Leaving home

Some tips to try

Short pieces from the library, and a first thing to try from each.

• The GP, the Medicines and the Vaccines Before Your Child Leaves. The GP, any regular medicine and two vaccines are easier to sort out while your child still lives with you.
  • Help your child register with a GP near where they’ll live, in their first week.
  • In the summer before your child leaves, sort out three health things with them: where they’ll see a GP, how any regular medicine will reach them, and whether their vaccines are up to date.
  • If your child takes a regular medicine, work out before they go which surgery will prescribe it, which pharmacy they’ll use and how they’ll order it. Let them order the next repeat themselves while they’re still at home: through the surgery, or in England through the NHS App, which anyone aged thirteen or over who is registered with a GP can use. The NHS suggests ordering up to five working days before the medicine is needed. If a specialist team started the medicine, ask that team how it will continue after the move. If it runs out while your child is away, a pharmacy can supply some medicines in an emergency without a prescription, sometimes for a charge.
  • If your child becomes physically unwell, or runs out of a medicine, and their surgery is closed, there is an urgent advice route wherever they are. In England, Scotland and Wales, call 111. In Northern Ireland, contact your GP surgery during surgery hours, or your regional GP out-of-hours service when the surgery is closed. For a life-threatening emergency, call 999.
  theparentbook.com/quick-tips/the-gp-the-medicines-and-the-vaccines-before-your-child-leaves
• When a Friend Is Very Drunk or May Have Been Spiked. Most of what a student needs to know about drink and spiking is how to look after a friend.
  • Tell your child that suspected alcohol poisoning means an ambulance, not a lift to A&E. Call 999. Help is free and available at any hour.
  • Tell your child that suspected spiking means medical help early, and a report to the police.
  • Alcohol poisoning can look like confusion, being sick, slow or irregular breathing, pale or blue-tinged skin, a fit, or passing out. If your child thinks a friend has alcohol poisoning, your child should call an ambulance, and not try to take the friend to A&E. Call 999. Help is free and available at any hour. The person who answers will tell your child what to do.
  • Spiking is a crime, and it isn’t the fault of the person who was spiked. The Home Office lists the signs as confusion, feeling or being sick, hallucinations or paranoia, poor co-ordination or vision, difficulty speaking clearly, and memory loss, so spiking can look like being very drunk. If your child thinks they or a friend have been spiked, your child should get medical help, ask the venue’s staff for help, stay with the friend and report it to the police early, because some drugs leave the body in under twelve hours.
  • If your child, or a friend, may have been sexually assaulted, a sexual assault referral centre gives medical care, including emergency contraception, and can take forensic samples, whether or not the assault is reported to the police. It is best to go as soon as possible, and the NHS website finds the nearest centre.
  theparentbook.com/quick-tips/when-a-friend-is-very-drunk-or-may-have-been-spiked
• When Your Child Wants to Leave the Course. Doubts about a course usually pass, and a break may be possible, so nothing needs deciding in the week your child tells you.
  • Ask what has happened and what they want instead, and decide nothing that week.
  • If low mood is part of it, the university’s wellbeing service and your child’s GP are the first doors, and you can tell either of them what you’ve seen.
  • If your child tells you they have hurt themselves, or talks about not wanting to be alive, act that day: help them ask their own surgery for an urgent appointment, or help them call the crisis line from where they are. England, Scotland and Wales: call 111 and choose the mental-health option. Northern Ireland: call Lifeline on 0808 808 8000. Help is free, confidential and available at any hour. Whoever answers may share information to arrange care or keep someone safe.
  • If your child is badly hurt, or may have taken too much of a medicine, get medical help straight away, even if they seem well. Call 999. Or go to your nearest A&E. Help is free and available at any hour.
  theparentbook.com/quick-tips/when-your-child-wants-to-leave-the-course

The rest of each tip, with more to try and why it works, is in the library.

Something to do together

Five things to learn before they go. In the last year at home, your teenager learns five things they’ll need when they leave, one at a time, in the order they choose.

What it is for. Before they leave home, a young person needs to be able to feed themselves for a week on a budget, keep track of their money, register with a GP and order a repeat prescription, find contraception and sexual health services, and get home safely at night. If your teenager learns them one at a time while they still live with you, any mistake happens while you’re near enough to help put it right. The list stays useful after they have gone: it is what you can help with from a distance, when your child asks.

• The first step. Write the five things down with your teenager: feeding themselves for a week on a budget, keeping track of their money, registering with a GP and ordering a repeat prescription, knowing where to go for contraception and sexual health, and getting home safely at night.
• For the GP, let your teenager book an appointment and go in on their own; the activity “Their first appointment on their own” goes through it in stages. For a regular medicine, let them order the next prescription themselves. For sexual health, look up together where the nearest service is, and leave the rest to them.

Safety. If your teenager is very drunk, stay with them and don’t leave them to sleep it off alone: they could be sick while drowsy and choke. If you think they have alcohol poisoning, call for emergency help, using the routes under “If you need help right now”. Spiking can look like being very drunk, and some drugs leave the body within hours. If you suspect it, get medical help early and report it to the police. The person who was spiked is never to blame.

When to get help. If your teenager or anyone with them is hurt, very drowsy or confused, unconscious, or may have been spiked, use the routes under “If you need help right now”, at the foot of every page, straight away. If your child has hurt themselves, or talks about not wanting to be alive, stay calm, thank them if they have told you, don’t promise to keep it secret, and act that day: help them ask the surgery for an urgent appointment, and if it is closed, use the routes under “If you need help right now”, at the foot of every page. If your child tells you that someone is hurting them, stay calm, thank them for telling you, don’t promise to keep it secret, and act that day, using those routes; if the person hurting your child lives in your home or your child’s other home, go straight to children’s social care or the police. If your child is badly hurt, or may have taken too much of a medicine, get medical help straight away, even if they seem well.

The other four steps, and your part in it, are in the library.

If you want to read further

• When They Leave Home. For parents whose child is about to leave home, or has just gone, for university, an apprenticeship, a job or a year away. theparentbook.com/reader/when-they-leave-home

Worth your time

• A book for you: You and Your Adult Child, Laurence Steinberg. Steinberg turns to the relationship between parents and children over 18, covering university, returning home, money, partners and mental health, with a steady emphasis on respecting adult independence. uk.bookshop.org/p/books/you-and-your-adult-child-how-to-grow-together-in-challenging-times-laurence-steinberg/5f68aba394da56db
• A book to read together: Anxiety at University: A Pocket Guide, Dr Dominique Thompson. A pocket guide by a GP who led a large university health service, on recognising anxiety, looking after yourself and getting help once away from home. Useful to pack with a student heading off. uk.bookshop.org/p/books/anxiety-at-university-dominique-thompson/f7cfacbde8d14431

Who else can help

Your child’s own GP, near where they live, is the first call for their health, and at university the wellbeing service is the next; NHS 111, or Lifeline in Northern Ireland, is the line for a mental health crisis that can’t wait, in the nation your child is in; while they are still at school or college, the school or college knows them best; and MoneyHelper can help with money worries.

• Your child’s own GP. The GP near where your child lives, who can see them, prescribe, and refer them on. From eighteen your child books and goes on their own, and the surgery needs their agreement to tell you anything. If you’re worried, ring the surgery and say what you’ve seen. It can listen even when it can’t tell you anything back. www.nhs.uk/service-search/find-a-gp
• Your child’s university wellbeing service. The service most universities run for students’ mental health and wellbeing, usually with free counselling a student can refer themselves to. When your child is struggling at university. They refer themselves; you can tell the service what you have seen, even if it can’t tell you anything back.

• UCAS. UCAS’s pages for parents on applications, results day, Clearing, apprenticeships and the alternatives. From Year 11 onward. Information, not advice. University admissions is the main focus. For apprenticeships in depth, apprenticeships.gov.uk is fuller. www.ucas.com/discover/advice-for-parents-guardians-and-carers
• YoungMinds. The UK’s young people’s mental health charity, with a free Parents Helpline, webchat and email, and a plain A to Z of the things parents worry about. When you want to talk through a worry about your child with someone who has heard it before, or read a clear first explanation of a named concern. Not a crisis line. Parents Helpline 0808 802 5544 · Mon, Thu, Fri 9.30am-4pm; Tue, Wed 9.30am-6pm · Webchat Mon-Fri 9.30am-4pm; email parents@youngminds.org.uk · Outside those hours the parents line is closed. The urgent routes on this page are open when it is not. www.youngminds.org.uk/parent/parents-helpline
• Coram Family Lives. A free, confidential helpline for any parenting or family worry, by phone, live chat, WhatsApp or email, staffed by trained family support workers. When you need to talk it through with someone, about your child or about how you are managing, and you do not need a specialist to do it. Coram Family Lives helpline 0808 800 2222 · Mon-Fri 9am-9pm; weekends 10am-3pm; closed bank holidays · Live chat and WhatsApp 07441 444125 at the same hours; email askus@coramfamilylives.org.uk · Outside those hours the line is closed. Samaritans answer at any hour on 116 123, and Shout answer if you text the word SHOUT to 85258. www.coramfamilylives.org.uk/how-we-can-help/confidential-helpline

The full list for leaving home, with what each organisation does and when it is the right call, is at theparentbook.com/help/leaving-home/services