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The Pit Parenting Thread

lbE08 said:
Congrats on sleeping through the night!

We've been really, really fortunate that little lady is basically a unicorn... she eats well, she sleeps well, she wakes up happy, we can put her in her crib when she's kind of drowsy/rubbing her eyes and she'll happily go down on her own (maybe we have to go in once or twice to get the paci or her lovey that she's tossed out of the crib, but as soon as she has it back she's good to go).
This week she's had a cold and has been a bit fussier, but it's only resulted in one midnight wakeup (and I think that had more to do with teething pain).
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This is basically our son. Once he’s in the crib he’s asleep within about 5 mins.
 
BarcaDeac said:
This is basically our son. Once he’s in the crib he’s asleep within about 5 mins.
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And he usually wakes up about 20-30 minutes before we’re up and he’s content to just make happy noises in the crib until we come get him and he’s always so thrilled to see us. It’s so damn endearing.
 
You all are so lucky. It’s taken 11 and 8 years respectively to get a good consistent bedtime routine.
 
5 week old has decided he no longer needs sleep and would prefer to keep his eyes open all day
 
Babies man. All the same and all different.

Not many things in this world better than a weekend nap with a baby on your chest.
 
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Older kid issue here and apologize for being a downer but need somewhere to vent a little.

17 YO son last night calls us and hands phone over to cop for us to talk to. Turns out he was pulled over for speeding and they found alcohol in the car that his 2 friends had brought back from a some small party they were at (he was supposed to be at someones house outside at their fire pit). The cops gave him take a breathalyzer and thankfully it was 0.00. He was the DD and didn't drink at all. The cops were nice enough not to bust him for booze but did make us come and get the alcohol and of course gave him the speeding ticket.

He's pretty distraught. He's applying to schools right now and when we told him if he had been drinking this likely would have prevented him going where he wants to go. He's never given us any trouble at all (good student, no behavior issues, works hard). He then unloads (emotionally) on us on just how much drinking and drugs are in HS right now (we live in Chapel Hill and have heard this a lot over the years). His friend group is into the scene and he really has no safe place to go hang (he's grounded for a while so its sorta of a moot point for now). So no car for rest of the year (we may allow him the car at some point to get him to his job). He even told us one of his friends has been taking LSD b/c he's depressed which threw us for a loop. We certainly know kids drink and smoke some but not to the level he was telling us or certainly not dropping acid.

Meanwhile, the parents of the kids who had the alcohol in the car brushed the whole thing off (kids being kids) which pissed us off a little. Our son is certainly accountable but these kids are too.

We think our son is a pretty good kid (as do most parents) but damn, he put himself in a very bad situation and could have been half a beer a way from really fucking his life up. Hopefully this incident put the fear of god into him. He's 6-4, 235 but said he was never more afraid then when the cops made him blow. When we told him if he blew a 0.01 as a minor he'd be screwed I thought he was going to cry. These kids think they are invincible.

Fun times.
 
Drugs and alcohol are fucking everywhere.

I graduated HS in 2001. I could get access to weed and alcohol, but I had to work for both/either. Hard drugs were available, but it was super sporadic.

The middle school that my wife taught at in 2015 had hard drugs on the reg, and a marijuana incident (search/seizure) nearly daily. I don't have direct knowledge, but I'm plugged in to a community that indicates that meth is everpresent and ubiquitous in high schools now.

Shits fucking changed in a huge way. And kids don't even get a break from peer pressure now with the internet being in everyone's shit 24/7.

It's really cool that the cops didn't fuck your kid up. It's awesome that the saw a DD doing the right thing and probably rewarded that. Sucks he got pulled to begin with.
 
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I do not have kids that age, but I think my parents would have been thrilled/proud that I was a sober DD my senior year of high school (note, I was never the sober DD, although overall I was a good kid with grades, sports, etc.). Sounds like your kid is a great kid who will think twice about allowing his friends to bring booze/drugs in his car again. I grew up in city a little bigger than Chapel Hill in NC and drugs were everywhere from middle school on, including hard drugs later in high school (although those stayed a bit behind the scenes thankfully). It's unfortunate, but there are going to be 10x as many drugs around next year when he is in college. It sounds like he already has the skills to turn them down. It always seemed like some of the most sheltered kids from high school had a really tough time handling/turning down booze and drugs at the beginning of college.

No real advice, but it sounds like you have raised a great kid who learns from his mistakes.
 
Dad to a super 17 yo daughter. I’ll echo what others have said about your son doing the best thing he could do to look out for his buddies and try to get them home safely.

In our house, we have a simple system: if/when daughter finds herself in a situation w drugs, alcohol etc, she texts us “X”. Wife or I call her with a fabricated story that requires us to come pick her up asap. No judgments and we are happy to stay on the phone until we get to wherever she is. And we know where she is all the time because part of having a phone (that we pay for) means that we can see where she is at any point in time. If she turns off the location finder so we can’t see her, she goes to a flip phone for a year.

Fortunately our kid is a 100% homebody. She’s in a sport year round and basically does school, sports and homework before going to bed at 930 each night. Her friends are scattered all around town so it’s not like they hang out together outside of school/sports.

Recommend that in the days ahead, you reiterate that he made a good choice (not to drink) in a bad situation (when others were drinking). He made a good choice to stay committed to getting his buddies home (minus the speeding with beer in the car.). Coming clean with the details (both with cops and parents) was definitely in his best interests.
 
The cops did come over and told him basically that, which was cool. I was hoping they'd waive the ticket but no such luck.

Our son has told us he's drank before and we suspect he's likely smoked a little too but are relieved that he was either lucky, smart, or both that he didn't do anything last night when he was the driver. On two other occasions he's either walked home or gotten a ride and left his car someplace else. So he's practicing some modicum of common sense.

This all happened within a 1/2 mile of our house. Everyone was white, all 3 kids and both cops, and while CH is a progressive place, I do wonder if they would have cut a black kid the same slack / rewarded "good" behavior.

What still bothers is just how prevalent drugs are. We aren't naive. We know they are out there. But we've known these kids for literally their whole lives. And to hear that basically everyone is a huge pothead or worse is sorta stunning. I suspect COVID plays a big part here. My sons friends just want to get high. And that bums him out.

One of the kids involved actually smokes with his dad. I just don't get that. We have a pretty open / honest dialogue with our son (much more than I ever would have had with my WW2 generation parents) which helps a lot. But we'd never light one up with the kid.

Thats my only advice here. Have honest conversations with your kids. They are going to do shit. When they do, have a relationship where they can tell you. Don't endorse it (hey kid, let me tell you how many times Ive been wasted / high and got behind the wheel) but hold them accountable to make good decisions or at least to know what the good decision is. Also, be a fucking parent and not a friend.
 
CH, sounds like your son is a good kid who’s going to do the right thing far more often than not.

Good insights here. Thanks.
 
Not sure if you are looking for advice or just venting. I'll give a little advice and I don't mean it in a judgmental way. My oldest started middle school, such as it is this year, so this is coming.

Sounds like you have a good kid. I encourage you not to go overboard with the punishment. You mentioned maybe he'll get use of the car at some point this year. Be careful overdoing the punishment side so you don't push him away at a moment that he was doing the right thing despite making a mistake. Keep the lines of communication and honesty open. I was a kid that did not drink or anything in hs but I did hang out with friends at times when they were. I had my parents trust because I was honest with them, like your son seems like he is. Your trust in him after the mistake may go a long way towards giving him the strength to not succumb to peer pressure. All this is not to say don't give him consequences, even big ones when warranted. Just being a largely anonymous, outside reminder that as the parents we can get sucked in to making our own mistakes like going overboard out out of an honest worry about our kids getting hurt.

Hope this makes sense. Sounds like you're doing a good job with him so keep it up.
 
CH, I agree with others that from what you wrote, it sounds like your kid has a square head on his shoulders and hopefully this incident serves as a 'holy shit' moment for him to realize how easily everything could have been flushed away. He is NOT invincible, and thankfully he had a pretty benign experience to learn that. How fortunate for him, and how reassuring for you to know that he takes DD responsibilities seriously.

Drugs and alcohol scare the shit out of me as far as kids are concerned.
I think I was partly naïve and partly too unpopular to get invited to places where drugs/alcohol were present in high school. I know it was around, but I've been a judgmental ass for a lot of my self-aware life and I'm sure nobody would want me around if they thought I would just narc/be a party pooper. (Note: i'm still a judgmental ass, I just keep more of it in my own head now and hope my face doesn't give it away.)

My stepson (13) is suuuuuper naive as well (I had to explain what 'bigot' meant this weekend, and he was honestly sad to learn/understand that someone might just be knowingly mean like that). He makes my younger self look like a rebel by comparison. He has the fear of I don't know what that keeps him straight in certain situations, and I believe our relationship and honestly with him in terms of being on his side/there to support him however we can will keep him from getting into a really boneheaded situation.

....stepdaughter (10) on the other hand. Holy shit. She means so well, truly, but she gets really wrapped up and motivated by peer pressure/attention for her actions. This has already led to some really poor choices with online communication in classroom social chats, and she's already felt the burn of having her conversation screen-shot and passed around to others. Thankfully because she's 10, the content wasn't as bad as it could be. Unfortunately for her, for 10yr olds it was still bad enough that her reputation is getting set AND parents saw it as well (because people monitor 10yr olds chatting). Husband has had to do a lot of smoothing things over with other parents so kiddo doesn't get totally socially ostracized from outdoor playdates, etc., as we work through some other things with her. I am scared to death of what this behavior turns into when she's 15,16,17. We're working with professionals to help address some of it now, but oh my gosh - it's really hard to feel like you're providing every positive resource, love, and support that you can and STILL know it's up to the kid to make the actual decision when push comes to shove.
 
Yeah, there's plenty of weed in middle schools and more of it in high schools. I think the whole vaping thing made getting into weed easier for kids too.
 
Paul Hogan said:
Yeah, there's plenty of weed in middle schools and more of it in high schools. I think the whole vaping thing made getting into weed easier for kids too.
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...plus the fact that in many states, it's legal. Not for teens, clearly, but it's as "difficult" (read: not at all) to get as alcohol if you have an older connection.
 
lbE08 said:
CH, I agree with others that from what you wrote, it sounds like your kid has a square head on his shoulders and hopefully this incident serves as a 'holy shit' moment for him to realize how easily everything could have been flushed away. He is NOT invincible, and thankfully he had a pretty benign experience to learn that. How fortunate for him, and how reassuring for you to know that he takes DD responsibilities seriously.

Drugs and alcohol scare the shit out of me as far as kids are concerned.
I think I was partly naïve and partly too unpopular to get invited to places where drugs/alcohol were present in high school. I know it was around, but I've been a judgmental ass for a lot of my self-aware life and I'm sure nobody would want me around if they thought I would just narc/be a party pooper. (Note: i'm still a judgmental ass, I just keep more of it in my own head now and hope my face doesn't give it away.)

My stepson (13) is suuuuuper naive as well (I had to explain what 'bigot' meant this weekend, and he was honestly sad to learn/understand that someone might just be knowingly mean like that). He makes my younger self look like a rebel by comparison. He has the fear of I don't know what that keeps him straight in certain situations, and I believe our relationship and honestly with him in terms of being on his side/there to support him however we can will keep him from getting into a really boneheaded situation.

....stepdaughter (10) on the other hand. Holy shit. She means so well, truly, but she gets really wrapped up and motivated by peer pressure/attention for her actions. This has already led to some really poor choices with online communication in classroom social chats, and she's already felt the burn of having her conversation screen-shot and passed around to others. Thankfully because she's 10, the content wasn't as bad as it could be. Unfortunately for her, for 10yr olds it was still bad enough that her reputation is getting set AND parents saw it as well (because people monitor 10yr olds chatting). Husband has had to do a lot of smoothing things over with other parents so kiddo doesn't get totally socially ostracized from outdoor playdates, etc., as we work through some other things with her. I am scared to death of what this behavior turns into when she's 15,16,17. We're working with professionals to help address some of it now, but oh my gosh - it's really hard to feel like you're providing every positive resource, love, and support that you can and STILL know it's up to the kid to make the actual decision when push comes to shove.
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The good news is that we've seen that happen but its amazing how quickly kids can re-establish / fix their reps, esp as parents become less important in their setting their social calendar. MS and HS really help, esp as you bring new kids into the fold. So I wouldn't worry too much about it in the medium term, esp as you are helping remedy now. Whats sorta funny is one of the good kids from his youth, a truly great kid, has gone off the rails after his parents divorced when we was 14. When we heard he was dropping acid, we literally ere stunned. Sweet innocent kid from CubScouts is tripping. That scares me to no end.
 
CHDeac said:
The good news is that we've seen that happen but its amazing how quickly kids can re-establish / fix their reps, esp as parents become less important in their setting their social calendar. MS and HS really help, esp as you bring new kids into the fold. So I wouldn't worry too much about it in the medium term, esp as you are helping remedy now. Whats sorta funny is one of the good kids from his youth, a truly great kid, has gone off the rails after his parents divorced when we was 14. When we heard he was dropping acid, we literally ere stunned. Sweet innocent kid from CubScouts is tripping. That scares me to no end.
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Yeah, thankfully (?) these kids have been through a lot in their younger years (dad deployed, divorce, me, baby sibling), but we still have a pretty reasonable ability to shape and adapt their perceptions of things... instead of them thinking their childhood is solid, only to have the wool pulled off their eyes with a divorce later in life.

Thanks for the perspective on the computer chat thing. I believe she'll recover, but I also don't know how much we trust her ability to make good decisions right now. Her emotional development is a little lagging and she's not fully grasping the impact of her actions outside of the way SHE perceives them, and that makes choosing to do the 'right' thing harder. She thought she was doing the right thing by standing up for her friend. Unfortunately, she went about it in a way that was mean/hurt someone else and THAT's what people saw. We're trying to help her get to a point where she's better able to think through the full impact of her actions.
 
Not looking forward to these issues. My biggest problem right now is that our son bit the hell out of the kid in our neighborhood that he is doing “daycare” with when he was over at their house this morning. Now my wife is buying all of these “teeth aren’t for biting” books and it’s not helping that I’m pointing out teeth are precisely for biting.
 
lbE08 said:
...plus the fact that in many states, it's legal. Not for teens, clearly, but it's as "difficult" (read: not at all) to get as alcohol if you have an older connection.
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A lot of the time that just makes weed easier to get because the sellers are already scofflaws. Weed is also a lot easier to conceal than a 12-pack of White Claw.
 
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