Raising Teens....Ain't For The Weak

I thought I had it made...

I mean raising babies wasn't that difficult..... sometimes there was crying, fighting, pooping, peeing, nursing, tired, hungry, angry, fussy, and sick babies...and this could be all at once.

That seemed easy....breaking up little kid fights. Wiping tears and bandaging boo boo's.

Feeding their bellies was easy too.

But no one prepared me for the TEENAGE YEARS.

I really thought it would be easy. I mean my kids are sweet (at times) but never ever any real trouble. I was blessed w/decent kids...

(dom dom dommmmmm)

I realize I'm out of my comfort zone. I want to be a tough parent...but sweet too. I want my child to know they can come to me no matter what. But yet I'm still the parent. There are boundaries to living in our house. Simple things like.....

No eating around the house or in your room....only at kitchen table. Not like they can't see the TV from the table...we have a great room Kitchen, Breakfast area, and Living Room all in one....So why do I find bowls around the house or kids sneaking upstairs with food. I mean hello? Have the rules changed since I made them last? And then I'm met with "Ohhh come on Mom!...I'll be careful!" (yeah right!) And get this...they do it anyway. Every day I find food bowls....and I'm ticked off. I mean heck fire it's summer and I don't to have to ground you, but I will not be disobeyed.

Curfews....I'm at a loss here. The pool has teen night once a month from 8-12pm. I feel like 11pm is long enough, but the boys like being with all their friends and so it's this battle of 'Your mom is mean' So I made a compromise...they need to be home at 11:30. The kids walk in groups so I feel ok about that. But I'm the type of mom that can't fall asleep until all little dude's are in their beds. UGH. So that got me thinking about REAL curfews. What on earth do you do when they want to go out with friends...like in a car? Deep sigh. Mine growing up was always 10pm. Even when I was a Senior. Try going to do anything for fun? Most kids don't leave until 9pm in the first place. But then again...there is nothing but trouble to get into after 12pm.

Don't get me started with chores. I waited too long to have kids do things...ie trash duty, dishes, sweep, (ohh clean up after themselves) pick up the house. If you walk past a piece of trash on the floor...don't walk over it...pick it up and throw it away. I feel like I'm in constant battle over chores. I now find they run from a room every time I need help. I feel resented and taken advantage of. I do so much for them and is it really that much for them to take the trash out for me when it's over flowing. I hear the "BUT I DID IT LAST TIME...SO AND SO HASN'T DONE ANYTHING" Or ...we've already unloaded the dishes twice today...why more. (deep sigh) I have no one to blame but myself for having lazy kids. Surely it's not too late to correct it.

Then we have the dreaded answer..."Does it matter" I swear if I hear my child say that one more time I'm gonna lose it. That's his answer to everything.....It grates on me. For instance, this morning he came home from spending the night at his friends at 7:28 am. WOW that seemed early ...since he usually sleeps until 10am at our house if not later. So all I did was ask..."wow why are you up and home so early?" His answer? "does it matter" ARRRRGHHH yes yes it does. So I pull out the ol' "Yes it does, because I'm your mom" phrase!

I think from now on....when he asks me a question and I say NO and he asks why? I'll say "does it matter?"

The oldest is like your trial an error...your experiment! Although you can't make a mistake...you can't start over so you can't mess up too badly.

Raising teens seems more challenging than I thought. But I'll never let them know that.