I'm 16 years old and I want to move in with my 18 year old SO, am I allowed to decide this for myself? What can my parents do against this?

Question

I want to move in with my SO who is 18 years old and has his own place. My question is basically: When I run out of my home, what can my parents do against this?

• Can they "force" take me from his place?
• Can I decide they aren't allowed to touch me or force me to go to another place?
• What can they do against my SO?
• Will my SO get in trouble, if yes what kind of trouble and how to mitigate that?
• Can my mom / parents call the police against my SO and force them to take me from him?

My parents are split. I live with my mom, and I can't live with my father because he is just as bad. The problem with my mom is that she doesn't cook meals, doesn't give me any money to buy food and yells at me for asking for food when I'm hungry. I don't eat much and I'm very skinny due to that, last year I was in hospital because I had severe anorexia. I'm recovering and my mother still calls me fat and always complains about everything I do. Sometimes - but that doesn't happen as often anymore - she hits me. My SO is very supportive and I need him, I want to be with him, I want to solve all this misery. I tried getting help via GGZ / Jeugdzorg / Kinderbescherming / School but my mother acts to the world like she is the perfect and good mother and she manipulates everyone into believing I am just complaining and that she does help me and that she is good for me. No one believes me. I need a way out, desperately. Help me, please, what can I do? My SO does everything to help me and make me happy, he is there for me, always, he is the only one I can go to, I can't wait for help from Jeugdzorg / Kinderbescherming because they think my mother is good and they won't put me into 'Woongroep'. My mother is just abusing me mentally every day, also calls me names, almost every day and anything I do is wrong - I wanted to make homework with the help of a friend of mine and called on skype at around 21:30, she wasn't even in bed but told me to go sleep and hang up (well told? shouted very hard angrily) and I couldn't make my homework. I told her this and she yelled even more. I also can't make too much noise in the night because she can't sleep then and yells at me for it - but when it's 1 a.m. and I need to be up for school the next day and I say I want to sleep, she yells at me and calls me names. I am also seeing a psychologist and I tell him everything, talk about these problems and my mom also talks with him, and they keep e-mailing each other, and even my psychologist is convinced that my mother is good and even managed to tell him that my SO is bad influence on me, when all my friends tell me I changed for so much better after meeting him! They try to separate me from my SO now, not going to happen. No one except my age relatives / friends believe me and we can do nothing about it (my best friend even really saw how my mother is, and her mother knows that too - how bad my mother can be). Please help.

Answer 1

Under the Dutch Civil Code article 1:245, "All minor children are subject to authority". Article 1:247 says that "Parental authority comprises the duty and right of the parent to care for and raise his minor child". This basically means that parents have the right to exercise authority over their children (until age 18). Art. 1:249 says that:

A minor child must observe the rights and powers that are granted to his parent or guardian in connection with the exercise of authority and he must take into account the interests of the other members of the family of which he forms a part.

There are some exceptions, under Art. 1:246, people who cannot exercise authority over a minor:

...minors, adults who are placed under guardianship and persons whose mental abilities are so disturbed that they are unable to exercise such authority, unless the disturbance is temporary.

As for the latter, that is a determination that would have to be made by the court. Death and divorce of parents add complications.

There is also subsection 1.14.2.2a, about emancipation of an underage mother, where a mother 16 or older can request emancipation

...to care for and raise her child under the right to exercise authority over it

and then

The Juvenile Court may award the request only if it thinks this is in the best interests of the mother and her child. If another person was charged with exercising authority over the child, then the emancipation of the underage mother has the result that she as of then shall exercise this authority exclusively.

Under §1.14.4, the court can also order custodial control of a minor

If the moral or mental developments of a minor or his health are seriously endangered and other measures to avert this danger have failed

But such control is given to a Foundation under Art. 1(f) of the Youth Care Act (not an SO).

Under Art. 1:266

Provided that this is not contradictory to the interests of the children, the District Court may remove a parent from the right to exercise authority over one or more of his children on the ground that this parent is unfit or unable to comply with his duty to care for and raise his children.

Art 1:269 is more specific about grounds for depriving parental authority. Insofar as they have apparently denied your request under §1.14.4, that is about as far as one can go.