Tennagers, Introverts, and Issues, Oh My!

I never really understood real frustration until this year. I mean, I've been frustrated, yes, but it's a different ballpark all together when you are frustrated because of a lack of effort out of fear than it is when you are giving your all and feeling like no one cares.

By no one, I mean my soon-to-be-officially-a-teenager son.

I always assumed that the horror stories were much exaggerated by parents who were stuck in the middle of things. And honestly, maybe they are.

Needless to say, I have a great deal of appreciation for people who volunteer above and beyond what is required in order to work with teens. I don't think I could do it. At this point, I'm not sure I'll make it through the next two weeks, let alone the next seven years.

Having a teenager who is emotional, doesn't understand the concept of peer pressure and sound parental advice, and that his actions not only embarrass those in his life, but also make them look like they don't give a rat's patukkus, is pure hell.

Teenagers can't deal with their growing bodies, their charged hormones, and their desired independence. They aren't quite at the point where they can be independent without having some form of supervision, but they resent that they need adult fingers prying into their pie, so to speak.

Bringing an emerging teenager into a household with someone who spent years and years on his own makes for rocky patches. And I don't mean the kind of rocks that have been through the process of being smoothed out, I mean the still jagged, tear things up, sharp rocks. I feel like I'm in the rock tumbler with him and everything is falling apart around me.

Sometimes I'm not sure if I can keep it all together. My other half says he's at his wit's end. We're all falling apart. And my son just doesn't get it.

So, this summer, he is going to spend almost two months with his grandparents. My parents. The people I still have a very difficult time communicating with and being comfortable around. He will be getting on a plane, flying by himself, and returning the same way.

It's funny, and not in a ha ha way, how he tends to get in with the kids that seem like good eggs, but the more he tries to make himself look good when he gets in trouble, the more I think he's going to be in a lot of trouble over the next few years.

I really want to have some more good times with him before it hits, but I fear it's already too late. I made some mistakes in my past, wasn't the best mom in the world, and probably still lack in an innumerable amount of ways, but I can't help but hope I still have a chance to be a good mom to him.

It hurts. I ache inside. I honestly don't know what else to do that I'm not already doing. I've had e-mail after e-mail and phone call after phone call from the school, both from teachers and from the principal. I've tried to be more structured at home. I've been working on my own issues so that there are fewer things that can blow back into my face in the form of "well, you do such and such."

Somedays I feel like I'm doing it alone. Not only do I have to try to understand and figure out myself and my teen, I need to learn the ropes about my introvert boyfriend's personality and adapt to his needs. He can only handle so much human interaction at a time, and he has reached that point. Me, the more I have to be strong, the more demanding my emotional needs become. I'm trying to be strong for so many people right now, and all I really want to do is crawl in a hole somewhere and sleep for the next seven years because this "sucking it up" crap isn't working so well.

I've spent years learning to ask for and accept help.It's taken a lot to get to that point. I openly admit that I can't do this alone. I can't. I suppose I just need to find a way to juggle all these personalities. I need to find a way to be strong and let my hunny recharge his human-contact batteries, try to keep my son from falling completely off the straight and narrow before he even hits that thirteenth birthday mark next weekend, and find a way to stay sane without becoming a needy emotional cow.

Someone told me age thirteen is the hardest. I can do this. I can make it. A few big breaths and a tight hold on sanity and I'm home free.

But wait a minute...

As soon as I make it through this mess...

TAKE TWO with the other one!

AUGGGH!

Hmmm, time to go incognito and run away? Maybe so...

Any suggestions?

Seriously, bring them on. The funnier the better. Laughter is, after all, the best medicine.