Things I never knew until I had kids of the teenage persuasion

I read and guffawed my way through an extremely funny and exceptionally relatable post on Scary Mommy’s10 unrecognizable post-baby body parts. It got me to thinking, which never amounts to much other than song lyrics typically, about things I never really knew or appreciated until I had these creatures we call children. I guess the post was sort of the inspiration for this, in a roundabout way.

I never knew how insanely dumb I was. In fact, I’ve recently learned that I’m pretty brain dead. Always illustrated by a teenage eye-roll during conversations. It’s amazing how stupid all my brilliant advice is particularly when directed toward question-asking, problem-solution finding teenage children. From almost 17 years of hands-on research, my scientific studies have concluded it best to either not answer their questions with anything more than a shoulder shrug or a primal sounding grunt or the voice of an adult from a Charlie Brown cartoon. Because I’m thinking that is all they hear anyways. I could be wrong. Maybe someday, they’ll all start a blog and I’ll have more conclusive answers.

I never realized my parents were right. We are all assholes when we are teenagers. I never really understood why they would get so mad at me. Now, I totally get it. Teenagers and parents are like bulls locking horns. Not all the time, to be certain. But wow. And so, to my parents (my mom is reading my blog on the wifi in heaven, surely), I apologize and I totally get why you took my door from its hinges.

What’s mine is yours and what’s yours is yours. Nothing is sacred. Nothing. I can’t even have my period without sitting down on the toilet, reaching into the box of tampons and finding the brand new, super-sized, Sams Club purchased box to be completely empty. Not to mention, my hair products, brushes, hair dryer, hair straightener and make up constantly gone missing from my bathroom, only to turn up in the girls bathroom SOMEHOW. “I dunno”-shoulder shrug. Interesting that upon questioning, no one knows exactly how the mothers things are turning up in the daughters bathrooms. Perhaps we need an exorcism to rid the house of that pesky poltergeist.

I didn’t know how much I valued privacy until it was constantly invaded. Oh privacy, how I took you for granted. It’s one thing to have a toddler scratching on the bathroom door like a cat, mewing for mommy. But it’s completely another thing to be mid-stream, only to have someone walk into the bathroom to ask if they can “borrow” something. But, then again, the only time they ask to “borrow” something is when I’m already in the bathroom so, perhaps it’s a good thing? To be fair, I do get Monday through Friday between the hours of 8:30am and 2:40pm completely to myself. Which is nice. And quiet. And gives me time to strategically hide my things. Problem therein lies with the fact that, inevitably I forget where I hid them. Whatever, I’ll just blame the girls.

I never realized how loud I could actually yell. In most cases, it’s just to be heard above the external noises of video games, rap music, phone conversations and sibling fighting. I find it to be a little more effective in the attention getting department to use my indoor voice when lecturing. It gets them to listen, or at least pretend to listen. Reality is, they are probably formulating their next Facebook status update in their mind, the one that reads “I hate my mom, she sucks” or something…one that gets a bunch of “likes” from their teenage friends who are mad at their parents, too. Mind you, I yelled a lot as a kid. You know, the typical fighting match with the parents or sibling. But, I think after childbirth, my vocal chords must have expanded, allowing for maximum vocal capacity usage.

Never, in a billion years, did I ever think that I would drive. In a car. Alone. Without the radio blasting. And I do now. I drive in silence, which I welcome. OK, fine. Sometimes I turn the radio on but at a noise level that doesn’t break sound barriers or delicate, aging, constantly ringing eardrums due to excessive use of Walkmen, car radios and concerts from my youth. It’s always a shock to enter the car after my daughter has driven it and be assaulted by killer bass and offensive rap lyrics. Omg…I sound like my parents.

I thought I had a pretty decent grasp on the English language. You may not always be able to tell via my writing because a lot of the time, I forget big words and replace them with elementary school vocabulary. Sometimes, when I’m talking to my kids, which we DO talk by the way, I have to stop them and ask them to translate. They don’t use words like grody, bitchen or gag me anymore.

I always considered myself to be somewhat stylish. I think I dress cute, sometimes. I also think I have good style sense. So, when my kids ask me how they look and I tell them their pants are too tight and I think that their shirts must have shrunk in the wash, I am told that I just don’t understand fashion. My response…I think it’s them.

The most important thing, however, that I never knew until I had kids was how fiercely I could love someone.

With a passion so great that it literally takes my breath away.

With an intensity so strong that it makes up for missing product, bad attitudes, horrible clothing and privacy invasion.

Kind of.

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