Yes, you heard it right. I bought my daughter a phone at age 11. Before you get the pitchforks out I have a very good reason. And for the record, it was never my intended plan to get her a phone. Seriously, I thought that she would not be getting a phone until high school but circumstances don’t make that possible.
I couldn’t have even fathomed the idea until this year when I realized that most likely my daughter would be walking home from middle school (that’s another post for a later date.) Yes, kids in New York City walk by themselves by middle school. In fact, there were many kids from my daughter’s school who started walking to and from school in fourth grade. That’s age 9-10, yikes!!
Making the decision to get her phone was not difficult enough but let’s face it, I had no interest in paying another bill to my already long list of bills. If you can believe it, my original thought was to give her my iPhone 4S when upgrade to the new iPhone 6 (when the hell is that thing coming out). I thought hey why buy another phone when I have one already thus saving me money.
A friend reminded rather brusquely that what is the cost if she loses the phone telling me her son who has to take the bus to his private school in Brooklyn has already lost his phone twice in a year.
“She only needs to phone or text you, period? And she was right.
After much searching, I bought a cheap phone albeit a colorful phone, not an old school flip phone like I had imagined through a phone service that can blocks calls during certain periods of the day and she can only call and receive calls from a list of people that I enter online, all for $25 month. Mind you there was a cheaper option but I opted for the unlimited texting option.
We shall see how this works out. At the end of the day, I will only be out $80.
A what age did you buy child a phone? And which carrier did you use?
