Somebody to love

November 28, 2011

Sometimes I wonder what I’m going to do when I run out of stories to tell. Find other people’s kid stories maybe? Try to remember the 20+ years of working with teenagers?? I think I have all of that blocked out for a reason…

Girl-child # 2 was one of the bat-shit crazy kids. I’m quite sure she would be okay with that title too by the way.  Funny, funny, funny but yeah, not entirely, completely sane.  Actually, she does have a psychiatric condition and she does struggle with some ‘stuff’ but underneath it she is, yet again, a pretty good kid.

I was explaining recently how teenagers gravitate towards peers that reflect their life or their beliefs or something else internal about who they are or where they’re at.  Girl-child # 3, all of her friends have crazy moms.  Seriously. If you sat down and listed every friend – every single one of them has a mom that is not stable and has big issues. I told her that once and she found it rather interesting.

Girl-child # 2, she goes one better than that, she has crazy girlfriends (yes, she is gay – no, I don’t want to hear any religious ramblings about god’s will and devil and ruination of mankind thanks, anyways).  She is so focused on being in love and someone loving her that she is willing to give up whatever about herself in order to hang onto or solidify the relationship.  A lot of kids have a ‘crazy’ boyfriend or girlfriend at some point and if you’re lucky, they’ll get that out of the way before they’re of marrying age.  Girl # 1 and boy-child both managed to find their crazy boy / girlfriends while still in high school.  I thought girl-child # 2 had done the same but it didn’t quite work out that way.  When she was just finishing high school (so maybe 18 – 19 at the oldest), she started dating this one girl, who on the surface seemed to be pretty nice.  Cute little thing that was bubbly and full of excitement.  Girl-child # 2 had a full-time job and her and girlfriend made plans to move in together in town.  Now girlfriend was still in high-school but both moms thought this was an excellent idea.  I know for a fact that one of the moms had it in her sites to “marry-off” one of the girls as a solution for not having to deal with her or worry about her anymore (I kid you not).

I also remember having concerns that girlfriend was still in school but I don’t recall anyone listening to me.

So they move in together and things started to fall apart pretty quickly.  Before long girl-child # 2 started missing work.  She just wouldn’t show up and people would have to try to find her.  I guess girlfriend would get jealous if girl-child went to work and would cry, threaten to kill herself and one night slit her wrists.  Girl-child was doing everything she could to try to keep it together but it unraveled very fast.  Girlfriend was on meds for depression, was actively suicidal and at one point we had to alert the high school and get the police and hospital involved.  Why on earth did this mother think it was okay for her kid to be anywhere other than home??  And why was I the one dealing with the police, the school, the crazy mom?  There were a lot of threats and a lot of issues to be resolved but ultimately, girl-child had to get out of the relationship.  She kept her apartment, she kept her job but got a demotion (I think) and got out.

Until she did it again. And again. And yes, again. Some people never learn!

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The dating game

November 24, 2011 2 Comments

I tell this story in the class I teach about teenagers but it’s so cute, I have to tell it here.

Oldest girl-child is quite a pretty girl, and she’s the first born child.  As with most parents, the whole idea of dating and boyfriends / girlfriends was a little bit stressful, especially when you’re brand new at it.  You just don’t know what to expect and how it’s all going to work out.

Girl-child was in grade 8 or 9 maybe and wanted to go out on a date with this guy she knew or met or something.  (really, I was paying more attention back then)  I’m thinking it must have been closer to grade 8 because she was very new to the whole dating game and I was very new to the whole being the mom of a kid that dates.  So, you know, I’ve read all the “how to be a good parent” articles in all the magazines and figured I should meet this kid.  As with most younger teenagers the whole notion of a date was getting together at a very public place to hang out.  Seeing as we’re a bit of a rural community with not too much to do, it was decided that she would meet up with this new guy friend at the mall and they could hang out there for an hour or two.  On the condition that I meet him of course.  Now I didn’t really have a clue what my meeting him was supposed to prove at that point since they were just hanging out in a mall but I insisted because it was the responsible parenting thing to do (and really, it is a good thing, I just didn’t have a clue what I was doing back then). 

So off we go to the mall.  We’re hanging out in the food court area and this very young looking boy comes strutting over to say hello.  He had a mohawk hairstyle and a spiky-like dog collar around his neck.  This was before the trend of pants hanging down at your knees but he was suitably baggy and shaggy enough that if that trend had been around back then, he would have been right on it. 

That, my friends, was my daughter’s first date.  A mohawk and a dog collar – you can imagine my joy.

I don’t remember this kids name and quite frankly, he couldn’t care less who I was because he only had eyes for my daughter.  They kind of hovered for a few minutes before taking off down the mall and getting away from me.  That was long enough though for me to notice something a little surprising.  This young boy was smitten.  He looked at my daughter like she was some kind of goddess and he was in awe.  She, on the other hand, barely noticed him.  She was busy looking around at the other people in the crowd and seeing if anyone was watching them or if any friends were around or what was on sale.  At that moment I thought “that poor boy” because it was obvious that she was going to break his little heart.  The dog collar and mohawk didn’t seem to matter so much anymore.

As it turns out, they never really dated for too long and there were far more presentable but not necessarily nicer boyfriends after that one still to come.

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Just like the 70s

November 21, 2011 2 Comments

A couple of the girls here have this awful bad habit of grabbing food, bringing it down to their bedrooms and then never, ever bringing the dishes back up to the kitchen.  I could go get the dishes myself but I insist on making them do it.  That, of course, means me telling them to do this on a regular basis.  And of course, because I don’t think of it every three hours, this means that some days the dishes have a tendency to pile up in their rooms.

One night I realized that there were no more clean bowls in the house.  In fact, there weren’t any bowls at all – or spoons.  The girls were both gone somewhere, I think out to a party.  Off I go, gathering all the bowls and spoons and sure enough wouldn’t you know, in the very room that we figured would be the best end-of-world-zombiepocalypse-hideout-space in the entire house, I find a homemade bong, an empty pop bottle with water and butts in it and a half empty 40 ounce bottle of peach snaps (where’s the pukey smiley when you need it).

I’m pretty much a “it’s your room – your responsibility” type of parent.  That also means I treat the bedrooms as their space, knock before I enter the room, don’t go snooping or cleaning up after them.  Now, I’m not never going to go into the bedroom but I will go out of my way to make sure I’m respectful about it.  I typically will wait until the girls are there before going into their rooms but hey, if they’re not here and they’re too damn lazy to bring up the dishes – well, that means sometimes I’m going to go searching if I have to. 

I’m not a parent that has tons of rules.  Almost everything is negotiable at some point or another.  If you think you can handle it, (whatever “it” is) and you can present a good enough argument as to why you should be allowed to try it, then chances are pretty good I’m going to let you give it a try (if it’s not going to get you or someone else hurt that is).  I will be very clear on what I think the consequences will be if things don’t work out and that way the kids have a good idea of what they want to try for themselves or are willing to risk.  That being said, the only non-negotiable rules in the house are no smoking inside, no dope smoking on the property, no drinking here either.  As I said, I knew they drank and I also knew that one of them smoked dope (albiet I had no idea how much at that time).  With almost everything else negotiable what do these chickies go and do?  Break the only non-negotiable rules in the house.  And why did they do it?  Because they just couldn’t care less and automatically assumed they wouldn’t get caught (since they hadn’t been caught yet).  I was one angry momma.

And really?  Did they not think I was going to catch on at some point?  Have they never seen “That 70s Show?”  Do the math girls and figure out when I was a teenager.

For the first time in their lives, both of these girls were grounded.  They thought it was kind of funny since it was new.  

Until it happened again.

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