parenting teens

Oh look, a squirrel!

/ Outrunning my demons / 1 Comment

I had an idea that the teenage years might be hard when my oldest daughter turned 13. We were on the road…my mom was driving and Angel was in the backseat. Angel asked us, “Did either of you have sex before you got married”? I choked on my spit while my mom almost drove off the road.

Oh look, a squirrel!

Awkward silence filled the air..You see, my mom and I never really talked about those kind of things..Growing up, my friends never had those conversations with their parents either.

I remember my mom sitting me down for ‘the talk’ when I was 12. I learned about sex from a friend when I was in kindergarten..I laughed uncomfortably and walked away…it was too late, I already knew..

Paul and I decided to be open with our kids about difficult topics and they have been particularly candid with us. It hasn’t been easy, but it has been worthwhile..

When my kids were young, I thought they would always stay that way. I didn’t understand why parents of teens seemed to forget how much work it was to go anywhere with a toddler or how tiring it was to stay up half the night with a fussy baby..They always said things like…enjoy it while it lasts, soon they will be teenagers…I thought their comments were cold and callous…didn’t they remember how hard it was?

Now I have teenagers and I understand. I feel like I will be the parent of teens forever. I still don’t sleep at night..

I hear empty nesters say…enjoy it while it lasts, soon you will return to a silent empty house..

It was homecoming not too long ago..I took pictures of Alex and his girlfriend Baylee. It felt strange because not too long ago I was at the same location taking pictures of Angel and Mitch…They broke up this year after dating 3 1/2 years. Mitch is now a junior in college..It did go by fast, didn’t it?

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Homecoming

It seems like I was running around the whole homecoming weekend…I sold tickets for the football game and watched my son play for pep band during halftime. Afterwards, I received a call from my son telling me that he appreciated that I was there. Was something wrong? Did he need money?? No, he was just showing that he cares.

I have been upset with him about going to the party in the cabin for so long now that you are all probably sick of the story. Seriously, what teen would give up a weekend at a cabin without adults and with a seemingly endless supply of liquor??

I was angry at the girl that decided to throw a party that trashed her grandma’s cabin until recently. I found out that her parents divorced in June but are still ‘together’. Her grandpa died in June…it was a hard time and her daddy didn’t leave. Her mom got into a bad accident in July and needed help…her daddy didn’t leave..Her mom got better, then the girl threw a big underage drinking party creating so much stress that…you guessed it…her daddy didn’t leave..Maybe I understand her motives now…

My son didn’t have a party at our house nor at his grandparents cabin. He helps my parents with their yard work and turns down the money they offer him.

The other day my son said that he didn’t really care about his grades because this is the only time that he has to be young and have fun without responsibilities. Besides, he said, the most successful people in his life screwed up in high school.

My brother Luke has a wildly successful career. He was a complete screw off in high school, a million times worse than my son..My husband is another, he flunked out of high school Chemistry and had to take summer school. His grades were so bad in college that he had to take a semester off. Then he turned his life around. Now he is a successful business owner…But son, I could’ve been so much more if I applied myself  just doesn’t seem to cut it.

His role models of success showed him that what he does at this time of his life really doesn’t matter in the long run. I can almost understand his logic. But what he doesn’t know is how difficult their home lives were and the obstacles that they had to overcome.

This summer my son worked for a flooring company full-time. He had to get up in the morning at the time when many of his friends were going to bed. It was physically hard dirty work. He wanted to quit many times, but kept going.. He is a hard worker and that will get him far in life.

He is also a loyal guy…he has had the same girlfriend for almost a year and a half. Baylee is absolutely wonderful and we love her. A couple of months back I overheard a boy talking about a girl he was planning on hooking up with to his seemingly disgusted mother…Since when did previously taboo subjects become public conversation?? I was mortified. Hello, I am right here!

I had another opportunity to feel thankful for my teens’ fondness for long term relationships.

We have had struggles with our son over the years..I was talking to a friend lately commiserating about our teens like they probably do about us. She said something that stuck…Has he improved over the last few years? I felt better because he has improved immensely. Look at how far he has come.

A few months ago, I had to give that same friend a call about her daughter. My youngest daughter opened up to me and told me that her friend was very depressed. Please call her mom and ask her to get help..

I have not found one person that told me the teenage years have been a breeze. If you do tell me that then a) you are lying, b) you need to write a book on how you did it because obviously you have everything figured out, or c) you weren’t there.

Yesterday my 14 year old daughter asked while I was driving…Would you be mad at me if I decide to have sex in high school or would you put me on the pill?

Oh look, a squirrel!

I have to remember that soon I will be returning to an empty house.

 

Animal Kingdom

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Animal Kingdom is my favorite park with kids. One of the best things to do there was go on a safari ride to see the animals.

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When we went with the kids, they got their faces painted. We did an African dance and played instruments. Each part of the park has separate continent themes to enjoy the animals native to that area. This time they even had an area dedicated to Avatar. It was over a 2 hour wait to go on the ride, so we didn’t.

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I think that this park was the hardest for me to tour without the kids. I felt sad that they had grown so fast until I saw the little kids cry. The parents seemed surprised that their children weren’t happy the whole time they were at the happiest place on Earth.

I had expectations at one time too. I thought that my children would get along. I thought that if I provided the right kind of environment for them that they wouldn’t argue as much as they do. It took me until my 2nd child was 6 months old to figure out that expectation wasn’t going to work well for me.

The evening we went to AK, we ate at the African restaurant at the AK resort. I loved seeing all of the animals, but I like to people watch too. I saw a couple with a small child at the table next to ours. When he got a little fussy, they handed him a cell phone. They relaxed instantly to know their boy wasn’t going to make a scene. But I thought ‘how sad’ in my motherly mind…they don’t know this yet, but in another decade they will be trying to pry the phone out of their teenager’s hand to have a conversation.

I have learned so much, but there is still so little that I know.

I really thought I had this parenting thing down. I mean, my oldest adult daughter and I are like best friends. She tell me things that I would never share with my mom.

But what worked with her did not work for my other 2 children. With them it is more of a struggle.

This week I had to tell my son that he needed to do his homework. He is a very smart guy but doesn’t care enough to do the work. He has been sliding by the last couple of years with C’s and D’s. He thinks that he will be able to get into a decent school by just having raw music talent. I also told him that he needs to wear his seat belt although he argued that he has never been in an accident and will not die because he is young.

My youngest daughter thinks that she is stronger than me. She said that she could beat me in a short race. I reminded her of the 5k we did a few years back where I placed in my age group and she came in last place overall. Seriously!

These are the types of conversations that I have with my teens.

But despite my insanity from parenting teenagers, I missed them when I went to the AK park. I missed all of our trips to the zoo when they were little. I missed their excitement and awe over seeing the animals. I wish I could recapture that again. Maybe with my grandchildren someday.

What is the meaning?

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Are you there God? Just show me a sign. Let me know that I am not walking alone. Sometimes I feel alone.

I am angry dealing with a rebellious 17 year old. Maybe someday I can look back and laugh at this. Maybe it will be like the time when his buddies and him mooned his classmates at recess in grade school. I laugh about that now.

Even though I am angry, I still feel love. He is a good person. He said that most teenagers would jump at the chance to have a cabin to party at with free alcohol. Perhaps that is true. He didn’t partake of the property destruction.

Last week my son texted me about saving a bird. He saw it as he was leaving for school flapping on the ground. The bird hit the garage door and was bleeding from the head. I tried to save it, but it was too far gone.

Doesn’t God care for the sparrows? Doesn’t God care even more about me?

I have been thinking a lot the past few days. I don’t think I feel angry about my current situation as much as I do about the past. It brings me back to a time that I didn’t feel like God was there for me, for my mom..

My mom is right up there at the top of God’s most faithful servants list. I, perhaps, am at the top of the doubting Thomas list.

You see, my mother’s life has been difficult since her first premature breath in a foreign country. I can almost understand if God is not there for me…but my mother??

She had to deal with 4 teenagers at a time…two that were severely depressed. One that was into alcohol and drugs…and my brother Matt, the Helen Keller of mental illness…anxiety, autism, schizophrenia, and tourette’s. He was often violent. My dad was also depressed. When he wasn’t depressed, he was angry and cruel…

God, were you with my mother the many nights she cried alone??

Does what I went through have purpose?? What is the meaning? Did I even help one person live another day besides myself??

Are you there God? Can you show me a sign?

 

Walking away

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I bet you were waiting all weekend to hear if we have bedbugs. Good news! We don’t.

We spent money to find spiders apparently. But I have a piece of mind that everything is okay.

We have since moved on to our next crisis.

Our son’s car broke down right after the exterminator left. The car started steaming when he got to our road. When he pulled into the driveway, all of the antifreeze leaked out. Today we had to get the car towed to the garage to be fixed.

We have been having record high temps in WI. It has been hotter the first few days of fall than it has been all summer. All I wanted to do was go to the beach, but that never happened.

On Saturday we drove a couple hours to go to my friend Lisa’s 40th birthday party. She wanted to go to a small town’s Octoberfest.

While we were there, we heard from a friend that we might get sued.

Just a quick recap…last month my son, along with 20 other kids, went partying at another girl’s cabin without her. She got busted by her parents with alcohol but told her friends to go anyway. She gave them directions and told them how to get in. There was some minor property damage…a broken water pump, broken glass, blood on the carpet, and penises drawn on the wall.

We have been in constant communication with the parents and have offered to pay for a share of the damages. Now we are wondering if we need a lawyer. It doesn’t appear that my son will be facing criminal charges since he got permission to spend the weekend at the cabin via text from the daughter. However, we don’t want to get sued. We know some of the other parents will be unable or unwilling to pay. Will they go after us for more than our fair share?

I didn’t feel like celebrating after hearing we might be going to court. I didn’t even do one dance. I took a walk through the small unknown town by myself. I needed to be alone to think. I walked until I saw the courthouse and sat on the steps. It seemed bizarrely suiting for the occasion.

Sometimes I feel like walking out of my house with the clothes I have on and never coming back.

When I am really upset, I aimlessly drive for hours or go on a long walk. Last night I went for a long walk. I felt anger and despair. I wondered if God really was there.

Paul and I have been upset and/or fighting about this all weekend. We accused each other of not caring about the other, but neither one of us said that we didn’t care.

Now we just sit and wait wondering what will happen next. We just want this to be over with. We want to stop feeling angry every time we hear about it. Thankfully Paul and I are getting along better today..It is hard to be angry and to express that anger without feeling blamed or attacked.

I just want to walk away…or better yet, sit on the beach oblivious to the cares of my world..

 

Parenting from my horse and buggy

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A few weeks ago, I received a text from another parent regarding my son.

Surprisingly, it was not a late Friday night knock on the door.

She told me that my son was driving 15 mph over the speed limit on the highway with her son in the car. She knew this from an app and suggested that I get the app too.

I decided not to.

When I confronted my son about his driving, he became upset.

His friend got a ride with him to the band concert because his parents didn’t want to attend. No one bothered to show up on his behalf. But they complained about my son’s driving.

My son said that if they have a problem with the way he drives, then maybe they should take their son and be involved in his life.

I don’t want my son to speed on the highway, but I have to agree with him. What good is constant nagging without being an involved parent??

I already have the app that tracks my children. I know where they are at all times.

I have the app that tracks their grades. I know about every missing assignment, every time they were a few minutes late to class, and every bad grade.

Every night could be a nag fest.

Did you turn in that assignment yet??

How is it going to make them responsible for their own lives if they constantly have mom and dad telling them what they need to do?? How can they think for themselves if we already have a solution for every problem??

Sometimes I think parenting was a lot easier when parents didn’t know so much.

I remember bringing my report cards home and the screaming and threatening only lasted a day or two. Sometimes I was even surprised by my grades.

I remember going to the library (where people smoked cigarettes) if I needed answers to questions. Shocking, I know. This comment should almost give my blog an R rating. The librarians had all the answers or knew where to find them, kind of like Siri.

I remember my parents saying that I had it made in my day because a bus picked us up for school. They had to walk uphill both ways to a one room schoolhouse that didn’t have indoor plumbing.

Every generation seems to think that the next generation has it so much easier. But is it really true with this generation?

When I was a kid, I spent my summers riding my bike around town from morning to night. Sometimes the chain fell off or I got a flat tire. Sometimes there was a storm.

I didn’t have a phone to call someone to pick me up. I had to solve my own problems.

I feel like some of that is missing in today’s world.

I wonder when we convinced ourselves that it wasn’t safe for our kids to ride their bikes around all day.

Parents worry about sexual predators, but somehow we convince ourselves that having our kids inside on the internet is safer than riding a bike around town.

To think we didn’t even wear helmets. That would be considered bad parenting today.

Now my kids can’t live without their phones. My daughter called me from her friend’s phone this morning saying that she forgot her phone at home and asked if I could bring it to school for her. I said ‘no’. I told her that I lived my first 18 years without a phone. I’m certain that she could survive for one day.

The kids of today have phone separation anxiety. They are bored or antsy when they have to be without the internet or their phones for more than a few minutes. They run up huge amounts of data on long car rides. They don’t know how to get anywhere because they never look out the window, yet they are lost without their phones.

What kind of life is that?

I think that my kids are wasting their young years watching everyone else live online. But yet they need to stay up to date on technology if they want to have a good career. We’re damned if we do. We’re damned if we don’t. We struggle with them and ourselves over limits.

We don’t know what to do. We can’t relate. We never had this. More often then not, we need our kids help to make technology work. It can be very frustrating.

There is such a huge technology gap between what I know and what my kids know. I would need them to set up the parental controls. Why bother? They are always 10 steps ahead of me. How can I adequately monitor them?

It will be interesting to see how the next generation of parents respond to these issues. I think it will be much easier for them since there won’t be as much of a technology gap between the generations.

Forget helicopter parenting! I feel like I am parenting from my horse and buggy. Meanwhile, my kids are driving the fast snazzy automobile of technology. I can never keep up.

For the first time in history, I think that our children are teaching us more than they are learning from us. This scares me..

 

Another late night visitor

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I received another late night knock on the door this week. Surprisingly, it wasn’t for my son. It was the neighbor girl Abby who was crying bearing gifts of cookies and a handwritten apology note for my youngest daughter Arabella.

I found out there was a problem when I picked up the girls after school. Arabella wasn’t talking to Abby and Abby had no idea why. Arabella mentioned something to me later about the girls having friendship issues due to their extreme differences in body shape. Abby is in 7th grade and is very tiny. Some of the kids were teasing her saying that she looked like a kindergartner. Arabella is in 8th grade and is on the hefty side. I can see a future of her always struggling with her weight.

It is open to debate, Abby may or may not have said something about rather being small than fat. Arabella may have found this offensive.

Abby’s mom sent me a message wanting to know why Arabella was upset with Abby. I responded that they were having a discussion about body image. Abby’s mom replied that Abby admitted to saying some not very nice things to Arabella. In response Abby’s mom said, “I can’t believe this. I’m incredibly sorry. I’m just mind blown and upset. Abby has always been so sweet and considerate and I have no idea where this came from. I sincerely apologize.”

Then Abby showed up at the door crying offering her apologies.

Wow!

Abby’s mom was very stressed out by the whole situation. To be honest, it didn’t really phase me.

Abby is the oldest child. They are going through this whole middle school yucky time for the first time. Arabella is my youngest child. We have been down this road several times before. We have received worse knocks on the door.

Abby is a good kid. I didn’t want them to get worked up too much over this. I told them that sometimes people say things they don’t mean or that they regret later. No hard feelings..

I remember my middle school days. It is a terrible time for kids. It seems like everyone has to fit into the same cookie cutter mold.

When I was in middle school, I was the smallest in my class. One day I wore my green stretch pants to school and everyone called me frog legs. I bemoaned the fact that at 13 I was still asked if I was under 10. The adults all said that someday looking young would pay off for me (it did).

Some of my friends had braces and glasses. For awhile, I wanted that too. I remember walking around the house with a gum wrapper held on my teeth by an opened up paper clip. I also wore my babysitter’s glasses and looked at myself in the mirror which she said would cause me to need glasses. Apparently, she was wrong. (Why do I remember such crazy stupid things??)

I think the middle school years are the hardest. Especially if you are really short, really heavy, have a big nose, can’t afford to wear the right clothes, or are different in any way.

Woe to the popular kids too. They have to jump through a lot of hoops to stay popular.

I am soooo happy that this will be my last year as a mother of middle schooler.

 

The great parenting paradox

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This is something that I have thought about for a long time and it is still a mystery to me. When I was a child, it was such an emotionally crushing time of my life. It really wasn’t anyone’s fault and I am not trying to place blame. It was just the circumstances of my life and really Paul’s too. We both grew up in very difficult situations. So much so that we would do almost anything to give our children the “perfect” childhood. The childhood that we never had.

There were times that I didn’t think I was going to be strong enough to make it through my childhood. I emerged as a healthy adult, but not without battle scars and wounds. I don’t think that I will ever be able to outrun my demons. We have worked incredibly hard to provide an ideal childhood for our children.

However, surviving through difficult times has made me the strong person that I am today. It has given me the courage, the determination, and the grit. I am not a superficial person. I am raising children that I did everything I could to make their life like mine wasn’t. Parents always seem to want things for their children that they never had. I am raising children who have sharing a room with their sibling as their biggest hardship. I have no sympathy for that. I am happy that I feel successful in giving them a great childhood. Yet at the same time I feel resentful. Am I raising healthy kids or spoiled brats?

I sometimes wonder if I am like a parent who grew up hungry overindulging their children with food. Or a parent who grew up poor overindulging their children with vast material wealth without them having to work for it. Is too much of a good thing a bad thing? Will shielding my kids from stress and pain allow them to handle it better when they grow up?

So the question still remains in my mind. Am I doing the right thing? Would I be a better person if my childhood environment was ideal? Would I be able to appreciate the good things in life without experiencing the bad? Sometimes with parenting, there are more questions then answers..

Modern parenting

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I remember growing up in the 1980’s. As teenagers, our parents thought we were the worst of all generations before us. They did not understand our music, rock ‘n roll and hair bands. Talking about hair, they did not like the way we dressed. Our hair was too poofy our makeup too wild. We spent countless hours at the mall trying to be material girls. We wasted gobs of time trying to get to the next level in Pong, Space Invaders, and Frogger on our Atari’s. We traded in our records for a large boom box with a tape deck. We dubbed tapes off of other friends tapes off of other friends tapes instead of listening to what our parents listened to on the record player or radio in the living room. Kids were rebellious, times were changing, and parenthood was hard.

As a parent of teenagers, I look back and wish times were a little simpler. We have less control and no guidelines. How much computer time should we allow our teens to have? How do we enforce that? How do we implement parental controls when we need our teens to help set them up? How do we monitor what they are doing when they know more about computers than us? I think that this is probably one of the biggest generation technology parenting gaps that has ever been and probably will ever be. At least our children will know what to do with their children because they grew up with the internet. From experience they will know from their childhood all the things that we don’t know now.

How do we know what to do? How much computer time is too much? My teens now do their homework on their computers. Taking away their computers is like taking away their pencils and paper. Is it good for them to spend all the time that they can on computers so they are prepared to use them in future careers? It is extremely hard to be hypervigelent with our teens use of the Internet without sitting next to them the whole time they are on it. This also is hard when they are at the stage in life where they want to be independent more than anything. If we have no reason not to trust them should we treat them like they are untrustworthy??

I remember as a young child finding my dad’s girlie magazines and showing them to my friends. They were in our house. We don’t have that option of keeping it out of our house if we don’t want it there anymore. My oldest daughter was exposed to porn in middle school when our previous pastor’s daughter showed it to her on a computer in our own house. Who would have thought?

What about cell phones? Back in my day, we had to talk on a phone tethered by a cord on the wall. There was no privacy. Now teens can talk anywhere with complete privacy about anything they want. If they wanted to send or receive naked pictures of someone, it is a click away. Who would ever know?

Now as far as music goes, the options are limitless there as well. If I wanted to buy a parental advisory CD as a teen I would have to go to the music store and show them my id. Once again, anything can be downloaded or listened to and I wouldn’t even know. How do you become proactive in monitoring that?

What about school shootings and violence? Back in my time there were a few kids that would call in bomb threats when they wanted the day off. I assume that doesn’t happen all that much anymore with caller id. Instead there are school shootings. Do you know how scary it is to send your child off to school after something like that happens?? Yesterday I received a letter from the principal of my children’s high school stating that there was an incident where a student was talking about bringing a gun to school. The authorities were called into the school to investigate. So, I sit here and worry. Worry about the things I can’t control. I wonder if I am doing a good job as a parent. Is anyone really? I don’t know what the hell I am doing parenting the modern teen. Does anyone? We are dealing with issues that our experienced parents wouldn’t even be able to give us advice about. 

On the flip side, it is a great time to be a parent. We have webmd for every bump, scratch, and sniffle. There are online support groups for any parenting issue. There is countless free advice for practically any parenting problem from getting stains out of clothes, potty training, to extra math tutorials at the tips of our fingers. Maybe it would have helped my parents raise us when they had 4 teens in the house at the same time. My brother could’ve gotten diagnosed with autism earlier, maybe would have had early intervention therapy. My mom could’ve joined online support groups and wouldn’t have had to parent an autistic child totally alone finding out what worked through trial and error.  

Ah, these are the best of times and worst of times for parenting. I am doing the best I can.