‘Welcome to Plathville’: Kim Confronts Lydia About Texting a Boy in Exclusive Sneak Peek

Kim Plath and daughter Lydia aren’t on the same page when it comes to the 17-year-old’s budding relationship. In a PopCulture exclusive sneak peek of Tuesday’s all-new Welcome to Plathville, Kim questions her teenage daughter after finding out she’d been sending a boy “100 texts a day,” but Lydia feels she’s been watched a little too closely by her parents.

At 17, Lydia is almost a legal adult, so Kim says she and husband Barry Plath want her to decide “how she handles this relationship,” but also want to “give input” into the relationship because she still lives at home. Sitting her daughter down, Kim notes that her teen hasn’t been talking to her beau since their initial conversation, which clearly is upsetting to Lydia.

“It’s just like when I’m having a not so good day, I remember back when we were communicating and I’d be having a hard day. He would just make it all better,” Lydia tells her mom, who responds, “Well, I feel like you can’t really get to know somebody [on] texting and phone.”

Kim explains to the camera that Lydia’s cell phone is mostly to be used for communicating with her parents, “So sometimes I’ll go on and I’ll just scroll through and see who she’s talking to.” She continues, “That’s how I saw that she was spending a lot of time texting that boy, probably 100 texts a day. Which … that was the red flag that I was like, OK, we need to talk about this. That’s excessive.”

Kim tells Lydia her concern is that she become “emotionally invested” without really knowing this boy, to which the teen responds, “Sometimes I wonder what conclusions you’ve come to.” Kim replies that she hasn’t come to any conclusions: “I just look and I see things. And then I’m like, ‘Huh? What’s that?’”

Lydia tells the camera she feels her situation isn’t the norm for a teenager her age. “As far as I’m concerned, not too many of my friends share their texts with their parents.,” she says, adding, “But I mean, my parents, they have every right to know what I’m up to while I’m living in their house. Sort of.”

Kim asks Lydia, “Do you know him well enough to be emotionally invested in him?” to which she answers, “That’s a good question. When do you know someone well enough?” Kim responds, “To me talking and texting isn’t enough to get there.” It’s clear Lydia doesn’t agree with her mom, telling the camera she feels like Kim “doesn’t fully understand” how well she knows this boy. “[I’m] just trying to think like, if my mom knows exactly where I’m at in this relationship and … I’m really the only one that knows. It’s hard to explain.” Welcome to Plathville airs Tuesdays at 10 p.m. ET on TLC.