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The only stipulation was
that they call me first.
Now that may seem counterintuitive at
first but years of experience taught us that most of the time, if you
were able to drill down to where it all started, even the worst
offenders started cutting due to an inability to cope. The root
cause could be as serious as bullies or as simple as
having a thing for the little red-haired girl
and not knowing how to process all the new
feelings. Or... the problem could be an accumulation
of stress and they simply needing a day off. I was
amazed at how “fixable” a problem could be if it was caught
early. But like a malignant tumor, if left to fester it would
be much more traumatic to deal with at a later date.
I reasoned that by the
time we become adults we simply trade our teenage problems for
grown-up problems (and by comparison our teenage problems don’t seem so bad).
What we forget is how BIG those teenage problems seem at the
time. My solution: when school got to be too much and
my kids were contemplating ditching, all they had to do
was go to the office and tell whoever to “call my dad”. I told
them I would come as soon as I could and I'd pull them
out of school.
Naturally, my wife and
I encouraged our kids to try and tough it out when things
got rough and most of the time they did. But I think the knowledge
that they had another option really helped.
The truth is, I was more concerned they
would run into and end up hanging out with "Billy Badass" whose
parents didn’t care if he went to school or not. Billy Badass is the kid who
seems cool because he smokes cigarettes and cuts class so he can drink beer
underneath the bleachers. So, when cutting school and hanging out
with Billy Badass actually seems like a viable option… CALL ME.
I didn’t get "the
call" very often, so when I did I knew it was something
serious. We would talk, go see a movie, or get lunch. Sometimes we
would just hang out at the arcade where we often ran into other kids who
were ditching without their parents. The difference was we had money to
actually play the games (something my kids noticed right away).
Now, some of you reading this will say
"I don’t have the type of job where I can just take off at the drop of a
hat", but I did... so I would. And some of you will say
"I couldn’t do this because my kids would take advantage and
call me just to avoid the test
they didn't study for." Well... that was never my concern.
I understand that we need to teach
our kids to tough things out. Life is hard and as adults we know
how important it is to be able to "hang in there" and keep pushing
until we make it through. We can’t just quit our jobs because of
a setback; we can’t walk away from our family when things hit a rough
patch. As responsible adults we need to teach our kids this
too… but in stages - not at ALL COSTS. Sometimes the desire to
teach them that lesson can backfire. Now be honest, how many of you
have ever called in sick to work because you needed a
“mental health” day?
I suspected my
kids wouldn’t abuse this privilege and they didn't. And if they had I
would have come up with something else. Everybody’s kids are
different. The trick is to know your kids and then put yourself in their
shoes. If you were them, going through what they are going through, what would
you want your parents to do? Then take a step back and put your
parenting hat back on. You need to try to come up with a
solution that you as a kid would have wanted done and what you as a
parent know needs to be done.
Somewhere in the middle is a solution
that is as unique as you and your child.
So take a deep breath before you
hit that comment button and tell me what a horrible parents we were. Withhold
your judgment. It won’t do you any good because our kids are already
grown and I couldn’t be happier with the way they turned out!
I've made a lot of mistakes in my
parenting journey. I've done a few things that I'm
not particularly proud of. But giving my kids the
"option" of cutting school is NOT one of them.
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