Unsolicited Advice From the Deep End

If you EVER buy your 15 year old daughter one of your children, a new queen sized bed...
and you have to buy all new bedding because you don't have any other q.s.b.'s in the house...
and your husband orders suggests that you "Just go buy the stuff without her!"
Do yourself a HUMONGOUS favor...
Listen to his demands advice...

How do I know this?
Let me give you the quick rundown...

• New bed arrives
• Sister is visiting from NC
• She is on the same wavelength as husband
• I am a rebel.... I want to do things MY way (which incidentally in THIS case was a mistake)
• I say "It's HER (daughters) room, SHE should be there to see what she likes"

Here is where it gets ugly...

• Sister says "okay, great!"
• We go to first store and suggest 16 comforter sets... daughter looks and makes face similar to this:

I told you before, I get this one A LOT lately!!

• By store #5... yes, you heard right.... store #5, we've heard all kinds of negative reactions, including "I HATE polka dots with a burning passion!" and "Eeew! Stripes are sooooo ugly!" and let's not forget the texture critiques including the "Too" family - too bumpy, too scratchy, too slippery(?) ...don't ask... because I have NO idea!

• Sensing my breaking point, my sister becomes the voice of reason... "Just buy a set of sheets and deal with the comforter ANOTHER day" followed by the thought in her head, I'm sure, 'Another day after I'm gone!')

• Sheet's grabbed
• Home too late to cook - Pizza ordered
• Catch sister glancing at me with "Poor you" eyes
• TOTALLY embarrassed and want to strangle daughter

I couldn't even complain to husband because then I would have had to have listened to a 35 minute lecture on why once again I should obey listen to him!!

I'm safe though sharing my story with you, because he never reads my blog on his own!!

The end of the story was much happier!

• Sister and I go shopping ALONE... for OURSELVES!
• Happen to find comforter set that will work
• Buy comforter set
• Daughter loves it
  
  - I know because this is the look she gave me when I handed it to her:

What have we learned here:

1. There IS such a thing as being too accommodating to your kiddos...
2. 15 year olds can be pains in the butts...
3. Occasionally, my husband is right
4. $3000. can do wonders for your smile *see pic above where daughter just got her braces off!!

Dnt txt my phn agn... evr....

I received a very unusual text message last night...
Before I go any further, you probably should know a few facts that are
important to this story...

FACT #1
I have a cell phone...
My teenage daughter does not...
But she thinks it's ours...
But it's not...
It's mine...
and mine alone...

I'm not completely heartless...
I do allow her to use it when we are hanging out at home at night to text her friends, etc...
She's really good at it too...
She can have like, I don't know, 30 conversations going on at once...

And even though she is sucking the life out of me on a daily basis, simply because she is a teenage girl, she is a great kid...

FACT #2
I was a bit of a semi-wild child when I was a teenager...
But I always flew under the radar, thus lowering the chances of getting in trouble...
I'm sure you can see where this is heading...
Because I wasn't always a rule follower, quite frankly it's hard to get things past me...

Although my adult kids will now occasionally confess to one or two times when they pulled one over on me...
They think because they are fathers themselves that there's nothing I can do about it...
Au contraire! (that's fancy-french for "Yeah...Right!")
Because what I can do, is wait for Karma to come back around and bite them in the patoot (which is Jackie-talk for REAR END!)

Okay, back to my text message of late...
I will give you the script using STB for stupid teenage boy and CLM in place of completely livid mom...

Here goes -

STB - Can you sneak out tonight?
CLM - Umm.. STB, this is G's mom and sending my daughter text messages like this
ever, could be seriously hazardous to your health!
STB - Oh, sorry
CLM - You should be STB! This is not a good way to make a positive
impression on me or cause me reason to ever trust you!

Silence followed by crickets chirping occasionally...

END OF TRANSMISSION....

My darling (nosy) husband then asks "Who was that?"
Poor seriously STB, who now will be known as, PSSTB, will never again gaze into my daughter's beautiful brown eyes!
Because now he has not only seriously angered a mom,
but he's turned a father into a lion...
a big, scary lion with sharp claws and pointy teeth
(and all lions have those embarrassing 'male' parts that swing all over the place that are also quite intimidating!)
PSSTB has done all of this, with just a few words he typed out with his thumbs...

I don't expect we'll be seeing PSSTB ever again... if he knows what's good for him...

Sugar and Spice...

Having raised four boys, I have always felt like I had a handle on parenting…

If not a handle, maybe at the very least, a fire extinguisher to put out the fires of teenagerdom (not an actual word, but I’ve added it to my list of “should be’s” that I plan to send in to Webster’s very soon)

I must reiterate, however, the lack of clarity that I feel in the murky, unchartered waters that I am treading through in the deep end these days, due to the fact that I am dealing with a fifteen-year-old daughter…

My friend Karen has three daughters…
Whenever I mention new worries that come with having to deal with estrogen, other than my own (and mine could be dwindling as we speak, as I am reminded constantly by my headaches and strong urges to turn the thermostat below the 79 degree threshold that Tony tries to enforce (see here to fully understand)… I’m a rebel however, and it’s blowing like crazy at this very moment, because I’ve turned it to 78 again!) She waves her hand at me dismissively, as if to say "My Poor Little Grasshopper, When you can take the pebble from my hand, then you'll know"
Usually followed up with cryptic advice, delivered with a sly smile “Just Wait”

For what?! I ask… no, I demand to know!

Then she breaks down into maniacal laughter and walks away…
(Not really, but I seriously think that she wants to, because misery usually loves company)

My daughter is lovely…

Truly…

But as I’ve mentioned before, Girls are complicated creatures and quite frankly, I feel that I am in over my head for several reasons…

1) BOYS – okay… I adore my boys, but I also understand that their ploy to be any girls’ friend when they were teenagers meant one thing…. They LIKED them and wanted to KNOW them… and by “know them” I mean suck-face with. This knowledge has completely ruined my daughters’ chances for being allowed to hang out one on one with any of her guy friends…
NOT HAPPENING!
PERIOD!

2) Girls are waaayyyy more social, therefore I am constantly being bombarded with new names, faces and plans… It’s not unusual for the discussions to begin on Monday about what she wants to do on Friday, Saturday and Sunday….
It’s exhausting! Many times I put a crimp in the plan (because I am trying my very hardest to ruin her life and so it must be done to accomplish said task)

3) Three words:

• Premenstrual
• Menstrual
• Postmenstrual

It’s like a hormonal firestorm for at least 27 ½ days on any given month!



Having said all that…

I must also mention that I absolutely adore her and she is a joy (at this point, for at least 3 ½ days every month)

NOT really! She is a joy every single day and I am grateful that she’s mine!

At this stage of the game, most days, I can’t confidently say that I’m sure she feels the same about me…

But that’s okay…

Because according to my girl expert, Karen,

That means that I must be doing something right!