During 2 AM feedings, many new parents find themselves wondering where the expression “sleep like a baby” came from. The good news is that there are actually a few years between the 5 AM feedings and the 5 AM hockey and soccer practices when you can sleep in till it's time to go to work.
Parenting is getting tougher. Ask a five-year-old if he broke the window, and now he's likely to say “No contest.” Instead of just taking the quarter when he looses a tooth, he may want to know if the tooth fairy works for the organ donor program. And it's perfectly normal for a five-year-old to think that the Pony Express is a service allowing someone to send her a pony with guaranteed overnight delivery. If your daughter watches lawyer dramas with you she may become concerned with outgrowing her imaginary friend, and fear getting slapped with a palimony suit. Ask a six-year-old girl what she wants to do when she grows up and she just may say she wants to be a criminal attorney and smell like her mom's magazines.
There's no question that kids are more advanced today than we were at their age. Ask some eight-year-olds if they want to be shown how to make a rainbow with a garden hose and they'll probably decline, but they may have a counter offer. For twenty bucks they could show you how to get free HBO with a paper clip.
Years ago kids played cops and robbers. Now they play cops and robbers and lawyers. At one time if a boy in high school was caught smoking, the punishment may have been to smoke a whole pack. If we tried that today, chances are he'd make it his goal to get caught necking with a cheerleader.
Dealing with kids has never been easy, but there are a few steps that can be followed. The first step to communicating with kids is to remove their ear buds. This will only work if they're not on a computer, cell phone or in front of a TV.
As for disciplinary techniques, if you mean to keep teenagers in the house it's worth a try hiding their hair care products. And remember, it's not really grounding a child to send him to a room equipped with a cable internet connection and a surround sound gaming system.
By the way, one of the most popular computer games involves kids trying to convince a parent that a new computer would help them with their homework. And this can be tempting. We want to help them with school work because it's great when kids stay in school, but not so great when they stay in one particular grade.
It's a jungle out there. Even when you take your kid to the movies you risk exposing him to bad language, violence and partial nudity. And that's just from the other kids in line waiting to get tickets.
Some say teenagers think they'll live forever. This is somewhat true, although at times they're convinced that they'll absolutely die if they don't get the latest pair of one hundred and sixty dollar cross training footwear. It would definitely be easier on our credit cards if the teens on the O. C. thought that bargains on clothes were cool.
These are just a few of the trials of parenting, among the countless joys that children bring. And let's not forget one of the most profound joys of parenting, which may very well be dropping the kids off at their grandparents for a while.
