A Stab At Bad Parenting

Image via Wikipedia

Well, I'm all done moving, unless you count the two boxes crammed with toiletries that I have absolutely no room for anywhere. (Perhaps I'm a tad high-maintenance...) A special thank you goes out to Sherra for stepping in as a guest blogger last week while I got all my affairs in order. (Check out her blog at http://ilashgirls.com/)

And to answer your question, Sherra, I think I do my fair share of lying to others about the real state of affairs in Teen Land. Not because I'm trying to paint a rosier picture of life with a teen, but because many of the situations that I deal with suck up so much of my energy that I am too battle-weary to rehash them. I'd rather just move forward.

Even so, it's no secret that raising teens is a battleground at times. We parents can get so frustrated and overwrought over the smallest act of defiance. Take this father in Maryland, for instance. He and his teenage son were sitting in church together and the father asked the 19-year-old to remove his hat out of respect for church rules. The teen refused.

OK, we've all engaged in a battle of wills with our own teens more than a few times. What would you have done? Taken away the car keys, refused to pay his cell-phone bill, maybe told him that you were leaving?

Any of those responses makes a lot more sense than what this dad did. He got out of the pew, walked out to his car, grabbed a knife (how handy to have a knife in the car!), came back into the church and stabbed his teenager in the buttocks. Then he did the only thing left to do . . . he fled! There is an outstanding warrant for this father's arrest.

Yes, teenagers drive us crazy at times. But stabbing them? That's just insane.