My grandaughter has nearly caused me to have a heart attack.

It is the nature of the beast! Teenagers' brains are wired differently. I can remember being extremely lazy and selfish when I was 15. My mother worked full time and had to do the laundry for six people on Sunday mornings. She also cooked a full Sunday roast dinner. She would ask me to get out of bed around noon and go to the shop, which was about 200 yards away,and I am ashamed to say I often refused. Once I got married at 18 I became a full human being and started to take my mother on holiday every year - I don't know why she put up with me the way she did when I was younger.

Its the sheer thoughtlessness of the young that amazes me. Perfectly nice kids on the whole but bloody thoughtless.

Both my daughters have had this problem with one or more of their children - once they get gossiping to their friends they just lose track of time.
Mind you, when my girls were in their early twenties I bought them a pair of semi-detached houses. They spent all day together with their young children but they still spoke on the telephone nearly every evening.
I grew up at a time when only the rich or businesses had phones, so I have never got the phone habit. My mobile is strictly for emergencies and I am just learning to chat on my landline because I get free calls to NZ and England.
One of my GDs is so proficient at texting she can send messages to her friends with her phone in her pocket! I am astonished by how quickly they can all send texts. How on earth did we all manage to have full social lives without phone/computer?

annika we had something similar years ago when DD was teenager in the end when DH and I went out we unplugged the phones in the house and put them in the boot of the car and took them with us,end of problem but sometimes I think that youngsters do not have any idea of the cost that they are running up at the time,only yesterday DH and I where talking about when ours where at school and they had money management lessons but they don't seem to do that in DGCs senior schools now and the little darlings are under the impression money grows on trees.DD is now dealing with similar with her DSs so it is pay back time I think ?

Thanks all for replies.
GD has now returned after seeing her mother, very subdued.To think that earlier today I was praising her for helping to make her younger half sister a costume for World Book Day.She can be good when she wants to!.

Before there was such a thing as mobile phones my DD ran up a big phone bill for me by ringing her friend at night while I was busy getting the family a meal.
Now this was a friend of hers that she saw every day at school so plenty of time to chat then I would have thought. But thats not all, her friend lived next door to us !!! Was it too much to have expected DD to walk out through our front door and down the path and then up the path to her house and knock on the door to speak to her ?

One of my daughters had a similar shock when her then 14 year old daughter`s mobile phone bill was £399....................for one month!!!! She did get a limit put on the phone after that, but it was like locking the stable door after the horse had bolted!

Some contracts will limit spending and alert you if you exceed the agreed limit, but it might be too late for that if she's never going to get her hands on your phone again. Kids, eh?

Now I know where you are coming from with this ...for me it was a gs taking money from my purse.
And I don't mean small change!!
It took me ages to work out what was happening ...as to start with thought I'd just mis-calculated.

I'm very sorry you've had to deal with this ...especially as you were/are trying to be supportive of your grand-daughter.