, his skin was irritated all over from it. I told the mother he would never be allowed over there again. His mother was crying saying she couldn’t control him. My wife and I were shocked as we didn’t anticipate anything like that could happen on a play date.
Our little guy is very sensitive and took it very hard. He told me when I was taking him to school that he didn’t want to play with him anymore and that he’s not a nice person and makes him cry.
A few days later he walked down to our house by himself one day, and I told him he is not welcome in our house. He asked why, and I told him because he does bad things. I then walked him back home, no one in his house knew he had left. I told his mom that our child would no longer be playing with him, she said that I was being over dramatic and that they were just kids. I told her that if she thinks this is kid behavior, she was in for a rough life when he gets older and reminded her she said herself that she couldn’t control him, and he’s 5. What does she think is going to happen as he gets older? She didn’t say anything. I told her to let her son know to not knock on our door again.”
The Little Thief
“One of our friends has a granddaughter who was treated horribly by her parents. They ignored her and just locked her in her room.
When she was young, it wasn’t that bad when she came over. She would act out from time to time but she was just so happy to be somewhere else and you could tell. It made us feel wonderful that we could provide that, and we did so often. We tried to basically make our house a second home for her.
However, as she got older, she started acting out more and more. It reached the point when she was 7, that she was stealing money from our child’s piggy bank. She got into my wife’s purse and stole money. We then caught her stealing toys to take home with her. She would run around saying ‘eff you,’ ‘eff jesus’ and all sorts different ways to say that word. We’d take them the park, and she would get into literal fist throwing fights with other kids.
These sorts of things started happening every time she was over. It went from ‘We feel so great that we can give her a break from her troubled home life’ to ‘sorry but, she can’t come over anymore’ and we felt awful. But, she had turned into a literal terror and nothing we tried would get out of it. The turning point was when she smacked our youngest across the head with wooden toy, and he needed to get stitches.
We tried to get CPS involved but, they basically said ‘As long as she’s going to school, getting fed, and not being physically or abused some other way, there is nothing we can do.’
Last I heard she is in prison for assault and illegal substance charges.”
That Was Not Wrestling
“I was a situation that set off my early warning senses. We were staying at the house of the daughter of my in-law’s friends. She had a 3-year-old son. My daughter was 5. They played well together, but I got some weird vibes that told me that my daughter shouldn’t be crashing in the living room in a sleeping bag. I had her sleep with my wife in the guest bed while I slept on the couch. I kept a close watch on the kids the rest of the evening.
The next day as we were leaving, the 3 year-old basically tackled my daughter (he was big, she was very small), and tried to mount and hump her on the floor. I extracted her and told him that wasn’t appropriate. My daughter laughed it off as him trying to ‘wrestle’ with her. Once in the car, I told my wife under no circumstances would our daughter ever be allowed back in that house, ever. She agreed.
We later learned that the then-boyfriend of the woman with the son used to let the boy watch hardcore x-rated videos with him. The mom found out when CPS got involved.”
What A Goof
“My son started public school after going to Montessori school in 4th grade. I met another mom whose son started from private school the same year. My son was weird about befriending her son and I wasn’t sure why. Shortly into the friendship, the single mom started asking if her kid could sleep over every Friday. I was fine with that. Then it became school nights. Not so fond of that. Her son started showing up at 6:30 am before school when we were all still sleeping. My son made other friends and just tolerated friendship with her kid. We explained that his home life wasn’t great and he didn’t have anyone most of the time.
Halfway through the following school year, the kid brought a knife to school and pulled it on my son. The school did nothing (Baltimore) so I contacted her to let her know what happened. Her response was that he was such a ‘goof.’ My son was rightfully avoiding him at this point and the mom had the audacity to contact me and ask if we could watch her son for half a school week because she really wanted to go on spring break out of state with friends. She is in her late 30s getting a PhD in psychology. I had to tell her she and her kid were never going to be invited again.”
Disrespectful And Inappropriate
“She was completely disrespectful to our home. After multiple times telling them not to (my daughter is 6, she’s 12. We live in the same complex), she’d constantly leave trash all outside, on our stairs, inside our couch, and on the floor where the baby can reach. She left makeup/paint all over our carpets. She didn’t care. Last and final sleepover, she invited a kid we didn’t know to stay with her, too. I felt bad because the girl was younger. Until it was 1 am and they were blasting music, yelling, and dancing (we live on the 2nd floor)…told them to go to bed.
She started coming over first thing in the morning, staying until late at night. I told her if she was hungry, she had to go home and eat and come back (2 doors down) as we didn’t have enough food to feed everyone (my husband has been out of work and we’re really struggling). She wouldn’t. Whatever snacks we had for our 3 kids were gone in a day.
Come to find out, she ‘wasn’t allowed at home’ while her mom was at work, because her 24-year-old boyfriend was at home. And ‘she’s getting a big chest’ so she didn’t need to be home alone with him. So much wrong with that statement, but true. Just last week, the mom sent her to another state for a bit. My daughter misses her, but it’s been nice not having my place full of kids (she’d bring friends all the time) all day, every single day, and eating all the food we don’t have.”
Will Her Mom Ever Come Back?
“I watched my daughter’s friend, Melissa, for the night while Melissa’s mom went to a wedding. The mom called me the next day to let me know she had flown 500 miles away instead, and I was going to have to watch her daughter for the rest of the weekend. And then she promptly turned off her cell phone.
So here I am with Melissa and my two daughters on a three-day weekend. As fate would have it, this poor girl has a severe case of ADHD and no medication, no clean clothes and no family nearby (Mom had just moved to the area from out of state) that I could call for back up.
This girl literally bounced off my walls for three days and nights. She broke furniture, tore toys apart, wrote on walls, threw temper tantrums… All unacceptable behavior, especially from a 10-year-old.
When I dropped the girls off at school on Tuesday, I notified the office that Melissa had been unmediated for 72 hours. They tried calling the mom immediately, phone was still shut off. They were finally able to contact a great aunt who drove across state lines to pick Melissa up.
I know it’s not that poor girl’s fault. That being said, she can no longer come to my home, because I’m fairly certain her mother will never come back for her.”
Bad Influences
“Towards the end of last fall, my 16-year-old son started bringing a friend over to our house. He’s a nice enough kid, but over the course of this winter, he’s basically inserted himself into our family.
Now he comes over every day after school and spends the night frequently on weekends. He only has his mother in his life, and she’s not home a lot. She’s a whole other story of entitlement. The second time we met her, she asked us for money.
Back to my son’s friend, though; he’s always bringing his issues and dramas with him to our house. Often I feel like his therapist. It would be different if I didn’t also have two young children in addition to my son, but I do and adding a troubled teen to the mix has just been frustrating and mentally tiring.
It’s all come to a head though. He smokes, although he denies it. There have been multiple times I’ve smelled smoke on him. Earlier in the week, one of their teachers caught them both smoking in the dugout at their school.
My punishment for my son was no going out and no friends over for a week. I’m going to also ban this particular friend from coming over. At least on week days. I don’t know yet. I’d like to ban him completely, but I do feel bad. I haven’t fully made my mind up yet.
My husband doesn’t usually come home until later on, so he’s not as bothered by his presence as I am, but since I’m the one to deal with and feed the boy my husband is deferring to me on this. I just have enough on my plate, I really don’t need all the problems he brings with him and now he’s becoming a bad influence on my son.”
A Human Tornado
“My son has a friend in his grade who is not only not allowed at my house ever again, but not allowed at birthday parties, play dates of any sorts, nor do I let my son play at his house. I had never met the child prior to him coming over after school one day. Warning: parents, meet the kids first before you let them in your house! This child proceeded to enter my house, run around screaming obnoxiously for over 2 hours straight. Knocking things off walls, making a mess of everything. More or less a miniature tornado. Then when his parents finally came to pick him up, he barricaded himself under my dining room table, wrapped himself around the base of the chair, and refused FOR ALMOST AN HOUR to come out and leave. I have never hated a child until that demon spawn entered my home. I don’t like the way he acted, and don’t want my son around kids that have no self-control. By the way, this kid and my son are 9 years old. I feel bad for picking my son’s friends but seriously, I couldn’t imagine what madness he would get my kid involved in eventually. My son has since found much calmer, more decent friends to hang out with.”
Irresponsible Mother
“There’s a kid that is not allowed to stay at our house (they must play outside or ride bikes in the neighborhood).
Earlier in the summer, the kiddo in question comes over on a Sunday evening. They play outside for a bit and then it’s around 8:30 pm (school for us had just gotten out and the long days made me lose track of time) and I suggest it might be time for him to go home. He says his mom’s not home, and she won’t be back until 11pm. And even though my kids’ school has gotten out, he still has school tomorrow.
My husband and I are like ooookkkkaay. ‘What if she’s not home by then?’
‘I’ll just find some place to stay.’
Then he asks if he can just spend the night. ‘Well what about your uniform for school?’
‘Oh, we can just stop by and get it.’ So after some deliberating, husband and I decide he is going to spend the night because we want to get to bed (it’s about 10 pm at this time) and we aren’t just going to send this just-turned-8 year old, who has a mom ‘out’ (that was the word he used, not that she was at work) and about gourd knows where on a school night, out into the streets. Our neighborhood isn’t the greatest, and we have had a kid in the past come over who said, ‘Mom says I have to play outside cause she has a friend over and is sleeping.’ It was 11am and the kid was still in pajamas. So this feral boy incident didn’t seem too implausible.
My kids think it’s great that a friend is staying over, and we all go to bed. Flash forward to one something am and there’s pounding on our front door. She’s blubbering and crying that she didn’t know where he was. He was supposed to be at another friend’s house and left.
Then a few days later I get a phone call from the kid’s mom. ‘Hello?’ I ask.
‘Who is this?’ she says.
‘This is Candice, Jace’s mom.’ After a bit, I recognize her phone number from the list of phone numbers my kid’s have been collecting of friends.
‘Is [feral boy] over there?’- she asked
‘No.’
‘Ok bye.’
Apparently he’s out wandering again and, I’m guessing from this exchange, his mom was just dialing all the random numbers she had in her phone hoping to find one who knew where her kid was.
Then a month ago, the kid comes over again. I make sure that he calls his mom to let him know where he is and when we can expect her to pick him up. She says 6. It’s now after 8 and I ask him to call his mom again because we were planning to go out for dinner. She shows up, and he talks to her for 30 seconds and comes back and says, ‘Are you paying?’
‘Paying for what?’ I ask.
‘For dinner. My mom said it was ok if I came, too,’ he says.
‘No. It’s family time now. You need to go be with your family.’
Then a week after that, mom shows up at my door. ‘Is [feral boy] here?’
‘Nope, sorry, haven’t seen him,’ and she leaves.”
A Demon Child
“When my oldest son was 6, there was a girl who lived around the corner who was 8 that made friends with him on the bus. She had her dad come meet us so she could come over and play one day. He was weird, all shaky and nervous looking, like a Chihuahua, told me him and his wife were splitting up, so I chalked it up to that.
At that time, my daughter was just about 3 and shared a room (bunk beds) with my son. The neighbor girl kept telling my daughter to get out, and my stubborn girl said no, it was her room too. It gets really quiet in there (door was open, I was in the next room) so I call out for my son and his voice comes back from sounding very far away. I tell him to come to me, and he comes in all red-faced (sweaty) and mussed. I ask him what they were doing. He said neighbor girl pulled the blanket over them and was kissing him and touching him (inappropriately).
I looked at her and asked her what she was doing, and she got very belligerent and yelled and flat out lied to me, accused my son of lying etc. I told her to go home and that I was going to call her father and talk to him about this. She fled home and in the time it took me to dial the phone, she had told him some story about how we were making up all these lies etc.
My son had no reason to lie, no idea of the wrongness of what was going on. My daughter corroborated the fact that the girl had got into her bed (bottom bunk) with my son and pulled the blanket over them ‘for privacy’ since my daughter refused to leave the room. I believed my children and banned that child from our house. They moved not long after.
The bad thing is, they moved back into our school district a couple of years later, and she’d been held back and wound up in my son’s class. Obsessing and fawning and trying to ‘be his girlfriend’ and being vicious to any other girl who spoke to him or sat by him, etc. When he made it clear that he wasn’t interested, she got hateful. ‘Accidentally’ hitting him, stomping on his feet (he had ingrown toenails), slamming into him, etc. constantly. We had to move his class to try to get him away from her.
She has bullied him for years and the school won’t do anything because, ‘Well, he’s a boy, and he’s much bigger than her, so there’s no way SHE’S bullying HIM, he must be causing it.’
They’re in middle school now, and she’s in one of his classes again. I tell him to be polite but stay away from her, and if she puts her hands on him again, break her. He knows not to hit girls, but no way if I’m going to make him suffer anymore at this psychopath’s hands. We’ve done everything we’re supposed to, he’s ignored and avoided and accepted. And it has gotten him nothing except more abuse.
I pity the guys who end up in this girl’s life down the line. Shudder”
We Wanted To See What Would Happen
“I was in terrible pain due to back issues and was bed ridden for about 4 months (eventually having surgery, but that’s another story). Anyway, my son’s friend came over after school one day. They were both 15 and I did not give any thought to supervising them when they went upstairs to my son’s room.
I had just put on this new device for my back that provided stimulation, like a TENS unit but not exactly, which would run for about 30 minutes. I felt myself doze off for a second, but then I smelled something burning. Oh my gosh, I’m on fire – that was my first thought. So, as best as I could, I jumped out of the bed and started ripping this thing off me. But, as I’m sure you can guess, it wasn’t the device burning. I yelled up the stairs to my kid and asked if he could smell something burning. ‘Nope!’ he lied. I frantically started searching the house looking for something burning, but when I couldn’t find anything, I started marching up the stairs. He and his friend started coming down the stairs at the same time, saying that the friend just got a call from his mom, and he had to go home. So, while my son was walking his friend out, I went upstairs.
There is a guest room up there and that is where the burning smell was strongest. I looked around and saw a bunch of paper torn into shreds laying on the bed. I looked out the window to see burnt pieces of paper on the roof (the window is over the roof above my kitchen) and other singed pieces of paper floating down to my yard.
My son came back in and said that he didn’t want me to freak out when his friend was there, but, they were lighting paper on fire and throwing it out the window ‘to see what would happen.’ What would happen?!?! Yeah, that kid was banned from my house for a long time. His dad is a State Trooper and not the nicest dad to the kid, so I didn’t tell his parents.”
Overreacting At Its Finest
“There was one kid in the third grade. She was over once and while I didn’t like her energy and the stories my daughter brought home from school about her, I try to let them choose their own friends unless there is really an issue. But I’d met her Mom, she is a single mother/nurse, and at the one sleepover, my daughter had to get up early enough to go to church with them. Seems like the Mom is trying to do the right things.
So, weeks later, I hear my kids and step kids down in the rec room, arguing about telling/not telling me something. Turns out, this little psychotic wonder kept calling my eldest child’s phone, asking to speak to my step son. He was in 1st grade and girls were gross, and so he said no. So she called like 17 times. And then started saying if he wouldn’t date her or talk to her, she was going to kill herself.
So on the next phone call, I answered and asked her to put her Mom on the phone. I’m thinking, this Mom seems to be on the same level, maybe she doesn’t know what her daughter is saying, but it’s inappropriate to call us 18 times, and in our household suicide is never a joke. Not even once. The kid starts crying and yells ‘NO GET OFF THE PHONE. HANG UP THE PHONE,’ to me and then I said you can either get your mother or I can drive to your house to talk to her.
Mom is suddenly on the phone. Halfway through my explanation of what her spawn was doing, I realize she had hung up the phone. Now, I am trained in a very effective communication method, and I was employing every method – after all, no one wants to hear when their kid is messing up, so you need to be careful when making a call like that. So, she didn’t hang up because some I was yelling in her ear about, ‘YOUR child is CRAZY and MY children blah blah.’
Kid was banned from our house, not only for pulling that stunt, but because her mother was obviously unwilling or unable to hear about it. I also banned my kid from playing with her at school, and called the teacher to explain exactly why. The teacher was happy to enforce the separation.”