I have I think insulted a friend. I suggested her son was missing too much school. He is very immature for his age. While he might be predisposed to this her parenting choices have dscouraged him from learning any responsibility or self reliance. He is now a teenager yet she does everything for him - including walking him to school. She still gets a babysitter.

The part that really bothers me is that she keeps him home when she doesn't want to be alone. He is missing a lot of school. If he doesn't want to go he doesn't have to. If she doesn't want to walk him he stays home. This to me is really serious - for her I think and not just the boy.

This IS very serious. Poor kid. He's being used by his mother to take care of her emotional needs, and it will probably end up having hard consequences in the end for him in the area of social skills, personal responsibility, educational gaps. She needs people to be honest with her. I see this happen occasionally to certain of my students, and those kids are stressed out and pretty miserable. It is so terribly unfair to the kids.

[Open Eyes]

This mother is most likely filling a void that she developed in her childhood. It sounds like she doesn't know the next step to parenting and is stuck. That can happen with parents and these parents can be offended or insulted if they are approached the wrong way about this problem.

If he misses to much school, they will send the police to her house. Other than that, the rest of it is obviously not a good thing and he will probably resent her for it later. I wouldn't say anything else though, there's not much you can do.

Well there is another matter I posted elsewhere that further impacts this making it all highly alarming. I agree about school authorities. However, she lives in a neighbourhood where missing school is rather common place. It is possible the schools have simply thrown up their hands in the situation and can't keep up with calling parents or truancy measures.

I tied in missing schoo when I spoke to her about the other matter. I admit I tend to be passive agressive when broaching difficult subjects. I hinted rather heavily.

As for her mental illness being impacted by this, she is isolating herself. She uses lack of childcare as an excuse. On those occasions the boy is with his dad she hides at home.