My son is twelve. He is expressing a desire to have his own email address, which I could easily create for him in yahoo or gmail. But he is also expressing, very loudly, that he does not want me checking up on him. I am instantly bristling at this as I don't know if he is old enough for it yet.

I want to give him his privacy but I know that I am going to want to check up on him too. Is this invasive? Where do I draw the line. If we create an email address for him, he has to have a password, which he is not going to want to share with me. What now?

I don't mind him using my business email addy for close friends - as we do for family - but this seems unacceptable to him.

I don't know where to go from here.