Teenagers

There are just about 7 school weeks left before the girl child is supposed…I say supposed to graduate 8th grade and move on to a public high school. Currently she is on academic probation, and displaying a pretty poor attitude about school and life in general. Having little patience for excuses as to why she’s got bad grades, much to her dismay, I am requiring weekly progress reports.

After a Friday afternoon announcement that she and a girlfriend had plans to take in a weekend movie, I reminded her that I had asked her all week long to clean up her bedroom, before the Child Protective Services came for me as no child should be subjected to living in that kind of environment. Nor should the ants. And….since it still had not been accomplished we weren’t discussing any weekend activities.

I then asked to see the progress report.

Hmmmm. I am proud to say that my daughter is becoming much better at expressing her emotions and I am sure her therapist would be pleased. I was able to clearly hear and understand her issues. She hates the school, her teachers are sooooo stupid and totally unreasonable, as am I! However, we must have further discussion with her counselor about the fact she has not yet fully realized the necessity to take responsibility for one’s actions, or in this case, lack thereof. We’ll continue to work on that.

So, upon realizing that mom was not impressed with the fact that she still had missing assignments, the same poor grades that were reported last week, and a Science Project not yet started that is due this coming Tuesday, I calmly informed her that she would not be going anywhere for at least one week.

It was at that time, once she’d finished with the silent treatment, that I was able to see that she was becoming even more expressive about how she truly feels. This lasted way into the night, with at least 4 tearful and heroic attempts to get me to change my unreasonable mind about her restricted activities. As I wouldn’t relent, she finally gave up about midnight with a swift slam of my bedroom door.

My father used to say that it’s a lot easier to get good or decent grades than it is to get bad ones. Basically, he said, if you just put a little effort into doing the work and turn it in, that’s about all you have to do and the grades will follow. Then your teachers are happy, your parents are happy and YOU are happy, because they aren’t on your case all the time and life is good.

I don’t know if this child is going to grasp the concept, but we’ll keep trying.

Thank God this is my last teenager!