On Raising Teenagers

I remember thinking that trying to raise little kids was SO MUCH WORK.

Now, I look at my friend with 2 young ones, and all her frustrations, and I smile knowingly. I enjoy their defiance, laugh at their tantrums, and teach them all kinds of worldly things beyond their years. It's all relative.

My 2 oldest are a girl, 14 (15 in 2 months) and a boy, 13. They are lovely, sweet, kind kids. But we are in the throes of adolescence in our house, it is rubbing off on our 9 year old, and I feel like we are completely ganged up on.

Our kids don't have many things...no gameboys, or xboxes, or Wiis. We have a small house, the boys share a room, one tv, one family computer (though both my husband and i have laptops for work). I don't think they are spoiled. They have things they want, like skiis and snowboards (usually second hand), and they get to participate in the sports they like, but that is mostly because I feel that fitness is important, not because we are competitive.

But the mood swings, the attitude, the defiance, the challanges...they are constant, and they are so draining. When I am at work, I have to call home and make sure they are doing their chores. The rules set down one day don't matter the next, unless we remind them of them. You ask them to do something, they argue about it, until one of us has to put our foot down, and then we are "jerks." Yesterday, my son told my husband to fuck off when he was trying to get him to do something.

Finding appropriate consequences for such unacceptable behavior is also difficult, when they don't really have that much to take away. They have all lost their computer priveleges for the week, but the 2 oldest have to use the computer to do homework, and they are constantly sneaking on the internet. I suppose I could delete their facebook accounts, but I don't even have their passwords to do it. Plus, I feel that that goes beyond what is called for, and will lead to sneakiness that I don't want to have. They will start another account, only this time I won't be able to see it, or know about it. Not something I want to happen.

It is a constant challenge, trying to find and maintain the balance between molding their behaviors and having appropriate consequences for their transgressions, and allowing them to grow as individuals, encourage their expression of their SELVES, and to respect that they DO need some space, and DO need to defy us, to a certain extent.

And I have yet to find a blog that addresses this. All of the blogs I read are mainly parents of little ones. They don't address these issues.

Parenting. It's not for sissies.