Being a Mom is not the easiest job in the world, especially if you have more than one child. Having to deal with more than one personality type, and trying to figure out what will work with each type, is kind of like learning to be a mother all over again, for each child. What works for one, will not work for another. And then, they start becoming teenagers!
When I started having children, at first I thought I was only going to have one. When I remarried and realized I was going to be having more, I made the conscience decision to space them at least 5 years apart. My middle child, in birth as in life, didn't want to cooperate and didn't make it an even 5,5,5... He's off by one year. But there are 10 years and 10 days between the first and the last. It wasn't until I had the last child (my third) that I realized from the birth of the first to the 18th birthday of the last, I will have had children in my home for 28 years and thought, "what was I thinking?" But now that I am dealing with my oldest, who is now 17 years old, I am once again glad that I chose to space them apart.
I believe that my mother cursed me when I was a teenager and she was at her wits end. She said to me, in a moment of frustration, "I hope when you have kids, you have all boys and they turn out worse than you and your brother!!!" With each pregnancy, hoping and praying for a girl but discovering that I was having a boy, I knew that my mother's curse was going to come to fruition. So, I've been bracing myself for the tough times that were sure to come.... because I remember what we were like as teenagers with me being the emotional one and my brother being the manipulative lying one, and I just knew I was going to be in trouble!!
My oldest, who has been in what is generally considered the troubled teen years for two years now, has not been much of a problem. In fact, he's been so easy to deal with, that for just a few moments, I thought maybe the curse wasn't going to be that bad. But alas, I was wrong. Turns out, he's just a late bloomer.
Apparently, he's in love. Of course, you and I know that this isn't true love... not yet. But he's so desperately in love that he wants to spend every spare moment with her. I mean, what teenage boy who has lost his heart wouldn't want to spend every spare moment with the person of his affections? The problem is that she lives on the other side of town... and I mean, waaaayyyyyy on the other side of town. When he takes the bus to see her, it takes him 2 to 3 hours to get there. Also, she's older than he is, and apparently has children. As a mother, my first instinct is to say no! I want to protect him from the fall that is inevitably coming. But as a student of Novus, I know that this experience is in his path for a reason and he needs to follow his path. Also, he's almost an adult and will have to go this alone very soon so I have to learn to let go. Trying to be a fair and reasonable mother, I tried to come to an agreement with him. I told him, if he could act like an adult, with adult responsibilities, then I would concede to letting him spend time with her as long as we don't have anything else on the schedule. He said he could agree to that.
Then, while I was at open house last night with the two younger boys, he texts me... "you said if I was going to sneak out I should just go out the front the door and I won't get into trouble." I immediately become suspicious. First of all, that's not at all what I said, but I understand that as a teenage boy, that's what he heard. Second, I have a good idea I know where he's going ... or where he wants to go. But, being of an open mind, I text back, "where are you going?" He texts, "Jenns." I blow a gasket! Now I have to call him because everything that I want to say will not fit into one text. Plus I can't type fast enough on a phone to satisfy my growing anger. The first thing out of my mouth is, "that's not a very adult decision, don't you think?" I ended the phone call with, "You are still my son, you are still a minor and I am still responsible for you. You are absolutely not going out tonight and we'll talk about it when I get home." Of course, I wasn't calm when I said it. As soon as I got home and walked in the door, I said, "What do you want me to do? Throw my hands up in the air and say okay whatever you want to do is okay with me? Cuz that's not gonna happen!" I won't go through the entire conversation, but I will say this: There was a lot of yelling (on my part), a lot of tears (on his part) and I found myself wishing my mother hadn't cursed me!
And all the while, I keep thinking, "I have to do this two more times???" Out loud what I said was, "THIS IS NOT FAIR!" I seem to recall having said that when I was a teenager. Talk about coming full circle!
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