‘The adult is lying’: Discomfiting sleepover situation arises when parents try to film a group of teenage girls against their will

Like summer camp nights with s’mores and spooky stories or complaining about piles of homework, sleepovers are often seen as a childhood rite of passage. Many adults have fond memories of the thrill of skipping bedtime and chatting into the early hours of the morning. But there are more and more stories of eerie sleepovers, and that makes parents nervous about saying yes to what should be a regular, fun, and innocent coming-of-age milestone.

TikTok user @unpluggedmoments, who shares Reddit stories to her 337K followers, relayed one story about a woman looking after her 14-year-old niece for the weekend, during which she realized how creepy sleepovers can get. The woman’s niece was going to a birthday sleepover at a soccer teammate’s house. Later that evening, the niece texted, “Auntie can you come pick me up?” She did ASAP and told the sleepover kid’s mom that her niece wasn’t feeling well. The mom said the other girls weren’t feeling well, either. Massive red flag…

When she checked with her niece that she was okay, the niece said, “It was weird, there was a camera in the room.” When the niece put her hoodie over the camera, the sleepover kid’s mom came in and took it off, proving she was aware of it all along. Yikes. The aunt relayed the story to her nieces parent’s, who decided to come home early. They were told by the sleepover kid’s mom that the camera in the bedroom was there for security reasons, but that didn’t sit well with them. All the moms of the various kids decided to go to the police station together and inform the authorities about what happened. The aunt finished her video by saying “Be careful with sleepovers.”

One user said this was “The ending I needed.” Another commented on one of the most alarming parts of the story: the sleepover girls’ mom said she didn’t remember the hoodie incident. As this user wrote, “When adults say ‘I don’t recall’ after a child told on them, the adult is lying!”

This is just one heartbreaking story of sleepovers gone wrong. In 2024, a man put sedatives in smoothies when his daughter had a sleepover. There are so many worrisome moments in this story. For one thing, the mom of the girl hosting the sleepover told the niece she should have said she was uncomfortable and could have slept in another room. I’m sorry, what? I can’t decide if that’s more or less creepy than someone filming a group of teenage girls hanging out together. Other users pointed out that although the mom said the camera wasn’t live, the fact that she knew the hoodie went over the screen proves that it was.

Kristi McVee, who worked for the Western Australia Police, shared a TikTok in 2023 and said “Definitely sleepovers are a no no until children get older.” Although 52% of American adults who answered a YouGov 2023 survey said sleepovers have a “positive impact” on “a child’s well-being,” many have pointed out that parents aren’t so big on sleepovers anymore. Those who are uncertain about sleepovers often bring up terrifying stats, like how in almost 90% of cases, the person who is abusing a child isn’t a stranger.

What makes this story so scary is that the moms knew the parents because their kids had been on a soccer team together for 10 years. Maybe stick to sleepovers at grandma’s house or a trusted relative from now on? Or take this smart idea from Parents.com of a “lateover” or “sleepunder” where kids hang out together and then go home when it’s bedtime. And, no matter what, every child and teenager needs a trusted adult who they can turn to in the event that they notice something off and want to come home right away.