Wilful Deception...

Image

Ahhh, youth.

We had an incident with Miss T on the weekend that led her to being grounded for a whole week and her phone taken off her. Plus sleepovers cancelled until further notice. It is the phone bit that hurts the most. Just fulfilling my parental obligation to make a point as memorable as possible and for her it mean sans modern communication!

To cut a long story short she had 3 friends stay over and they went out to a neighbour's place for a movie with a 10pm curfew. Multiple texts assured me the movie was going well and could they stay out until 11pm, then 11.30 pm?....

Needless to say at midnight I jumped in the car to pick them up (in my pyjamas for maximum embarrassment) only to find no girls. They were never there.

Bit cross by now. Phoned Miss T who said they were home already.

Hmmm, I don't watch all those detective shows for nothing. I took her for a chat the next day and asked her about the movie.

"The Anchorman" was the reply.

"Oh" I said. "Was it good?"

"Yes" she said

"Is that the one with Will Ferrel?"

"Yes. Jess got it for her birthday"

"Oh" I said. "That's funny because Jess's Mum said you were never there. Never there"

"Oh" she said

We then discussed personal integrity, wilful deception (aka lying but I think it sounds a bit more sinister this way), trust and  independence.

She was shocked that I knew so much

I told her she was turning me into a detective and damaging our relationship.

Where were they? Apparently sitting in the cold at the local footy fields and talking for hours. Not sure if I r-e-a-l-l-y believe that. I told her parents are not put on this earth to stop teenagers from having fun, contrary to popular belief. I told her that as adults we weigh up the situation, look at it from many angles and then make decisions. At 15 she is not privy to all the factors that go into this process but as she matures, she will have more input. I then asked her to look at it from another point of view. That I was responsible for 3 extra girls. They were in my care and it was up to me to ensure the outcome was good.

I then grounded her for 1 week, asked her friends to contact me to apologise, ask the girls to discuss this with their parents and also apologise to Jess's mother for using them as an alibi.

Consequences, consequences, consequences. Bit uncomfortable for all but a great opportunity to learn. The girls got the same talk about personal integrity and good decision making and trust. They will have to build that up again. I also spoke to some of the parents too. The more interested ones that is.

Did any of this sink in? Not sure. Only time will tell.



Ciao for now...