The teenage years

No, not really. I'm way too granola for her tastes.

She threw the, 'you smoked when you were my age' gauntlet at me. I told her it was legal for me to purchase cigarettes when I was her age and smarter rules are in place now to help kids avoid bad habits during the years where they're most tempted to try them.

The new bf is 18, gulp, and can purchase them legally. We told her smoking is only one of the concerns we have with her dating an older boy. He seems nice, we like what we know of him so far, but they need to keep their age difference in mind as they make choices about their relationship. He needs to remember she's only 15, she needs to remember he's legally an adult. We, Mr B and I, probably need to have our heads examined for allowing the relationship in the first place.

We told her we're putting a ton of faith in them and our concern is finding out too late that we were being too lenient. It's not just about cigarettes.

J_B--

Cupid has a sense of humor. With luck, you can keep yours.

Hold your dominion.

JB
No, you don't have to have your head examined. After your kids reach a certain age, you have to losen the leash a bit every now and then. Otherwise they will rebel and make things ten times worse.
I find that talking with you kids "a lot" makes a huge difference in the outcome.
I always make sure my son knows that I'm looking out for him and remind him that he's very smart and I trust that he knows how to use his better judgement. He just turned 18 last month and so far, so good ;-)
I also made sure not to keep too tight of a leash on him and it paid off.
I questioned myself a million times, just like you are, but it turns out that I did the right thing after all :-D

Cheers, girlfriend :-D

Noddy ~ I'm at the transition stage when I battle with Cupid to stay away from my baby girl, realizing as I do so that she's not my baby anymore. "Love Conquers All" includes meddling mothers.

I've noticed she's reaching out to Mr B now more than she ever has before. I think she's trying to get a male perspective on things whereas she's always come to me. It's an interesting transitional time.

Montana ~ I'm sure your son is going to be wonderful 'in the real world'. He couldn't much help it with your guidance and attention. He's lucky to have had you as his mom. K's going to be wonderful too. She's a great kid and we talk, talk, talk. Then she goes out and makes her own decisions, some of which I like, some I don't, some I'm not even aware of but that's probably a good thing :wink:

She just turned 15. Did you have an agreement to let her start dating at 15?

I had always set 16 for dating age. Some protest, but hey, she needed to mature. Prior to 16 she could go to a movie with a group of friends, but not a date.

Even now that she is 16 1/2, I'd have trouble with her dating an 18 year old. Not sure what I'd do about it, but I sure admire your cool headedness.

No, Squinney, we didn't have a set age and in some ways I wish we'd established one. On the other hand, I'm the conservative parent among most of the parents in this area and even though I don't cave in to what other parents allow their children to do, I did feel she was being isolated from her peers because of my restrictions.

For instance, most of the kids here start 'hanging out' at the mall by the time they're 11 years old, K was 14. Part of that was because she wasn't emotionally ready, part of it was because I think 11 is too young to be dropped off at a mall.

The dating thing is mostly still as part of a group, but the groups are made up of one or more couples plus whoever else is there at the time. She has a 10:00 curfew on summer weeknights, 11:00 on weekends, and she doesn't go out during the week in the school year. School starts on Tuesday so her 'dates' will be restricted to weekends beginning next week.

I don't feel very cool headed. I'm kind of in turmoil about it to tell you the truth. I think I'd be in the same turmoil if she was 16 or 17 though.

edit: another thought more in line with Montana's comments above. K's close friend is very restricted in what she is allowed to do. I'm conservative, these folks are STRICT. The friend has many of the same experiences that K does, but she isn't able to discuss them with her parents because she's sneaking out to do them. She'll meet her 'bf' at the mall but tells her parents she's meeting the girls, because she isn't allowed to date. Although I'm in turmoil about the 18 year old, I'd rather be aware of it and be able to talk to her about it than not. It really is a balancing act, and I don't pretend I'm doing it right, but I am glad we're able to talk.

A lot of the kids here were doing the mall scene,too. I avoided it until 15 by suggesting they hang out at our house, their house, and then parents all agreed to stay out of the way to let them do their music / movie/ talk thing.

I had the advantage of the other parents being just as conservative in their parenting. Most of us have known each other since the kids were in elementary school, so there were parent relationships that allowed for agreement and consistancy. If one teen tried the "Everyone else is..." they knew we would call one of the other parents and ask if so and so was____, which cut that little phase short. (And, got some really cool eye rolling out of the kids!)

Had a talk with daughter when she wanted to go out with a guy that just graduated. I asked her what she thought an guy going off to college in a couple of months would want with dating a 16 year old. Just a date, was her answer.

So I asked if she would go out with one of her little brothers friends, who would be about the same age difference, just to be going on a date. NO WAY! She got the idea, luckily, though she didn't like my analogy or agree with it. Of course, that's different. Right?

The whole silence, mad at me thing doesn't bother me if I know what I'm doing is best for her. It's the internal questioning of if my decision was right that drives me nuts.

Teens! I know we all went through this stuff, as did our parents. I try to take comfort in knowing I survived, and so did my Mom and Dad. Try is the operative word.

Re: using good judgement.

I left the house the other day to run errands. Our exit routine is to tell each person goodbye with a kiss and "I love you."

I leaned over to kiss daughter goodby and said I'd be back in a little bit.

She asked where I was going.

I told her, thinking if it was anything close to her interests she may want to go with me or at least practice driving some more on her permit.

No, she said she just wanted to remind me to make good choices.

Great! I guess I just THOUGHT I was the Mom.

I just saw the last post, re: good judgement. Too cute!!

"Make smart choices" has become my mantra. Even as it becomes rote, I hope the mom voice calls out to her as she faces her peers. I'm almost 50 years old, my mom passed away a few year ago, but I still hear her mom voice. Mantras are sometimes the saving grace :wink:

It sounds like you and your daughter have a great relationship, Squinney. Kudos to you and your kids for staying close to each other.

Different train altogether...

Do you remember when 9:00 pm was early? When I was in college we would go out around 9:00 and get home after 1:00. I'm at the age when 9:00 sounds like a reasonable bedtime and my girls are just getting started.

It's 10:45 pm and I'm about to become a pumpkin. K & M are downstairs making a pizza. If I ate pizza at 11:00, I would want to hurl by midnight. But, there was a day when pizza at 11:00 sounded perfectly reasonable to me. I have a new definition of middle age.... when you're ready to go to sleep at the same time you used to venture out for the evening and your kids are at the age when they sleep until the crack of noon and you're lucky to make it to the crack of dawn

Aint that the truth!

School starts next week for us, so I have been telling them to go to bed soon so they can get in the routine. I don't really have a bedtime for them anymore. Instead, I've made it clear I'll be waking them up earlier so they can be prepared for the 6:20 am school bus. They then make their decision as to how much sleep they want.

Fortunately, they have both hit a stage where they like their sleep.

Daughter went up to bed last night and came back down and sat in the chair next to me a few minutes later.

I asked her what was up. She said she wanted to talk to me about something. (ALWAYS a parent attention getter statement, right?)

So, I jokingly turn to her and say, "NO! You are NOT piercing any part of your face."

Shocked, she looks at me and says, "But, um, I had this whole speech I wanted to give and..."

I said, "What? I was joking? That's really what you wanted to talk about?"

"Yes."

"Oh, okay." (puts on serious face) "Well, go ahead and give me your speech."

"No. I already know your answer."

"But, I haven't heard your reasoning. Maybe you'll change my mind."

"Okay, so I've done some research and there's really no complications other than infection and that can be avoided if you take care of it right and I figure that here in a couple of years I'm going to have to get a job and the kind of job I would want wouldn't mix well with a lip ring so I was thinking that it would probably be best for you to go ahead and let me get it out of my system now so I don't mess up my job possibilities later and I think that's pretty smart, wouldn't you agree?"

(head whirling, I take a deep breath)

"I tell ya what. I'll give this some thought and talk to your Dad about it and let you know tomorrow. I'm glad you did your research and prepared a convincing speech. So, with all that in mind, I'll think about it. Okay?"

"You always say you'll think about it."

"Well, believe me. I will give this some thought. As a matter of fact you'll probably now have me up all night thinking about it."

(Laughs)

"Night, Mom. Love you."

"Love you, too."

(I then sat in panicked state for at least 45 minutes before going up to bed to tell Bear.)

Oh my!

Extra holes and tattoos are near the top of my list of 'don't even think about it' items. K gave herself two new sets of ear holes earlier in the summer but allowed them to close over when I gave her the choice of spending the summer in her room with her earrings or enjoying the summer with her friends with the single set she already has.

A lip ring, huh? Yikes! I know it's my personal bias, but my stomach is doing flips just thinking about it. My nephew's fiance has a pierced tongue. I'm sure I give her 'face' every time I see her. It's unintentional, she's a nice girl, but I wince every time she speaks and flashes her jewel.

It's good she came to you to talk about it. Is she trying to say she doesn't plan on keeping it long term? How do you feel about navel rings instead? I don't much like those either, but I think it would be better than something on her face.

Good luck on this one. I can't wait to hear your decision.

Decision?

The decision was no a long time ago. I just said I would think about it. That means I needed time to threaten Bear in case he didn't back me up.

Unfortunately, I'm VERY conservative when it comes to this kinda thing, and Bear is not.

Bear has tattoos. Bear has piercings (ears) and pierced his lip last year. Didn't keep it long, but he still did it and he did it at a time when the kids were well aware of my feelings.

Two years ago, at 14, he took daughter and got her naval pierced WAY against my wishes. I cried, moped, stomped around and grumbled for a months.

This one... Over my dead body!

But, I have to figure out how to be more diplomatic about it than that.

Squinney--

Hold your dominion--against all comers.

hmmm, tough situation.

Did you get Bear to agree to back you up, or at least to not over-ride you?

We're having a parental difference over the amount of time K is spending with the new bf. I've been pretty liberal with it as long as she's home at a decent time, knowing it's going to slow way down next week when school starts. Mr B wants her home every night for dinner, wants them to hang out here vs going out, etc. We haven't come to an agreement yet. She's going out with him for dinner tonight, but dad just told her to plan on a family dinner on Sunday. She said fine.

Bear agreed with me.

But, then he "handled" it.

I brought it up again while she was at work Friday. Asked if we could talk about how we were going to address it.

He said there's no discussion. It's no and that's it.

He went to pick her up from work and told her the answer was no and remember the agreement we had when you got your bellybutton pierced, and that there would be no other piercings? You agreed to it. So No.

That wasn't exactly the diplomatic way I wanted to approach it where it gets brought around to her knowing and agreeing it's not a good idea.

So, now I've had a moping, mumbling 16 yo all weekend. I just hope she isn't cutting again.

How 'bout something like this: She's waited two years from the time she got her naval pierced and in another two years the choice will be hers. You hope she will continue to see the sense in not having a lip ring while trying to find/keep a job. 16 year olds are not allowed to make this decision for themselves because 16 year olds are sometimes impetuous, making permanent changes to their body when they really don't intend for it to be permanent. A two year old lip ring hole would not close over very easily.


I know an 18 year old girl who decided she wanted purple spiked hair. She died it purple and cut it into short spikes. She was immediately fired from her job at Banana Republic. We're hearing more and more stories about personal decisions affecting employment, be it writing blogs or posting opinions on public access web sites from work computers, to personal appearance issues.

I admire the part of her speech about not wanting a face pierce to impact her job ops later, but having it now might impact them too.

If it were me, I'd probably just say something about stomach flips and not wanting to be nauseous in my own house from looking at my lovely daughter.

I too hope this doesn't lead to your daughter cutting. I've found that the things I fear might trigger it aren't the same things at all that actually are the triggers.

Heh, they have Falls Creek here in Oklahoma which is a Church camp thing for 2 weeks. It has the highest teen pregnancy (spelling?) rating in Oklahoma or close to it...

"Pregnancy" is spelled correctly, but I doubt that a Church Camp can become pregnant.

What is the source of your information?