Many years ago, when my younger stepdaughter was quite little, my husband and I were on the sidelines at one of the kids’ soccer games. My younger stepdaughter was maybe 4, wandering back and forth from her biological mother to us, entertaining herself.
All of a sudden, my younger stepdaughter (let’s call her YS so I don’t have to keep typing that out) started shouting angrily at her biological mother, furiously barking commands. Her mother instantly did as she was told, as everyone in earshot turned to see what the racket was all about.
YS wandered back over to her dad and me, oblivious to our shocked silence. Finally I asked, “What do you think would happen if you talked to us like that?”
YS laughed. “Oh, I wouldn’t talk to you like that,” she responded, then turned back to dancing around, playing, the conversation already forgotten.
But it wasn’t forgotten for me.
Fast forward about 10 years to today. YS is in high school, racking up Fs and absences. She has had in-school suspension twice just this school year.
Kids know from a very young age what they can get away with, and with whom. They test boundaries and remember where those are.
But we’re not talking about a child drawing a picture on the wall or hiding her brussels sprouts in her napkin here. That is the scary part. We are talking about a child who has already romanticized self-harm, who desperately needs guidance, who simply does not care about her future.
It’s basic psychology that children and teenagers need stability, structure, routines, support. The simplicity of this — the very basicness of this — is what I find most maddening. These are baseline parenting concepts, yet the response to red flags rocketing all around her has been stunningly nonexistent.
I must note that we have not seen YS for months. The results of YS having zero direction, zero rules, and zero discipline have been immediate, terrifying, and destructive.
I am no parenting expert and don’t pretend to be. But I will be damned if I ever toss my hands helplessly in the air and whimper how I just can’t do anything with a 14-year-old living under my roof. I love my stepkids enough to not care if we are buddies or not: my husband and I are parents first, and we expect them to follow our rules, period.
The discipline and constancy that YS had gleaned from her brief moments with us were deliberately taken from her, and she is the one paying the price, whether she realizes that right now or not. She is digging herself into a pit that will soon be impossible to climb out of, deluding herself that she is having fun and ruling the roost, when instead she is in danger.
Just like years ago at that game, YS knows exactly what she can get away with, and with whom. She is playing a manipulative game with enablers who bow down to her and are afraid to tell her no. Is it easier to let your child self-destruct than to parent?
It shouldn’t be. It shouldn’t be easy to watch your own child decay, flinging her future into the garbage. It shouldn’t be easy to see your daughter embrace dismally low standards for herself. It shouldn’t be easy to let a child tell you what she is and is not going to do in a home you are supposed to be in charge of — but clearly are not.
I am not naive. I don’t expect things to improve. Things will continue to deteriorate until we get a phone call, or more likely a terse text message, that something unspeakable has happened. It won’t be surprising but won’t be any less heartbreaking that the potential and the light of my younger stepdaughter was willfully snuffed out by apathy, cowardice, and self-absorption.
The ultimate parenting fail is watching your child replicate your most hellish failures and doing nothing to stop that descent.
Ten years ago, a dysfunctional path had already been paved for my younger stepdaughter. My husband and I have been the only voices since then encouraging her to take a different, better way. Ten years from now — where will she be? I am afraid of the answer.
Sweat & Sparkle 