Being a mother of small children is fun, but sometimes it is not easy. You often see those cute toddlers with perfect mommies and daddies on pictures in magazines, but trust me:they are all models! As nice as they are in those photos, they can be so annoying when they enter the so-called "toddler puberty", with all the antisocial behavior that we do not yet call that. However, I now know that this period is not in vain. This is because it is the run-up period (for us at least) to more antisocial behaviour…
The REAL puberty.
Well, I think everyone has an idea about that 😉 . But for the sake of completeness we will of course take a look at Wikipedia and it says the following about it:
Those who have read my previous columns know that I am a modern mother of two teenage daughters. Fortunately, the eldest dries up nicely, but now the sister is starting to copy her antisocial behavior flawlessly. She is allowed to go out now and then (just like her big sister), and that of course includes nice clothes and make-up.
But… sometimes I'm a bit scared. My sweet cute daughter is very handy and can turn herself into a true diva in no time! Of course she is not allowed to drink (yet) and certainly not to smoke. The commercial:“And…What have we agreed? Indeed… NOTHING!” is often used by us. Yet things recently went horribly wrong when her friend ended up in the hospital for drinking TOO much. We threw in some serious conversation, because even though our daughter hadn't drunk as much as her friend, she hadn't kept the agreement either. But unfortunately this is not the only thing…
Recently she sat next to me in the car. Mobile in hand and earphones in her ears. When I asked her something, she didn't hear me, so I gave her a nudge. She looked at me in surprise. Did Mommy say something? When I asked the same thing again, I heard her chuckle. “Are you laughing at me now?” I asked surprised and I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. “Not now mommy”, I heard her say irritated. "I'm having a chat with friends." Angry, I parked my car at the side of the road because of this antisocial behavior. “What is it?” she asked in surprise.
“I want to talk to you, but you think friends are more important?” I tried to explain to her that it was not neat and that even a taxi driver is often treated more friendly, but the message did not get through. "Get out!" I cried angrily. "You're going to walk the last stretch with those friends of yours!" “Huh… do I have to get out” she answered arrogantly. “How childish you are!” With a firm panache she opened her door and didn't give me a glance anymore.
“Where is our daughter?” my husband asked when I stepped through the front door a little later.
“Oh…she preferred to walk the last part, because she was talking to friends through her earphones and I was not allowed to disturb her”. “Oh really…?” my husband said. “Well, you are absolutely right!”
Our daughter has now had a week of cycling (due to weather and wind). Yet I just took her away again because it was raining so much. And what do you think? The ears stayed neatly in her bag! Oh well… she'll learn!
