Home alone

It’s the latchkey kid concept taken to extremes: 5- and 10-year-old boys left home alone in San Ramon, Calif., while their parents headed off for a five-day vacation in Las Vegas.

The boys’ father and stepmother pleaded no contest last week to the child endangerment charges filed against them, a move that spares them from prison, but the story raises the question every parent eventually asks: How young is too young to be left alone?

Some parents wouldn’t dream of leaving their kids alone overnight at any age. Others do it with aplomb – and a long list of caveats that starts with “must be 17” and “put the neighborhood on alert.”

It all depends on the kid, said family therapist Marty Sochet, who encourages parents to err on the conservative side. Just because a child is 15 or 17 doesn’t mean he’ll keep a cool head when the grilled cheese catches fire, or the butter knife severs something critical.

“Going away overnight is a really big deal,” Sochet said. “Some parents are concerned about not giving their kids enough freedom, particularly compared to the rights and privileges other kids have. There’s a subtle pressure. (But) in a crisis situation, how much do you trust that that child has the capability to act responsibly?”

Most states do not stipulate how old a child must be before he can be left alone. But social service agencies in North Dakota, for example, rely on state guidelines that say children younger than 10 should not be left unsupervised for more

than two hours during the day, and never at night. Children younger than 15 should not be left home alone overnight, and parents should be cautious about leaving older teens unsupervised at night.

“I think it’s important to be on the cautious side with kids,” said family therapist Margie Ryerson, of Moraga, Calif., “Even though kids are capable of taking care of themselves from the age of 12 on, there are all kinds of situations that could attract problems.”

A 12-year-old has the cognitive development to understand cause and effect, said Lisa Hardy, a psychiatrist at Children’s Hospital in Oakland, Calif. Young teens know an unwatched flame can torch a house, and running bathwater will flood the first floor. They can take care of themselves.

“(But) when you start talking about overnight,” she said, “You’re talking about real security issues.”

Hardy could see a very savvy 14- or 15-year-old being able to care for himself for a single night, with a neighbor on call. By age 16, she said, you’re risking something else.

Solo overnights mean preparing for all the parental nightmares – injury, fire or intruders. Or, the wild partying of several hundred unexpected guests.

“My answer is never,” said Ellen Peterson, who coordinates the Acalanes Drug and Alcohol Task Force. “By the time they are old enough to take care of themselves in terms of cooking food and doing laundry, their friends are old enough to walk in the door with alcohol and other drugs.”

And spontaneous keggers happen to “good” kids, too, said renowned parenting expert Mike Riera, who became headmaster of Oakland’s Redwood Day School last year.

“It’s very important for parents to not be naive about this,” Riera said. ” ‘Yeah, but my kid is really responsible, I’ve always trusted her.’ Wrong. What parents consistently underestimate is the power of the social pull if they can have a few kids over, what that does to their popularity. And how these good kids tell other good kids. Two kids becomes 12 people hanging out and before you know it, it’s a full blown party.”

Riera recommends approaching the “home alone” thing the way one tackles bike riding. You don’t put a kid on a two-wheeler and point him downhill, he said. There are skills to learn.

“You run behind him,” he said. “You have the training wheels.”

Have an aunt or older baby sitter spend the night. The next time, have the teen stay alone, but have a neighbor check in periodically. The prospect of a neighbor coming by at 10 p.m., and again at 11 and first light should deflate any budding kegger.

“You make it hard for your kid to go wrong,” Riera said. “She’ll say, ‘My parents, blah, blah, blah’ but inside she’ll go, ‘Whew.’ “