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Kady McMaster
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This last weekend provided yet another stellar example of my parenting skills.
Our oldest is 13, and this school year has been a challenge. Between his sometimes-surly attitude and sudden dearth of communication regarding his classes at school, my husband and I feel like we’re raising a brick wall.
Here’s a little look at a typical after-school conversation:
Me: Hi, Sweetie! How was your day?
Surly 13-year-old: All right.
Me, asking a question I already know the answer to: What kind of homework do you have tonight?
Surly, reading his text messages: I don’t know.
Me: I love you!
Surly: (unintelligible mumbling…)
I’m a well-known neurotic, especially with the first kid. If that boy makes it to adulthood without any deep-seated neuroses of his own, it’ll be a miracle. And it’s all because – against my better judgment, against the advice of the myriad parenting experts I’ve consulted, against my gut – I keep doing things like asking my 13-year-old point-blank whether he’s using drugs.
Yes. That’s right. Go ahead, mock me and pity my children.
Here’s how it went down:
Surly Boy had been acting like he smelled something bad every time he got near us. He was picking on his siblings and picking fights with his dad and me and talking back and – in hindsight – pretty much acting his age.
I knew he was pretty much acting normally. You wouldn’t believe the number of parenting magazines I read. Or the numbers of parenting books I’ve read. Or how many parenting classes I’ve gone to.
However, there’s a little voice inside my head that second-guesses my every move. And sometimes, at the worst possible times, that little voice speaks.
And that’s when it happened. I just blurted it out: “Are you using drugs?”
Surly Boy just stared at me with incredulity and a little bit of hurt in his eyes. “I can’t believe you think I’d use drugs,” he said.
And I couldn’t believe it, either – that I thought that or that I’d said that out loud.
It reminded me of the time during my senior year of high school that I got sick with the stomach flu before school one day. I was lying on the floor, hugging the toilet, when my mom stopped in on her way to work.
I remember her peering down at me over her glasses and saying, “You’re not pregnant, are you?”
I was speechless. Not only was I appalled that my mom would ask her 17-year-old daughter that question, but I also had not had a date in a year. I mean, really.
But I guess in my mom’s way, she was just putting the worst-case scenario out there, figuring she’d just face it head-on, in case I answered in the affirmative. Maybe I was doing the same thing with Surly Boy.
And maybe I just figured out why I have this little voice in my head that speaks up sometimes. It’s genetic.
I’m blaming my mom. Thanks, Mom.
See what I mean about the parenting guilt?
LOL! I did the same thing with my daughter and she was so indignant with me! I told her that a.) it was my job to ask and be concerned and 2.) I hd been her age once and back then I unfortunately did not make good decisions, so I had to ask. I must be doing something right so far, I am so glad the learning curve has a large gap!So funny! Hey, just figure that your kids will need SOMETHING to tell the therapist, so you go girl.
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