Seems that a lot of the kids are grounded these days. Some of them are pushing the envelope:  disobeying their parents, lying, doing things they’re not supposed to do.

Sounds like every teen movie ever made.

I guess it’s to be expected. TEENAGE REBELLION. But just because these are our kids doesn’t me we’re not going to freak out.

In fact, we’re  probably freaking out MORE because we remember what we were doing. And it wasn’t pretty. We know the risks we took, the scary places we went, the caution to the wind attitude we adopted from time to time.

And we live to tell the tale. Thankfully. I have spoken to more than one parent who, when reminiscing about their own teen years has said something like: "I don’t know why my parents let me do what I did." or "Where were my parents anyway?"

It was the 1970’s and EVERYONE, not just the kids, was rebelling. A lot of our parents were too busy with their own mishigas to worry about ours.

From what I know, parents of teens circa 2005 are hyper-focused on their children and extremely vigilant about their whereabouts. Sure, you hear about some loosey goosey parent types here and there. But they are surely in the minority these days. 

Teen parents circa 2005 are comfortable setting boundaries for their kids. SETTING LIMITS, that’s the child rearing mantra for this, the "What to Expect", Brazleton, and Penelope Leach generation (we hated the books but read them just the same).

We are blessed with the cell phone, an invention that has made it much easier to keep track of our roaming children.  It’s ten o’clock and we ALWAYS know where our children are. Or so we hope.

"Heloooo," my son answers hopefully, thinking I am one of his friends.
"Hi there," I say.
"Hi mom," he says loudly. I can hear his friends murmuring in the background, "Is it your mom, what does she want?"
"Where are you?" I ask…

And so it goes. But at least we’re in contact. For now,  at least, he always tells me where he is and gives me his estimated time of arrival home. And he’s usually just off by 20-minutes or so.

Teen parents circa 2005 worry, worry, worry. And they talk incessantly among themselves about their kids. We sigh a lot. And look for signs: Are they doing drugs? Drinking? Are they interested in sex, having it, obsessed with it?

Mostly, we wonder how it happened that, seemingly overnight, we became the parents of teens when we were just teens ourselves grappling with these very same things.

Some parents have it worse than others. The horror stories get passed around like cautionary nuggets. We get scared, wonder if we need to crack down a little more, set more boundaries. Worry some more.

And then we sigh. Because sighing feels good when you’re feeling a little bit overwhelmed.