To Date or Not To Date? That Is The Question

My 12 year-old son is dating.  There.  I wrote it.  He (and I) have stepped out of he safe-zone of playdates and into the minefield of t(w)een dating.  I knew this day would come eventually, but I have to admit that I wasn't expecting it to arrive this soon.  Within minutes of consenting to this new development in his social life I found myself trolling the internet searching for reassurance that I was not a "terrible parent" and that my decision was OK.  My search confirmed two things:

1. There is a lot of information out there on teen dating - a Google search using the terms "teen dating" returned 21.3 million results compared to 6.6 million results for the terms "teen drug use"
2. There is a lot of disagreement among parents about WHEN to allow teens to date

My first finding is what led me to write this blog post.  Since I am now the parent of a dating t(w)een I consider myself just as entitled to an opinion as the other 21.3 million or so  people that seem to have one.  My second finding was the one that truly intrigued me.  When should we allow our kids to date?

After sifting through hundreds of web pages containing scholarly articles, excerpts from parenting books, advice from counselors & therapists, and blog posts from parents, I concluded that, as is the usual case in the wonderful world of parenting, there isn't one right answer.  Most indicated that 16 or so was about the right age.  A few suggested that 11 or 12 was OK.  Some deferred to the individual parent and recommended that the decision be made on a "case by case" basis.  So where did that leave me?  Mostly, it left me wondering if I had made the right decision.

Several weeks have passed since my son's initial announcement and I am now quite confident that I made the right decision...at least the right decision for us.  What follows is my rationale:

• My son's definition of dating is NOT what most define as dating.  The consensus adult definition of dating involves two people going out on dates...alone.  My son's definition is somewhat more informal, dating means that you like each other and hang out together (largely at school and occasionally on the weekends under adult supervision).
  
• We let 15 year-olds drive vehicles capable of killing someone (with adult supervision).  16 year-old get to drive solo! We let 12 year-olds ride their bikes on the roads that are driven on by the aforementioned 15 year-old.  We leave 12 year-olds home on their own while we do the food shopping or run chores.  We even let them babysit other people's children at that age.  So why not let them date?
  
• As far as physical intimacy is involved, I have been clear from the beginning that at his age, in relative privacy, holding hands is OK, having your arm around your partner is OK, even the odd peck on the cheek is OK in my book (after all, I often greet my friends that way - it's a European thing :-)
  
• When I asked him about PDA (public displays of affection) he was clear that hand holding was OK, having your arm around your partner was OK, but kissing, embracing, groping, etc were completely out of the question. I believe his exact words were something like, "it makes me uncomfortable when I see other people do that so why would I" (If I had an emoticon for sigh of relief I would include it here!)
  
• As a parent, my biggest fear is more about emotional entanglement.  This was the most difficult hurdle for me to overcome.  Was my son really ready for the hardship and heartbreak of relationships?  I'm in my mid 40s and I still don't deal well with relationship issues all the time.  Relationships at any age are hard work and are sometimes painful.  There is no way around it.  Why not let him start learning now, while the lines of communication between us are still strong and functional?  Why not coach him through his first experiences dealing with romantic relationships while he will still allow me to?

So here I am, navigating the minefield, waiting for the first bomb to go off.  I'll keep you posted.

New Beginnings

When I started this blog several weeks ago, I began it will all the best intentions.  I intended on posting a new entry every week.  I intended on recruiting other authors to join me.  I intended on quickly building up a community of followers.  It was all going according to plan until... the new school year started! I am a middle school educator so as you would expect, August and September are usually very busy months.  I am also the parent of a middle school student and I, like most other parents got caught in the "Back To School Vortex" only to emerge this weekend.  So I began thinking about how wonderful it is that life often presents us with opportunities to begin again.  We simply need to snatch them up, wipe the slate clean, and start over.  The beginning of a new year, the start of school, the first day of fall, another Monday, a beautiful sunrise, a new breath - think about how many new beginning are there for the taking!

This morning presented the perfect new beginning for my blog.  The start of a new school year presents a golden opportunity to establish new routines, negotiate new rules/guidelines, and break old, destructive patterns with your teen or tween.  Perhaps you could try a new morning routine that gets everyone out the door without feeling rushed or stressed.  Maybe your child needs a different homework routine in order to ensure that he or she is meeting the academic challenges of the new school year.  Maybe this is the right time to agree on how your family will handle evening meals - will you all eat together?  how often? what's on the menu?

My challenge for this week is for each of us to begin again in at least one area of interaction with our kids.  Identify a routine or a pattern that needs work and talk to your adolescent about it.  Agree to try a new approach for a set period of time and then review progress.  Remember that the beauty of new beginnings is that they come up all the time, so don't get too hung up on finding the right approach immediately.  You will have another opportunity to begin anew tomorrow...or maybe even in the next moment.

Yes They Can

I am writing to you on my BlackBerry from Plymouth, MA where I am half-way through a 10 day road trip with 18 adolescents. Over the course of the trip I have had the opportunity to really observe these young people in action. They have been responsible for setting up camp, cooking & serving meals, navigating new places, and taking care of each other. My message to you this week is "yes they can". They are truly capable of so much more than we give them credit for. I've seen these young people rise to great challenges, and figure out the answers to difficult questions on their own.
Two of these young people (12 years old) got separated from the rest of the group as we traveled through Times Square, NYC on our way to a Broadway play. We immediately alerted police and began searching. Twenty minutes later the crisis was over. The two young ladies had found their way to the theater safe and sound. They had received no formal training in what to do if they got lost, had never been to NY, and were half as tall as the throngs of people surrounding them. Armed with common sense and self-confidence they made some choices and solved their own predicament. It is not an experience I ever want to repeat, but these two young ladies taught me an invaluable lesson: our kids are capable and powerful and strong. They don't need us as much as we think. Mostly they need us to believe in them and give them opportunities to spread their own wings. YES THEY CAN.

Michele
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

How Embarrassing

My parents were an embarrassment, or at least that's how I felt about them when I was a teen.  They knew nothing about anything, they said the stupidest things, and they wore awful clothes.  When we walked around town together, I would often walk a few paces behind them hoping that people wouldn't notice that we were together.  A couple of weeks ago, the shoe was on the other foot.  I had become the embarrassing parent as my twelve-year-old admonished me for dancing at a concert that we attended together.  I know what you are thinking...what would ever possess me to dance at a concert? What an absurd thing to do.  I mean really, DANCE at a concert?  For the record, I plead guilty to the offense and express no remorse or regret.  Back in the "good old days", when I was young, I remember dancing at many concerts.  How was I to know that in his world this was considered an embarrassing public display?  I also pointed out to him that we didn't know any of these people and would probably never see them again.  "That doesn't matter", he retorted and reminded me that as a parent I couldn't possibly understand what I was putting him through.

Once he settled down (several hours later) we were able to discuss "the incident" more calmly and I discovered a couple of  interesting incites:

1) Dancing at concerts is neither illegal nor uncool.  In fact, you'll be surprised to hear that many young people do it today.  I even caught my son doing it at another concert we attended recently!  Thank goodness for that.

2) Being embarrassed has nothing to do with other people...at least not directly.

Embarrassment is a feeling, an emotion that is born and resides within our own person.  I may have triggered my son's embarrassment, but the feeling is his to own not mine to take responsibility for.  I have read many articles and parenting books that advocate refraining entirely from doing anything that might embarrass your child during these emotionally sensitive years.  Really?  Am I really supposed to give up my identity (the way I dress, dance, act) in order to shield my child?  Before you jump to his defense, please know that I am not advocating a total sense of disregard for other people's emotions and sensibilities, nor am I suggesting that we should go out of our way to embarrass and humiliate our teens, or anyone else for that matter, at every opportunity.  I am, however, suggesting that when these embarrassing moments arise (and they will), they create opportunities to talk and connect with your teen.  I don't want to give up who I am in order to spare him embarrassment, but equally, I need to honor who he is and not expect him to give up or hide his identity in order to spare me embarrassment. Stephen Levine said it best:
 
"Embarrassment is just that—embarrassment. We need to have mercy on ourselves. We all feel embarrassed. Actually, when we do speak about these things, when we do share our embarrassment, we experience relief. The holding back is what is hard.... We need to be able to trust relationships. If two people can share their embarrassments, what a bond that creates."

—Stephen Levine, "Living the Life You Wish to Live" (Tricycle Magazine, Spring 2009)

So don't be afraid to embarrass and be embarrassed every now and again.  It is the stuff that relationships are made of.

Peace & Courage

Introducing "Caught In B T(w)een"

"Ora na azu nwa". This saying from the Igbo people of Nigeria is echoed in different languages throughout the African continent, and indeed throughout the world.  Roughly translated it means "it takes a village to raise a child".

I created the Caught In B T(w)een blog space in order to build and encourage a far-reaching village to help each of us guide our children through adolescence and into adulthood.  The blog title, "Caught In B T(w)een", reflects the challenges and difficulties that teens and tweens face caught between childhood and adulthood and acknowledges the stresses that caring adults face when caught between holding on and letting go.  It is also a wink and a nod to teen speak... or rather teen text.  BCUZ U C, we all need to LOL every now and then, or life Bcomes a GR8 big bore!

I will post weekly and will recruit other parents, educators & professionals to contribute articles as well.  Feel free to comment on what you read and make suggestions about topics you might want to see covered in future posts.  Invite others to join and feel free to share what you read here with others, that's the whole point.  So please join the conversation and together we can build a village.

The web address is: http://caughtinbtween.blogspot.com