Several months ago, I saw a news article about how old your child needs to be before it is okay for them to be left at home without supervision. The guidelines vary widely from state to state. Interestingly, when it comes to actual laws, most states don’t have a specific age.
I know that it feels like just yesterday that your kids were still in diapers, but for most families, comes the time when it is very reasonable to transition from needing a babysitter.
There are obviously a lot of factors to consider.
Does your kid tend to be responsible?
Are they comfortable being left alone for a bit?
Are there neighbors or resources nearby if needed?
It all brings to mind a true story about a time that I left my youngest daughter Alana home for the first time. Things didn't go exactly as planned.
She was somewhere between 10 and 11.
There was no school that day. It may have been a conference day, but I don’t actually recall. In any event, none of the parents were easily able to take the day off.
We arranged for two of her closest friends Lauren T and Yael to spend the day at our house.
These were very responsible and fairly mature kids. Also, I was only 7 minutes away at the Noe Valley Pediatrics office if they needed me.
All of the parents would take turns checking in. We felt pretty comfortable with the plan.
I was not expecting any issues, so I was surprised when mid day, Alana called me in a complete panic.
To the best of my recollection the conversation went something like this
Mommy, we need you to come home right away!
Is everyone okay?
There was a ghost in the mirror, please come home!
Um, excuse me? Please take a deep breath and tell me what is going on.
We tried to conjure someone and he appeared. There was a 4th set of eyes reflected in the mirror. We all saw this. PLEASE, just come here and we will tell you the whole story
If I need to leave work for something bizarre like this, I am going to be mighty annoyed.
We will do anything. No allowance for the rest of my life. Please come home.!!!!
I tried one last thing.
Surely Java would bark if there was something creepy in the house
(In all honesty, Java, our golden retriever would more likely bring the ghost her ball and ask him to throw it. She wasn’t much of a watchdog.)
Java is already out with the dog walker. She isn’t here. Please come home!
So, I explained to my office that apparently there was a ghost in my bathroom mirror and I needed to leave. Bless them, they were remarkably supportive.
I got home and the three girls collectively flew into my arms.
They tearfully told me what had happened.
MTV had a show called 2together that featured a fictional boy band. If you are in your thirties, you might remember the show. Both of my girls were huge fans. Lauren’s room was plastered with 2gether posters. (Sigh, they are still up there. Her childhood room is where I do much of my writing and it is frozen in time).
In January 2001, the youngest member of the band had died from leukemia.
All of their young fans were devastated over this tragic loss.
So here they were, a month or so after his death.. Alana and her friends decided to create some type of ritual. They went into the dark bathroom, stared into the mirror and chanted his name over and over. Suddenly, at the same time, they all swear that they saw a 4th reflection staring back at them.
This was more than 20 years ago but some memories stick with you.
Lauren T. remains one of Alana’s closest friends after all of these years. Here are her recollections in her words:
It was a Jewish holiday (this is what I remember, but you are probably totally right that it was parent-teacher conferences), and Alana, Yael, and I all had the day off. We were at Alana’s house, and it was one of those gray SF days, where the sun perhaps gave minimal effort to bust through in the morning, but had long since given up before the moment in question.
Michael Cuccione, one of the stars of 2Gether and our mutual tween crush, had recently passed away. We decided to try and contact him through a practice called “Ghost in the Mirror.” In my memory, we were giddy about it, giggling our way to the bathroom, the soft carpet of the Kivowitz’s house on my feet, the coziness of the day still palpable all these years later.
I stood in the middle, with Alana and Yael on either side, their hands in mine. We turned off the lights. I closed my eyes. We started chanting in unison, “Michael Cuccione. Michael Cuccione. Michael Cuccione. Micheal Cuccione. Micheal Cuccione….” All of a sudden, I heard Yael and Alana screaming. I opened my eyes to two bright yellow eyes making their way down the mirror and out towards us. We all scrambled to open the door. It was stuck. We finally got it open and raced down the stairs.
I sat in one of the big living room chairs. My finger was bleeding. Was it because I had nicked it on the door handle…or something more sinister?
I of course remember Judy coming home. Relief, warmth, safety…and I think subconsciously, a sense of understanding. I think back now to what it felt like to have an adult not just hold space for our fear, but also for our mischief, our curiosity…our wonder. It’s a moment that surely changed me, and what an invaluable gift that the adult in the room found a way to both comfort us and also validate us - a line I can only imagine was challenging to toe.
I’m so grateful that Judy didn’t try to explain away the “logical” reasons why this might have happened, like so many other adults in my life.I know what I saw, but more importantly, I know what I felt. And I will never, ever forget it.
For the record, I am not sure that I didn’t try (and fail) to find a rational explanation for what had happened. Also, Alana does NOT remember me being quite as warm and fuzzy that day, but I appreciate Lauren sharing her memories!
And yes of course this story will be included in the book that I am working on.
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If you are at this transitional stage when you are getting ready to let your kiddos stay home alone:
Start small, leave them alone while you do a short errand and see how that feels.
Have rules and expectations set and discussed in advance such as not leaving the house or opening the door to stranger.
Make sure that no one has access to firearms.
Until they are old enough that this isn’t an issue, have safe food and snacks available so that they don’t need to be using the stove or doing actual cooking.
Make sure they know where flashlights are and that the batteries are working.
Have all the phone numbers for emergency contacts written down, don’t rely on a cell phone.
Arrange routine check in’s.
Oh and……absolutely NO conjuring any spirits
Because you never can anticipate everything, as evidenced by this story, you might consider this game/exercise that I did with my kids. It helps your children work on essential problem solving skills.
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I couldn’t help using this photo. Lauren now has an album out on Spotify called Old Haunts and Alana was her ghost.
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