Texture in a Can and 15 Days

I went to the library yesterday to return some books, and I recognized the librarian. We had both been to a Christmas party at the house of a mutual friend. I couldn't remember his name, but I went over to say hi. He looked at me like he recognized me, and when I walked over to him he said, "Texture in a can?" It turns out that we had also had dinner together at our friend's house last summer when I was remodeling my brand new bedroom. I had to peel off all the old, ugly wallpaper, underneath which was just flat, ugly drywall. So I needed to buy something to make the walls bumpy like the rest of the house...I needed texture in a can. Once he said that I remember laughing together about how odd that phrase sounded, but what is really funny is that this guy has been walking around town for a year remembering me only as the girl who needed texture in a can.

I'm back blogging after nearly two months. The last half of April and the first half of May were really bad, and I couldn't think of anything to write about except depressing things. It's mostly because Aimee's attendance at school had been even spottier than usual, and I didn't know what to do about it. In May, she missed almost two weeks straight. It was awful. She was depressed and was just sleeping all day, and I was depressed and couldn't focus at work. But finally we worked it out. I'm still not sure what the problem was, but we went to the counselor's on Thursday, May 15th, and he asked me why it bothered me so much when she didn't go to school. Now, this might sound like a really stupid question, as obviously not going to school is not a good thing, but I think he was trying to help me get Aimee to understand why I was so upset. It must have worked because as I bawled about how she wasn't happy when she stayed at home and how when she went to school she talked with her friends and played sports and read her books, she got this odd look on her face. And since that day, she has had perfect attendance! I don't know if she had put up such a roadblock about going to school that she forgot that even the worst day at school with her friends was more fun than staying at home by herself or if she finally realized that we were worried about her and not her grades (although I was worried about her flunking out), but whatever it was she has been one determined girl these past three weeks. 15 days of straight attendance with full plans to finish the school year next week. Yay for Aimee!

While we were all fighting, yet trying to have the same result of helping Aimee get better, I read some books on teenage parenting. Her counselor recommended them to me, and I think they should be mandatory reading for anyone who even considers having kids. They are called Get Out of My Life!, But First Can You Take Me & Cheryl to the Mall? and Yes, Your Teen is Crazy: Loving Your Kid without Losing Your Mind. (Most people probably start with the books about cute babies, but I think they should start with the end of childhood and work backward if they want to make a really informed decision about whether or not they want kids.) Both of them talk about the relatively recent research that validates the theory that 95% of a child's brain is developed by about age 12--but the last 5% is the most advanced part of the brain and takes another 8 years to develop. So being (and raising) a teenager is hard because their bodies have gotten to be adult-sized, so people start expecting them act like rationale adults, when in fact they physically and mentally can't do it yet. They experience periods of craziness where they honestly don't know what they want. They want to make all their own decisions, yet at the same time that prospect terrifies them because they aren't ready to make all their own decisions--yet heaven forbid that they could actually tell someone they are in this dilemma. This accounts for the moodiness and attitude from many teenagers. They used to talk with their parents, but right now their parents are the last people they want to see because the very existence of parents remind teenagers that they actually aren't in control of their own lives, that they couldn't survive on their own. Yet at the same time they need to be taught how to do this--but not directly because they can't accept direct advice. Good grief.

Now this might sound obvious to some of you, but we must remember that I was never a teenager. And it might sound depressing to some of you since it pretty much guarantees that the teenage years will be awful no matter how well you raise them (although the comforting thing both books emphasized was that most teens revert back to all the good training they had once their brains finally become normal again). But it was really comforting to me because it meant that my sister wasn't treating me like dirt on purpose and she wasn't intentionally trying to ruin her life--these were just unfortunate side effects (combined with some depression, which made them all worse). It was one of the hardest things I ever had to do, but I had to change the way I thought about parenting and rules and being in control (I admit it--I am the oldest and I like it when people do what I tell them to do). The books (and for the record, normally I don't blindly follow books like that, but in this case everything they were saying seemed to fit so perfectly with how she was acting that I decided to trust them) talked about how the way someone parents has to change when they raise teenagers. The rules can't stay the same, and suddenly everything is up for negotiation because teens need practice negotiating their own decisions. I've learned never to say "No" unless it was a matter of life and death, that absolutely everything else needed to be negotiated because she was going to do whatever she wanted if I said no. But if she felt like she had some choices, then the entire endeavor of talking about something was much more positive, even if she ended up doing what she would have in the first place (remember, anything except life or death goes). It took enormous amounts of effort, was absolutely exhausting, and many days I didn't particularly like my sister and felt like telling her to start walking to Virginia, but you would be amazed at how well she responded. And Scott helped me through it all the way. Aimee doesn't know it, but she would probably be dead if it weren't for him.


I watched March of the Penguins with my friends a few years ago, and I remember thinking that if I were a penguin and in charge of the penguin world, I would have called it quits: "Sorry all, but the men sitting outside for three months in -200 degree temperature balancing eggs on their toes while the women risk being eaten is just stupid and not worth inflicting on another generation. No one hatch any eggs this season, and we'll just try to enjoy our last few years on this ice cube." I felt a lot like that when Aimee and I were having problems. Being and raising a teenager is just stupid and not worth the effort, so we should just all do ourselves a big favor and quit now. But of course, now that she is doing so much better I realize that it was so worth the effort. I'm not saying I would have minded if someone else made the effort, and I'm not naive enough to think that someone won't have to make the effort again--she does have 4 more years before her brain finally stabilizes, after all--but at least I'm not wishing for the end of our species any more.