You need to just buckle down and be independent as soon as you responsibly find the opportunity. You’re right, that no one is going to want to be around someone who gets reported as missing by overreacting guardians.

This is literally something that causes employers and recruiters to not call people back for job opportunities. As unfair as it is, they have an entire pool of candidates to choose from. Why would they willingly pick someone that, from their perspective, doesn’t seem like they have their life well enough put together that their parents/guardians have to make a fuss about it.

I’m not going to touch on the social aspects of it as, given your edit, you seem like you got a solid enough head on your shoulders. I will, however, emphasize the social/professional aspects of this.

You can feel however you want about whether or not your parents are or aren’t controlling, or whether or not they’re overstepping their bounds. However, as you just experienced, other people are going to have their say too. This is only the first time, and your grandparents have made it clear that they are going to do it again.

This is abusive behavior, and it will cause you to lose friendships, relationships, and professional opportunities, as your grandparents attempt to control your life through hyper vigilance and, potentially, outright lying to other people.

Ultimately, that’s what this boils down to. You grandparents lied to authorities in an attempt to control your life. Your mom, and you, aren’t people with lives and autonomy. You are possessions to be kept, protected, and displayed.

What happens when you turn 18? What happens when your college classes and responsibilities force you to stay out past what your grandparents consider acceptable? What happens when you’re applying for your first job, and you’re still living with them?

Heaven forbid, what happens after you move out, and your grandparents still have access to your information as a form of maintaining contact, but they instead use that to intrude upon your life wherever you go?

Will they call your job when you’re 25 and report you missing? Will they report your future fiancé for abducting you if you happen to go on a vacation to a place without cell phone service?

These might sound like exaggerations, but you just experienced 12 calls from the sheriff’s office, a call from your former high school, multiple calls from friends and family, and a bombardment of unknown numbers for not being home for 8 hours, and in spite of the fact that your grandparents could have literally just woken up your mom first to check.

I’m not saying “freak out”. I just want to emphasize that you’re making plans to go to college, and that is literally only going to make this problem worse, and it will likely continue getting worse until you make yourself independent, and likely cut off your grandparents, because they literally said they are going to make this an ever increasing problem for you once you turn 18, and beyond.

When people tell you who they are, listen.

Your grandparents plainly stated they are going to leverage at least this level of control over your life no matter how old you are.

This situation will very likely not get any better for you, and it’s going to be up to you to build a life for yourself while fighting against your grandparents’ efforts to control and possess you.

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I observe two types of 80-year old people.

Ones who have seen it all and are very chill.

Ones who no longer pretend to give a fuck what anyone else thinks.

My suggestion is when you are 18, MOVE far, far away....

i’ve actually been planning on changing my name for a long time because i don’t like the past being tied to it. it’ll definitely be freeing to do. gritting and bearing has been my tactic for a long time but as i get older i get more explosive towards them and when i walked in the house this morning, not a word has been spoken since.

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You are a walking 🚩. Poor girl.

I would say that usually these people do escalate until they get a response from you. The trick is to grit and bear all of that until they stop. They have to truly believe that they will not get a response from you no matter what they do.

One option might be changing your name?

it was around my age, i believe. it’s been on and off her whole life but she’s tried for me as best as she can. we argue sometimes but it’s never been serious and i trust her just as much as she trusts me. she was a young mother from a bad past and got into some unsavory things. she’s trying her best even now and i’m really proud of her but my grandparents feel the need to kinda shove her nose in shit every day, if you get what i mean.

I had a similar thing when growing up. Mostly it was "When the streetlights come on, it's time to come home." Typically that would be around 7-8.

If it was a specific time, we (my brothers and I) would periodically ask for the time from one of our neighbors or when one of our friends went inside.

This was a time before everyone had cellphones.

I would guess they had to do similar things.

Rage bait. How adorable.

Holy fuck dude, please stop. Clearly she doesn't like what you're doing and you're doing it anyways. Forcefully undressing her? Forcing her to do what you want with the threat of breakup? This is incredibly manipulative behavior. What kind of right do you have to decide if she wants to dress in jeans and sweatshirts?

If you love this woman, you need to apologize right fucking now, the things you've already described are incredibly bright red flags. Seriously, it is wrong to keep treating her like you have been.

Wtf is wrong with you? If you don't like the way someone is, then don't date them and scare them. It's none of your business how she likes to handle herself, and you should never force her to do anything that she isn't comfortable with.

You're absolutely right. Most of it is bluffs and thankfully I've come to realize that as well, but the time and energy spent verifying and fighting them is exhausting. It's amazing how much time and money they've sunk into messing with her life but as retirees who owned their own restaurant they sure have a lot of both.

Yes, they are. Admittedly for when we did it, it was for a young child, but there's no real limit if you reasonably believe someone is missing, as far as I know.

But she did tell her parent. Grandparents didn't bother to ask her mom

I wonder if it would be possible to go talk to a cop about the situation and see if the cop would be willing to sit down with the grandparents and explain this to them. There certainly are reasonable cops out there.

If you don’t mind me asking, when did your mom’s drug abuse issues start? Was it around your age?

Nobody wants to be around your grandparents either if they air everyone's laundry out like this. God they have no shame

No, because she's now making false police reports. Not a good idea.

I presume you were.... Very Little Contact and not a media player for 7-8 years?

There’s no reason to be embarrassed for another person’s action. I know it might seem like The Most Important Thing In The World but other people are going to forget about this in maybe a week, and if anyone asks you can tell them the truth and say that they decided you were missing because you were gone for 2 hours. I’m sorry you have to deal with this (it sounds exhausting) but don’t stress yourself out further by concerning yourself with other people’s opinions when they’re honestly, and in the best way, not really thinking about you.

She doesn’t want to rock the boat. Afraid of conflict.

There’s a book called “set boundaries, find peace” you might find helpful. Very how-to/example-oriented.

You didn’t fuck up at all. And now you have learned to set very clear boundaries with these people. They can call the cops all they want. That doesn’t mean you should stop living your life. They are the fools.

On the bright side at least they care what happens to you.