Conference turris::womannotes-v2

    This questions' rhetorical, right?
    
    --bonnie

    Does anyone want to start a group and rent a place?
    
    Bonnie

    re.3
    
    Not having teen-agers or anything, I can't really say.
    
    But for those looking for a week away that don't mind three cats,
    I frequently get house-sitters.  What my home has to offer is a
    large hybrid water-bed, 29" TV w/VCR and a library of over 80 tapes,
    a Jacuzzi tub in the upstairs bath.  Other than that it's a pretty
    standard house: microwave, phone in the bathroom, dining room...
    
    Oh, I almost forgot. For those who enjoy roughing it, Rick usually
    leaves his REI mountain hut up in on of the unfinished spare bedrooms
    because he doesn't want it to mildew.  I guess it takes all types.
    
      Ann

    When you go away for the week are you gonna take the father?
    If so, is it safe to leave the kids behind alone? I can't 
    imagine a kid who could both drive Bonnie out of the house
    *and* be safe to leave alone. :-)
    
    		Alfred
    
    PS: My son is only 10 and I've had no need (yet?) to get away
    without him.

    Just you wait, Alfred.
    
    Some time between 12� and 14, his hormones will spring to life,
    and you'd better not be standing in the path.
    
    One day you'll come home, notice cats tangled around your ankles,
    and ask, to make sure you don't feed them twice, "Did you feed the
    cats?" And this kind sweet kid you've known for years will
    suddenly hit the roof and accuse you of trying to set him up,
    inform you that you never asked him to feed the cats before, he's
    not a mindreader, how was he supposed to know you wanted him to
    feed them this time so why blame him for not doing something he
    didn't know he was supposed to do? 
    
    That's when you'll need a house to sit.  Or even a flagpole.
    
    --bonnie 

    Bonnie,
    
    That's exactly what I'm dealing with. :-}! My kids are good people,
    not in trouble, etc etc.. but they are touchy, can be very insulting
    at times they think that we impose rules and expectations on them
    just because we 'get off' on power trips (my 16 year old son is
    really into teenage liberation at this point - I *can't wait until
    he has teenagers!*), are offended if asked to clean up  (unless
    paid) and think that there is something wrong with me if I think
    I need a life of my own. i.e. they are quite typical teenagers.
    
    Our oldest who is now a sophormore in college has actually turned
    into an interesting adult. So I do have hope for the others.
    
    But I still wouldn't mind an occasional get away...with our without
    my husband (in fact maybe both!)
    
    Bonnie

    Gee, my teenage daughter is one of the people I'd most like to get
    away for a week's vacation *with.*  One of our goals is to someday
    be able to take a week's vacation in someplace like Bermuda, Florida,
    California, or Hawaii together.  Except for the fact that she isn't
    old enough to drink yet, I think we'd have a great time together.
    
    But, I probably feel that way because, first of all, there's only
    *one* of her, and, second, she doesn't live with me during the week.
     Because we don't see each other on a daily basis during the week
    we don't get a chance to get sick of each other! :-)  We enjoy planning
    day trips together to Boston, or Provincetown, plus movies and
    concerts.  Our time together seems more special because we don't
    live together all the time.  In fact, a couple of weeks ago she
    turned down a date with a cute senior in order to go to Boston to
    the movies with me!  She's only 14 though and I know I won't always
    come first, so I try to enjoy it while it lasts!
    
    Lorna
    

    re: .9
    
    I think the time apart does help cut down on the frictions.  I'll
    bet Bonnie's idea would be good for the average healthy family.
        
    I, too, love vacationing with my daughter and son; we all went to
    Europe together this summer and had a lovely time.  But living
    together, day in and day out, any set of people will have
    occasional blowups, and a teenager takes them so much more
    seriously.  Having to do homework before they go out on the date
    isn't a minor inconvenience of poor planning, it's a social and
    personal disaster. 
    
    I console myself with the knowledge that my brother and I were
    about as difficult as a pair of teenagers can be, and we managed
    to turn out all right.  So Kat will probably come through too.
    She's a pretty cool young woman . . . 
    
    --bonnie

    There appears to be some phenomenon about 18-20 +/- a few years.
    
    What I see is that my Son aged 20 is Constantly at odds with
    his Mother.  And she is always ready to argue with him.  I see
    this as a Breaking of the apron strings so to speak.  Has anyone
    else seen this. 
    
    I had the same type of thing between myself and the Daughter
    by my first wife.  I could not wait for her to leave, and let
    me have a break, now she is welcome for a visit, but I would 
    not want her staying for an extended visit.
    
    Dave 

    
    Even though my kids are real neat adults now ( 25 and 27), I do
    remember the 12 to 17 years.  I remember threating to leave home
    and never returning.  My daughter "forgot" to clean the upstairs
    bathroom every Saturday for about four years. 
    
    I support your need for a place to get away.

    Boy, did you hit home with this one.  Of course, as a single parent
    with two teenagers and a younger one, I sometimes think I may go
    nuts with them.  The teenagers never see their father, so I get
    them all the time.  The younger one does spend Saturday nights with
    his father when his father is able to (most weeks).
    
    Anyway, the chance to get away from them for a sanity check sure
    would be nice.  What happens in my house is that once every 6 to
    8 weeks, the older two go away to church youth conferences.  These
    run Friday to Sunday.  The glitch in all this is that I usually
    wind up taking them on Friday night (along with about 6 other kids
    - good thing I have a Dodge Caravan) and often picking them up on
    Sunday morning.  So it really is only Saturday - but I'll take
    anything.....
    
    I'm convinced that teenagers go through this horrible stage so that
    we will be glad to see them go when they do.  If my 9 year old stays
    as sweet as he is right now, I'd never want him to leave home. 
    Must be some rite of passage they need.....
    
    re: -.1 " Clean the Bathroom!?!?!  Yuck, mother, that is the grossest
    room in the house - why ALWAYS me??? "    Of course, she never
    contributes to the yuck-----------
    
    Ellen

    KIDS!!  I have 2 teens, a girl soon to be 15, and a boy 14 today.
    My daughter is the worst right now, mouthy, snooty, spoiled and
    looking for even more (she had the nerve to put a VCR on her Xmas
    list - HER OWN VCR!). Because they live with their dad (we are divorced
    for 10 years now) I have little control over the day to day discipline.
    He unfortunately is afraid of ANY physical discipline (not even
    a small slap to that snooty mouth), which if done once in awhile
    would cure that.
    
    Needless to say, like most parents, we have provided our children
    with alot more than we ever had (until adulthood anyway). But they
    just can't believe that you:
    
    1. have the nerve to remind them of that once in awhile
    
    2. refuse to give in to guilt (applied constantly)
    
    3. don't care what "everyone else has, does, thinks" to me this
       is the most enjoyable part on having grown up. Not worrying about
       it anymore
    
    And of course my 2 hate each other, my daughter who was the "good"
    kid, (now turned barely average) is determined that her brother
    who was the "bad" kid (until a year ago) should be like her, GOD
    FORBID I should have 2 of her!!!!!!!  My son who is not convinced
    thinks she is a brown nosing, conniving B____, (he's very close
    to the truth sometimes as she can lie with the best of them is
    necessary). On the other had the daughter is more open about her
    feelings, easier to read most of the time, while my son is in perpetual
    hiding (DEEP, DEEP, DEEP UNDERCOVER).
    
    All I hope for is that they will learn to love and accept each other,
    SOON! (get a job, graduate, move out of the house) Because of course
    they don't like living the way we tell them to live.
    
    I was NEVER like that!!!!!!!! :^}

    Well, physical violence doesn't do a whole lot of good toward
    teaching kids how to communicate their feelings acceptably. 
    
    And it doesn't seem like discipline is me telling my kids how to
    live or behave.  It's more that I teach them how to regulate their
    own lives.  I can't tell them it doesn't matter what other people
    think -- they have to learn that for themselves.  Because what
    other people think does matter. It matters what the people we
    respect think of us, it matters what the people we love think of
    us.  There's no worse pain than the feeling you have failed
    someone who trusted you...and few tasks of growing up are harder
    than learning to tell the people you respect from the people you
    merely want to approve of you for vain reasons.  I can help my
    kids learn this, try to share my own experiences with them, but
    past a certain point I can't make them listen to me.

    The task of growing up and learning to stand on their own two feet
    is not an easy one and not one I'd want to go through again. 
        
    --bonnie