Search Results for: experimentation
How To Raise A Teenager Without Losing Your Mind
Most parents do not relish parenting teenagers. Teaching them to drive is terrifying. Catching them drinking – and puking – for the first time is appalling. The horrors of teenage sexuality. The surliness, the lying, the sleeping until 3 pmDealing with teenagers is a grind, a bore, something to be SURVIVED.But I love being a parent to teenagers, as I recently told Michel Martin on NPRs Tell Me More.There was a parenting roundtable …
Why Sexting is Not Child Porn
It’s horrifying to parents: why would our children WANT others to see naked pictures of them? Why do we have to even TALK to our children about the many reasons that voluntarily taking, sending, or sharing nude pictures is not in any child’s best interest? But despite our horror over this digital and cultural divide…
Should You Go to Jail If Your Teen Drinks?
The story I’m about to tell is not unusual. But it’s personal, tragic, and common, repeating itself almost every day throughout our country. We parents need to pay better attention. Three summers ago, a picture surfaced of then-candidate for Maryland governor, Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler, at a party attended by his teenaged son. The…
Great Holiday Topic: Teens, Pregnancy and STIs
Here's a fun dinner table theme to tender as you and your loved ones gather for the holidays: the risks of teenagers having sex. Imagine it: “Aunt Mabel, did you know that 47% of high schools students have had sex, but only 22% have ever been tested for HIV?” Parenting teenagers can, at times, feel…
When Getting Fired Is Good News
Once a year, I head to a different kind of back-to-school night: our school’s drug and alcohol homily for parents. Thank goodness the school offers this parenting supplement. Otherwise, I’d know nothing. Most kids at our school are smart enough to avoid blatant intoxication in front of adults. But with several drug and alcohol awareness…