Say no to teen keg parties
Dear Readers: This week I am running “Best Of” columns while I’m on book tour, meeting readers of my memoir, “Strangers Tend to Tell Me Things,” which is now out in paperback.
Dear Amy: I am the mother of a 15-year-old daughter. She’s a freshman at a prestigious private school. She has great grades and generally makes very good choices. I have never heard anything from her about trying drugs or alcohol, but the other day she asked me if it was “cool with me” that she attended a kegger every once in a while.
I am torn because since she chose to go from public to private school, she sees these keggers as a social event (and nothing else). What should I do? Distraught Mom
Dear Distraught: Really, you are torn about whether to give your 15-year-old daughter permission to attend keg parties?
Drinking puts your daughter at risk for the following: personal or vehicle injury, sexual activity, sexual assault, pregnancy and arrest. You say: “Absolutely not. I am definitely not cool with it.” And then you talk about choices, healthy and unhealthy ones.
You should appeal to her to be someone who faces these choices with integrity. And you should also tell her that if you learn she has been drinking, or around drinking, there will be unpleasant consequences for her, coming from you — the “uncool” mom. — September 2015
Dear Amy: Our child, a 26year-old son, lives at home. He works part time and can afford gas, car insurance and outings with his friends. We pay for his other expenses.
He sleeps until 11 a.m., when I knock on his door to wake him. He claims to have issues sleeping at night and says he can’t get going in the morning, but his dad and I feel he will ruin his life if he does not start living during the daytime.
He is pleasant but will only do chores he likes. If he got a full-time job, or worked two part-time jobs to become independent enough to pay a fair share (or be able to move out), we would feel easier about his ability to exist without us taking care of him.
How can we make him hear us? He walks away when we discuss anything serious. He says he can’t deal with it.
Can you please add your voice to ours? Upset Mom
Dear Mom: Well, I’m shouting pretty loudly on my end, but not at your son. My voice is directed toward his parents. You refer to and treat your son as a “child.” He is 26 years old.
I suggest that you and your husband should wake up and finally treat your son like an adult. You didn’t prepare him for adult life when he was younger, and now he needs his mommy to knock on his door at 11 a.m. to roust him out of bed.
He needs a plan, but you should not provide it. Give him a timetable for moving out. Tell him, “You’re a grown man. You have two months to move out. We will give you the car but not pay any other expenses. You can make it.”
If you can’t bear to part with him, present a nonnegotiable of working 40 hours a week while living at home. Nonnegotiables only work when attached to consequences.
Cheer him on from the sidelines. He may flounder. But he will have to figure things out. And he will. —October 2013