02/20/98

You Reap What You Sow

In response to "Teens Need More Adult Guidance"

For some parents the teen years do not spell m-i-g-r-a-i-n-e. Instead, they spell j-o-y. Consider the following opinion of teens by a parent who says, "You reap what you sow."

People with children who are not yet teenagers sometimes ask me, "Well, what's it like? Are the teen years as bad as I've heard?" They know I have a son who's 17, and they also know he's a great kid, so they want to find out in private from me what the true story is.

My answer is always the same. "I read in the newspaper about teenagers doing negative things, and as a parent, I can't relate to it at all." My experience has been that my son has become more a joy to be with as he has grown older.

He can wear you out talking to you, and sometimes he is overly intense when he's complaining about the world, but I said to my husband years ago, "Let's be thankful he's talking to us, pouring his heart out, because he knows that we love him no matter what." I do believe that parents can take a lot of the credit if their teenager is well-behaved and has a positive attitude.

I'm grateful to my husband for telling both of our sons many years ago that when they turned 18 he would discuss the possibility of getting their driver's licenses. Until then they would be driven by us. Neither one of our sons ever argued against this. The 17 year old says he's glad he doesn't have to worry about driving, on top of worrying about his studies at an academically challenging high school.

When he turned 16, everyone asked him about getting his license. He explained that his father had set a rule many years earlier that he had to abide by. His father and I divide up the driving, so that one of us drives him to school in the morning and the other drives him home. That way we each get private time with him. Sometimes we don't say much in the car, but many times we have had heart-to-heart talks in the intimate space that a car provides. I know that all too soon he will be on his own, and I cherish the time we have with him.

Several of my friends have sent their teenagers to boarding schools. To me, this is the same thing as throwing a kid out of the house and telling a kid you don't want him or her in your life anymore. The excuses for sending kids to boarding schools are many and varied, always phrased as if the decision is being made in the teen's best interest. But I truly think that the decision to do this is, in most cases, in the parents' best interest and represents rejection. I wonder how the teenager who has been packed off to boarding school will respond when his or her parent needs care but does not want to go to a nursing home. Will the child make the selfless decision to reorganize his or her personal life around caring for the aging parent? I doubt it!

Teenagers need even more love than babies because a parent's love for a teen must be shown in a thousand ways that include well-articulated thoughts. Sometimes we are empathetic friends to our son; sometimes we are parents making clear what we consider acceptable behavior; always we are guides on the journey of life. I thought the teen years were going to be the worst; but I'd now say the teenage years are the best years for a parent. These are the years when the investment of time and love given over and over again during childhood pays dividends for parents. -- You Reap What You Sow

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