Mommy dearest

November 29, 2012 1 Comment

Not that long ago, a friend of buddy-child’s took in another friend that decided to leave an abusive home situation. The teenage girl leaving home had been dealing with an emotionally abusive mom who was cruel, demanding, insulting, derogatory and put this girl in the caregiver role most of the time.  She (teenager) had the opportunity to go to counseling and once she started, found the strength to make the break from her mom.  The girl’s mom was furious when her child moved out.  She was furious because she lost her caregiver; the person who did the dishes, cooked supper, watched the younger children and provided all the emotional support for her mom, all the while being told what a f-ing loser, slut, asshole (insert your favourite insult) she was.

This has been a tough transition.  The teenage girl that left has to learn how to live life in a non-abusive household.  She has to somehow repair herself from the damage that has been caused by the relationship with her mom and hope that it doesn’t permanently screw her up to the point that she messes up her own relationships whether it be with friends, colleagues, partners and / or future children.

Today an adult friend of mine posted a story about her mom and some very cruel things she had experienced (that would be classified as emotionally abusive in my world).  Another friend posted about how guilty she was feeling over losing her patience with her mom whom she is the caregiver for and the relationship is also unhealthy and inappropriate.  It was overwhelming and sad to see a handful of other adult women posting similar memories and situations and relationships with their moms.

I get parents make mistakes.  I make mistakes.  Even with all the knowledge and experience and history, I still screw up.  Everyone does.  There is a difference between screwing up once in a while and actively damaging your children because your life is focused on you and your needs must come first.  Once you have kids, that “me first” need has to go and you don’t have the right to actively and purposefully damage another soul like that, just because you think you own them because they’re your child.  Your needs don’t come first and if you can’t fathom that or deal with that, then don’t have kids.

 

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morals, values and OMG

November 26, 2012 3 Comments

One of the funnest things about teenagers is when you get to drive a bunch of them around from one place to another.  OMG, the things you get to learn and hear about!  Craziness.

I recall driving a group of teenage girls once and the conversation went from dating to boyfriends and girlfriends to who was dating who, to who was pregnant to who had little kids and was doing a really crappy job taking care of them because they were still partying all the time to who was fooling around with who and settled onto a huge debate about abortion.  They were horrified to hear about the means and methods that people used to go to “in the old days” in order to try and prevent or stop a pregnancy and spent the rest of the time in the car debating whether or not abortion should be a choice.

Aside from my own thoughts on the issue, these types of conversations are really good for teenagers.  I kept my mouth shut about what I thought (not easy for someone like me… ) and spent the time asking them why the felt the way they did and had them explain their reasoning.  This led into more debate amongst the girls around each person’s thoughts and beliefs and values.

These types of conversations are ‘gold’ for teenagers because this is how they learn how to challenge ideas in a respectful way and to listen to other people’s perspectives without feeling like they have to compromise their own beliefs.  So much time is spent teaching kids right from wrong that there comes a point where you have to let them explore the “why” that’s attached to the right and wrong that they’re figuring out for themselves.  There also seems to be a lot of fear (from adults) about letting kids hear other values and ideals and perspectives in case the teenagers suddenly switch gears from what the parents have taught them to something someone is promoting.  The reality is that these types of discussions are what allow the kids to develop their own moral voice and that moral voice is centered from the teachings they received from all the adults (parents mostly) as children.

Take note, they’re also comparing what you’ve said to what you’re doing in great detail and that carries way more weight than most people realize.

I think these types of funny, spontaneous, slightly attention deficit conversations are going to be one of the things I miss the most about having groups of teenagers hanging around the house.

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The end of the world as we know it

November 22, 2012 7 Comments

One of the toughest times as a parent is watching your kids go through a bunch of really sad or difficult things and for one reason or another, you’re not able to be there to take care of them or make it better.  As the kids start to get older and get on with their lives, this has happened a few times and it’s scary and heart-breaking all at the same time.

Boy-child got involved with a girl he met through school while away at University.  Nice girl and he was so in love.  I’m suspecting he was tailoring his life around this girl and he would have followed her almost anywhere.  He left to go out west because that is where she is from and that is where she went home to for the summer.

While he was out west, she suddenly and unexpectedly broke up with him.  I still don’t know what the issue was other than there was something that he wasn’t willing to change for her so she ended it.  It was some kind of deal breaker for her, whatever it was.  He was devastated.  This was the love of his life.  He was also a four day drive away from home.

He started posting messages on facebook about how he was going to “lose it”.  The ex-girlfriend messaged older girl-child at one point to say that she wanted boy-child to stop contacting her and leave her alone (I think he was drunk texting her in the middle of the night).  He wouldn’t answer the phone when I called the first day or two.  Talk about stressful.  You just have all kinds of worry and anxiety about your kids but these are things they have to learn how to get through mostly on their own.  Still, being so far away from home was a nightmare.  How could I make it better if he wasn’t here?

It was probably better that I wasn’t nearby because he did manage to learn to survive and now he knows he will make it through a tough time like that because he can and he did.  Still, it was so hard.  I had nightmare thoughts of all the stupid things he was capable of (potentially of course).  Luckily for all of us, he made it through in one piece and continued on with his life in  good shape.

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