Parenting a teen is a thankless job. The trials of parenting your child when they are a teen are fraught with land mines, emotional and otherwise.
A few examples of the choices and questions presented to the parent of a teen might include figuring out when your teen can navigate a mall when not under your eagle-eyed gaze, how to give them just enough privacy with which to hang themselves and when to have the REAL discussion about drugs.
(Thanks Nancy Reagan, I do believe you had good intentions, but when my 6 year old daughter came home after experiencing one of your ‘Just Say No’ campaigns at school and stated that she WOULD NEVER TAKE drugs, I simply asked her what a drug looked like. Yeah, as you would imagine, she had no response...so please, give the kids something tangible to work with here.)
When you are the parent of an infant or toddler, as that parent you get all kinds of advice; breastfeed or bottle feed? Which disposable diaper is the best...or if you are the crunchy variety like I was, which cloth diaper service? Which books to read to my little burgeoning piece of grey matter? And oh, how people would comment on my daughter's looks. How beautiful, cute, charming, dimpled and sweet. Praise about her adorableness used to abound.
But now that she is 15 and in the throws of teenagedom, I get few notices. Gone are the well-meaning helpful remarks about her diet and growth...nary are the comments about how adorable she is. The new sound bytes include how much she looks like me, how tall /big she is...and is she babysitting yet?
I insert comments about the trials and tribulations of raising a teenaged daughter into conversations with peers and they are mostly met with raised eyebrows and statements like “well, does her Dad own a shotgun?”
Granted, the daughter of my tales does not endear her to people. She is mercurial at best. (But if you are a stranger or a co-worker of mine, no doubt you will be charmed be her alter ego; the engaged, participatory and friendly version of herself.)
True to her age and science she can be hormonal and sullen in one moment or sunny and whimsical the next.
But, she is still a child - albeit one that is navigating her way into adulthood. She still needs me, for just a few more years. And, these are probably the toughest years that I will weather as a parent.
So where are the accolades, showers, commiserating blogs and advice that I received 14 years ago when she was an infant? Where are the Mommy play-dates, birthday parties and community of my daughter’s toddlerhood?
***Sigh***
Not only is parenting a teenager rough, it also makes a parent of a teen feel a bit isolated.
2 comments:
Don't feel isolated! There are other moms out there (tho I'm not one of them)... seriously, you should go onto some of the Mom blogs and post some of your questions - you'll get lots of good feedback and support. And every mom goes through this... not that this is any comfort, I'm sure...
As you can tell, I am VERY behind in my blog reading. Do you post a status on Facebook when you post a blog? It's a great way to drive traffic to your site. I do it with my TriangleMom2Mom posts. And on a more selfish note, I wouldn't go so long without reading about you and yours!!!
In my blog my profile reads that I "try to be the voice of Moms of teens." The challenges that arise are so much more complicated than whether to introduce fruit or vegetable baby food first. Also, in that first year, babies develop in a kind of predictable way based on age. But when they are teens, there are some kids who are totally ready to go to the mall independently at 13 and some that you wouldn't think about allowing to at 17. My theory is that only YOU know.
I'm not saying that you shouldn't have a great group of Mom friends that you can banter about this stuff with (preferably over several glasses of wine), but "age appropriateness" just isn't as definable when kids are teens.
Oh...and the best part about this banter over wine is that the more wine you drink, the more you all admit to your own failures and foibles, reinforcing to you that you are not alone and you aren't in fact the worst mother in the world.
You can always ask me since I was kind enough to have a daughter to pave the way for Taylor...but then again, you know that I am much less careful than you are.
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