What are parents to do when their eighteen year old daughter refuses to obey some basic rules?
A New Jersey couple had decided that if their daughter, 18 year old Rachel Canning, would not keep the curfew that they set, did the household chores the family asked, or ending a relationship with a boyfriend her parents say is a bad influence.
Canning, who has been labeled as “spoiled,”left home Oct. 30, two days before she turned 18 after a tumultuous stretch during which her parents separated and reconciled and the teen began getting into uncharacteristic trouble at school.
In court filings, Canning’s parents, retired Lincoln Park police Chief Sean Canning and his wife Elizabeth say that shortly before she turned 18, she told her parents that she would be an adult and could do whatever she wanted.
Rachel Canning been living in Rockaway Township with the family of her best friend. The friend’s father, former Morris County Freeholder John Inglesino, is paying for the lawsuit.
A judge in Morristown Tuesday ruled against immediately forcing Rachel Canning’s parents to pay her $650 weekly child support and pay for her remaining year of high school tuition, as she requested in a lawsuit filed last week. Judge Peter Bogaard scheduled a hearing for next month to decide whether to require her parents to pay for Canning’s college tuition.
“Do we want to establish a precedent where parents live in basic fear of establishing rules of the house?” Bogaard asked.
Canning said her parents are abusive, contributed to an eating disorder she developed and pushed her to get a basketball scholarship. They say they were supportive, helped her through the eating disorder and paid for her to go to a private school where she would not get as much playing time in basketball as she would have at a public school. They also say she lied in her court filing and to child welfare workers who are involved in the case.
“We love our child and miss her. This is terrible. It’s killing me and my wife. We have a child we want home. We’re not Draconian and now we’re getting hauled into court. She’s demanding that we pay her bills but she doesn’t want to live at home and she’s saying, ‘I don’t want to live under your rules,’ ” Sean Canning said, according to the Daily Record of Parsippany. “We’re heartbroken, but what do you do when a child says ‘I don’t want your rules but I want everything under the sun and you to pay for it?’”
“Mr. and Mrs. Canning did not tell Rachel to move out; rather they advised her that she is welcome home so long as she abides by their rules under their roof, which is completely reasonable,” the parents’ attorney Laurie Rush-Masuret wrote the court, according to the newspaper. “However, Rachel decided that she does not want to live within her parents’ sphere of influence and voluntarily moved out, essentially emancipating herself. Obviously, she cannot decide she will no longer live within her parents’ sphere of influence and simultaneously seek payment from them for support.”
