Dear 21st Century Dad, I feel like I live inside an on line video game. I have two teenage boys, 16 and 17. Their bedrooms and their play space are in the basement. There is a coterie of five boys that my two sons have over as regular visitors, and they also sleep over a lot.
Several other teens I don’t know will come in and out the back door entrance to the basement. It’s almost a parade. The other evening I stopped a teen I had never met before. He walked in smoking. Into my non smoking house! I told him to lose the cigarette. He treated me like a nuisance and I had to tell him three times to leave. I own the house! What’s going on?
Dear Occupied Territory,
We deserve applause for opening up our house to our teenagers’ friends. To us, the main benefit is obvious. We have more control over our teen’s activities in house, and we get to see them more than most parents. Lucky us. Our teens are safe.
Must the price for defusing parental anxiety be so irritating? Our teenagers are abusing privileges not accessible to their friends. We need to renegotiate the terms for hosting a youth club. Take back our house. Immediately.
And why not use a little pizzazz to make the point?
Notify them that there will be a house meeting at whatever convenient designated time the next day. Tell them a surprise is in order, and they should invite their friends. Keep the curve on our lips pointed upwards and maintain a gleam in our eyes.
Let’s initiate some guerrilla tactics and execute an unexpected surprise strike!
1. Can we afford to hire a house cleaner to sanitize the public area in the basement? Hire the cleaner when the boys are at school. The boys can pay for the cleaner’s wages by accepting partial reductions in their allowances, or they can offer up suggestions on how they will pay us back.
2. Let’s remove the television, the computer, and the game players to a safe place outside the house. Get all the electronics.
3. Buy enough hot pizzas at the designated meeting time to feed the two teenagers, their friends, and the parents of the friends that regularly use our basement. Notify the parents what will be the topic of the meeting, and suggest perhaps they can add to the pizza with a pot luck
With all concerned present, we can establish the ground rules that will be the boy’s new club rules. Let’s start with the easiest accomplishment.
1. How do they intend to limit the number of strange teens coming in and out of the house?
2. How will they schedule visitation nights, curfew times, non smoking and no drug regulations, on or near by the property?
3. How will they keep their hang out clean? Suggest scheduled cleaning times, or, inquire how do they intend to pay for a cleaner?
Between bites of pizza, the boys will have lots to say about their displeasure, and no doubt will want to know the source location of their prized sound machines. At this point with smiles on our faces, we can suggest the boys will get their equipment back after three days of silence, and, if and only do they agree to address our primary concerns. The next question is the topper!
4. How do they deal with 100 uninvited kids showing up at the door? We need a broad plan that may involve calling help from our children’s parents, or even the police. Take suggestions from parents and teens alike.
When the children have solved the issues of who comes to our house, and how do they maintain responsible actions, we must look at our parental obligations. We have to secure our house against teen thieves. Our jewelry, credit cards, cash and other possessions can be too tempting to the morally less inclined teens. We must empty our liquor cabinets. We must make our house extremely unattractive to covetous eyes.
Does that impose difficulties that we, as parents, shouldn’t have to experience?
Yes.
The price of knowing our teens are safe is worth it.
Google:
1. Parents Together Self Help Group of BC
2. Parent Support Services of BC - Parent Support Vancouver BC ...
3. Several excellent sites respond to Family Meeting.
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