strugling parent with text msg question

unless you can get their phone or a court order for the records from the cell company there isn't much you can do. Some carriers let you see the numbers the texts were sent to/received from on your bill. None will show the contents of the messages without a legal order.

If you are truly worried, you can contact your carrier to block texts completely.

 

Skip the eavesdropping (ie: reading the text-messages) and have a talk directly with your kid. It will be better for everyone

 

well, if you pay the bills, you're in control. so ur kid better listen...

 

I agree--I've done this.

 

If you are with AT&T, for example, you just go online, pull up your account and check "voice and data" usages and it will give you every incoming and outgoing call, as well as, all text messages phone numbers both incoming and outgoing of each phone line/number you own. It will not give you what was said in the text message just as the phone calls made and received won't give you a tape recording of what was said over the phone. Having the phone numbers, minutes connected, time and date, incoming or outgoing call tell you a lot. The reason this is available and legal is for you to control and identify what you are being billed for. This, of course, is not legal to do on someone else's phone that is not in your name or under your ownership.

Additionally, go on ebay and search for "bluetooth" sim card reader and it will download all text messages word for word from the target phone even AFTER they have been deleted from the phone itself. This also is legal because it is your own phone and you can use this to upload all of this information into your pc for file saving so you won't have to rewrite everything. It cannot legally be done with phones that you do not own. Maybe once a week or so; get their (yours, on loan to them) cell phone,;upload everything to your computer and read it later. It takes minutes.
As far as their privacy goes; that is, of course, a personal decision of yours and nobody elses' dependent or your own special situation that nobody else knows about or should care about. People that give out advice on "how to be" are usually trying to feel better about themselves. I worry more about the audiences I saw years ago on Springer than the poor fools on the stage. God bless and good luck. Having said that, if they find out, it will take years for them to trust you again. However, you might be able to save their lives or something depending on what is going on.

 

I have to agree 100% with RadioRaiders... talk to your child.

I don't know how old your child is, but if you are truly concerned about your child's well being (and for good reason) then you should not put your child's trust for you on the line by sneaking a peek at their message history, etc... so just talk to your child...

...and while I almost hate to recommend this, if your child would feel more comfortable with communicating over the phone or through text, then maybe that would be a way to do it. Send random texts messages to your child... Ask them how their day is going - what's new in life, etc...

But also, don't be too obvious by trying TOO hard to talk to your child. Just let it be known that they can always come to you with anything they need to talk about -- or, if they prefer they can always text you about anything that's going on.... whatever works between the two of you.

Good luck! I wish you and your child the best!