Bad Timing

Suburban Correspondent here, contemplating Mother Nature's bad sense of timing.  Think about it: do entering middle age and raising teens really mix?  I'm starting to believe it's a combination as deadly as drinking and driving.  I mean, just as 10 added pounds, wrinkles, gray hair, and less of that come-hither feeling (if you know what I mean) are becoming the new features of my personal landscape, is it really necessary that the resulting death blow to my self esteem be compounded by my teen daughter's obvious disgust whenever she is near me?  Do you know yet how damaging it feels - self-image-wise - to start speaking to your teen daughter, only to notice an embarrassed expression on her face - an expression that might be more appropriately directed at a raving, incoherent homeless person accosting you on a city street than at the person who birthed and diapered you?

I swear, Anna woke up on her 13th birthday, saw her father and me, and thought, "Who are these people, and why are they telling me what to do?" 

Lucky for me (and my self esteem), I do have younger ones, for whom I am still a maternal goddess of mythic proportions.  They play UNO with me, they tell me what they would like for lunch without looking annoyed at the question, they come to me with their problems.  I don't have to cut off all their contact with the outside world in order to get their attention (although, I will admit, I have fun doing that to Anna). I am their acknowledged mother and all is right with the world.

I know these halcyon days with them will end, of course; I'm no fool.  But hopefully, by the time these younger ones are teens, I will have passed through the maelstrom of impending middle age and be more comfortable with my older self.  I will be able to look down upon their adolescent antics with the Olympian detachment that comes with having weathered such blasts before and survived.  Right now, however?  I'm too new to both the aging game and the raising-teens scene to help but feel a tad shaken when confronted with a teen daughter who calls me a "stupid old lady" in the fitting room at Kohls.

So...how much longer?  Any of you out there with grown children feel like sharing the secret time line with me?  We're going on 2 years now, and I would really like my daughter back.  I understand she needs to grow up, I'm fine with that.  I just need the grown-up version that acknowledges not only my existence, but also our relationship.  Preferably well before the point in time when she is choosing my nursing home...

 

Comments

[Di]

I cherish my 12-year old son's fleeting moments of being my little boy. And with my 15-year old daughter, I know that if she is speaking sweetly to me, she just wants something. They'll come back around, I know. But it's still hard.

[the planet of janet]

hang in there. my mantra for all of it is: this too shall pass.

but if my teenage daughter called me a stupid old lady, someone would be very sorry ... and it wouldn't have been me. :-)

[Daisy]

When you find the secret, bottle it. And patent it.

[suburbancorrespondent]

Janet - Oh, she was sorry...and you can be sure I'll never let her forget it...but as you know, the true revenge will be approximately 30 years from now.

[Ilona]

Mine each had what I termed the "ugly year", but it only lasted the one year. (Well, with my eldest, a daughter, it was a little more complicated than just that, but I'm aiming to keep this brief!) My youngest will be 15 on the weekend -- and still no sign of "ugly"!!! Is this third time lucky for mom?

[Debbie]

Hmmm, that "ugly year" is now going on 7 years! She'll be 20 in November. It was bad in high school and now that's she's in college, she just uses bigger words to cut me down! No really, it does get better, just take one day at a time and "pick your battles"! And remember that revenge is sweet! (Pray she has a daughter just like her!)

[Sally Parrott Ashbrook]

My mother said we all improved when we were 17-18 and went off to college. When we realized we actually didn't know everything, I guess. :)