Our 18 year old son tells so many lies we are at the stage we can't believe anything he says. He went out on Monday night was going to be back for midnight and he didn't come back until 8pm on Saturday night. During this time he made no contact with us at all -i only found out where he was through contacting friends of his who asked around etc and texted me to put my mind at rest.
He is unemployed and at college couple of days a week -has made no attempt to find a job and basically sleeps until mid afternoon, gets up showers, eats and goes out with friends until late at night. He keeps saying he will be home at a certain time and I would say 80-90% of the time he doesn't turn up.
When he was around 14 he fell in with a bad crowd took cannabis and dropped more or less out of school. We muddled through and he seemed to improve for couple of years but this last month has been hell again. In between times he has been a bit better but its never been normal and we have never really been able to trust him .
We love our son and are at our wits end -our family is being torn apart and we live with continual fear he is going to go off the rails.
Can anyone please, please help us.

Time to enforce some house rules...

The first,if he is not back by a certain time, he's locked out.

He needs to contact you when is he out or not coming home.

He needs to get a job or do a course,no more free board.

He pulls his weight around the house.

He's 18,he's an adult,he might be behaving like a 12 year old, but none the less, its time to grow up a little,and time for you to cut the apron strings and start some tough love.

He needs to grow up and support himself. Or abide by your rules.
It would be easier to go by your rules.
Friends can be a bad influence. Wish I knew an easy answer, hopefully someone else will. Good Luck.

Thank you for replies so far. I think it just feels as if we are in a living hell at the moment. My husbands family live at the other end of the country and I don't have any other family at all. We have really tried to be good parents, we both have professional jobs and have always put our kids first but we feel as if we have failed with our son. I really don't know if I am strong enough to kick him out, the thought of it makes me feel as if my heart will break. However, I also acknowledge what others are saying about tough love and I just don't know what to do or where to turn. My husband and I are at rock bottom -we have two other children and they have had enough of their brother and feel I always leap to his defence. I suppose they may be right I always look for any good in him and try to get them to do the same but this is getting harder and harder to do. To other parents who have been through similar -how did you cope ? Just how did you keep going and pretend as if everything is normal.

You want to be a good parent, then be a parent, and not a friend or landlord.

Set your rules and if he does not follow, he gets kicked out of the house.

And you defend him againt our other children, what sort of parent example is that, teaching them to be like him so you will hold up for them.
You take his side against the other kids.

I agree mostly with the others, but I think that his lack of motivation and living habits are certainly consistent with pot use. If he is still using, there isn't much you can do about that. But, you can make life a little more realistic for him by giving him adult rules.

I would also enforce a curfew, not allow him the use of the car, if you do, don't do his laundry, and don't pay his cell phone (if you do). Give him notice of these things, in writing if you have to, and include as well a curfew, and an expectation by a certain date that he will either be employed full time, thus paying room and board, or going to school full time.

You don't have to explain yourself. It's your house.

Offer him counselling, a physical checkup if he is willing. If not, expect results with the new rules of the house.

You are not, I repeat, not doing him any favours in not allowing him to grow up and take responsibility for himself. The worst thing you can do is coddle him and allow him to think that life comes easy. The lessons he needs to learn now may turn him into a productive man. If you keep doing what you are doing, expect a 30 year old in your house with no future, and no desire to get one.

Let him grow up.

My 18 year old daught constantly lies. Quits jobs on a whim, goes from boyfrined to boyfriend. Will not come home when she says she will and than doesn't answer her phone. My husband and I have just the one child and I think we did wrong by providing for her in the manner in which we did. She has gotten in troublew with the law but the charges were dropped. I think this was not good for her. She used to be such a nice person . She has been caught drinnking, smoking pot but lies about these issues even when caught HELP please. She has run through all her money and we are not giving her any more. We are done but don't know what to do

M

Sounds like we are going through the same things right now. I too have an 18 year going on 12. In the past 2 years he has been in trouble with the law for smoking pot in school, graffiti at a school, underage drinking, running from cop. He got kicked out of votech school. Was told that he would have to repeat another year of high school due to failing this year. They told him it was in his best interest not to come back. So he got his GED. He went through the motions of going to community college just to get off probation early. He lost 75% of the tuition when he quit a few weeks ago after not even opening a book. He quit his job recently because they were going to fire him. He lies, steals, and manipulates people. He smoked synthetic drugs while on probation too avoid being caught in urine testing. He is using again. He too goes out and then does not come home for days. Last night after round 4 of this behavior I texted him that he is not welcomed to live at our home anymore and that he should come and pick up his things. He needs to get a job and get on with his life. I then turned off the phone that he has not paid for in months...

Careful about the locking out part. Someone in our town did that and that was the night that a serial killer found her daughter and murdered her. Lesle Mahafee was her nema and the killer was Paul Bernardo.