Full Time RV-ing With A Teenager

Corky12 wrote:
Could you do a summer road trip for several months to get a taste of living that close? We lived in a 27 ft TT from April to August as part of a cross country relocation when our kids were 12 and 14. We had a great adventure but all were ready for more space and privacy by the time school started.

We did a summer in 2014 and came away not wanting to fulltime and longing for home.

We then went fulltime in the summer of 2015 and have been on the road for 10 months.

Strangely, the experiences were different and expected outcomes weren't the same. I don't know how to describe it.

As for the OP- look up the Fulltime Families organization. If you're a Facebook user, they have a huge Facebook group. Lots of folks are doing it with teens.

Could you do a summer road trip for several months to get a taste of living that close? We lived in a 27 ft TT from April to August as part of a cross country relocation when our kids were 12 and 14. We had a great adventure but all were ready for more space and privacy by the time school started.

Ricebug wrote:
I've raised 4 kids, all of them adults now, so I'm familiar with that breed called 'teens.' Well, don't you know, I went and got married after my first wife passed, and now have a girl approaching the teenage years.

While my wife is excited about full time RV living, I'm a little apprehensive, knowing that teenagers are a restless lot. Does anyone out there have teenagers with them on the road? Any advice?

She's told us that she wants to be with us on the road. While she goes to school, we'll hunker down in a park until she's old enough to drive.

Know who your step daughter is through the filter of raising 4 children and make a decision accordingly. Some kids embrace the nomadic lifestyle; some kids, do not.

Our three are 14, 14 and 16. Our motorhome would have to be pretty darned big to fulltime with them.

Who knows? Every kid is different.
But you might figure out a way to roll slow, a way to back out, if she doesn't like the lifestyle.

Check out the websites Fulltime Families, and Ditching Suburbia. The later has been traveling with a teenage girl for 5yrs.

Insist on headphones for music listening, make sure she has unlimited text service, have a teen center nearby and finally a quart or fifth of bourban on hand. The bourban is for the adults.

We've met many families full-timing but the children were younger and they were homeschooled so the families could travel. The places they traveled to were part of their education.

I would think a teenager would have a hard time adjusting even though she thinks it might be fun. Going to a new school and living in a trailer park might generated problems. Why uproot her from her present school and friends?

You said you'll "hunker down in a park until she's old enough to drive". What difference would that make? That would be 16 yr of age. Would you just take off then? She needs friendships and activities at that age and needs to be thinking of after she graduates. Would you just leave her behind?

Personally, I wouldn't do it to a teenager.

We raised our two son's and then went fulltime. Two years later a family tragic event put us in a situation to become custodians of our 1 year old nephew and eventually adopted him. We sold the Class C and settled back down to raise him. Now here we are 15 years later, 5 grandkids and a 15 year old son who is a sophomore in high school. We have a 40" DP now and want to full time once again when he graduates high school and he is going to live with his Aunt and her daughter who is the same age as our son. We tried to get him to do his last three years on the road but he is set against it! Good luck whatever you decide to do!

If you are just going to live in a RV park until the teen is on her own, I see little difference than renting an apartment or even just staying put until she is gone.