I suppose I overlook that my 14y/o son is clinging to his emerging sense of identity when he "debates" so many "issues" that I had not realized were such fodder for conflict. I suppose it may have come off a bit condescending when I told him how cute he is in his seemingly angry need to have the last word. I suppose that may have been my attempt to have the last word.

Hmmm. I suppose I can deceive myself and say I was only trying to communicate with him on his own level. I suppose a therapist-type would suggest that I was full of the feces.

While teens must be held accountable for their comments and actions, and must be encouraged to articulate their thoughts and feelings, parents must indeed be mindful of the psychodynamic process of ego development that is ongoing in these developmental teen years. If you can imagine a young, naive, and vulnerable entity awash in the chaotic soup of life, then perhaps you can appreciate and value the tenacity with which an adolescent will 'defend the turf' of his or her emerging niches in time and space.

So difficult for parents to see it this way. The child may be acting inanely, yet remarkably, this is the process of individuating away from the merger that was "me and my mommy" and of course the rest of the family. Mindsets must be modified, and this does not come easy.

"My child", one exclaims, "cannot be thinking about sex and jobs and masturbating and how stupid I am."

'Once a child, always a child'. That is what they say. This, of course, in the eyes and experience of the parents. Yet, if parents have done their due diligence, then that child will be growing up, maturing, and indeed rebelling against that which continues to identify him or her as a child.

Ain't life grand?

deorre