Your Teenager
In today’s society everyone has choices. What car to drive. What to wear. Who your friends are. Or even whether you will go to the gym or watch TV instead. Raising children isn’t as easy. The choice on how you raise your children is entirely up to you. Were your parents good examples or not? Usually this plays a important role in how you may fair as a parent. Have you ever stopped and asked yourself, “How I’m I doing as a parent”.
My hat is off for all single parents raising children in today’s society. The dual role reversal is practised almost everday. One minute you have to be the hammer and the next you’re nurturing your child because they finally realized what they had done.
About a month ago my daugther left a crazy message on my voicemail at work and the same on the home phone. It sounded something like this.
“Hi this is Cait, Goin’ to the plaza after school. Don’t ^$*((&&(&_who I’m $#$$@&)*_*++)(*&^(*^*%&$&*$*$&$$&#&#, See you soon???” The meat of the message was said so fast we couldn’t decipher it. There we sat not knowing whom she was with. What time should we expect her. Or even I’ll call you when I get to the plaza.
School was out for the day at 3:00pm it’s now 4:30pm and no phone call. My wife and I both starting worrying. Five o’clock and still no phone call. It’s cold and dark and we know she doesn’t have a large amount money with her. Five thirty and no Cait and no contact. Our two other children sat on the side lines watching Mom and Dad get all bent out of shape. ” You should ground her for month. Take away her computer. Make her pay Dad”. They cheered.
At 5:45pm Caitlin walked through the door. “Hi guys” She replied in a happy voice. My wife stopped what she was doing and just verbally unloaded on the poor soul. Then it was my turn. I stood before her, chest out and ready to inflict another verbal rath so severe that it would take her a month to recover. My mighty index finger stood erect ready to drop the hammer. “Before you start Dad can I say something”. “Please do Cait”. I said in a very nasty voice. “Do you remember last month when I was working on that project to send Christmas gifts to 3rd world countries”. “Yes go on”. “Well the school has entrusted me to shop for a few families here in our area and have given me $100.00 to do so”.
What about a phone call to let us know where and or when your will be coming homing. “I didn’t have any of my own money left and didn’t want to use the school’s”.
No matter how we tried to justify our position Caitlin’s replies came from her heart. You just can’t compete with that. Later as my wife and I had a chance to calm down Cait came to us and said,”I know I’ve caused both of you some grief today so if you need to punish me that’s OK”. By this time we are both feeling a little ashamed of our actions and were looking for a chance to rebuild this lack of trust with her. “No Caitlin that’s fine, let’s all agree to ask questions first, and take action later”.
Going forward we learnt that trust and communication are the corner stones our the family unit. If we can help you not make the same mistake then the thirty minutes it took to write this blog was well worth it.
Thank you
Frank Joseph.
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