In two days our family moves into a situation that we have never, ever been in before. And I am more than a bit nervous.
Yesterday was the last day of school. Monday is the first real day of summer vacation. Monday morning I head off to work. Leaving my two sons home.
Now, they are certainly old enough to be safe; they can feed themselves quite nicely, and they can be counted on to do any chores I list for them.
But. This is the first summer of their lives that I have worked out of the home. And I would be lying if I said I was sure everything would be just fine.
I know without a doubt that given their druthers, they would watch TV, play video games, and be online all day, every day. For obvious reasons, that is not going to be allowed. I am struggling with determining how far I go to make sure that doesn't happen. I want to trust that all I have to do is say so, but my fear is they will sneak ... if not the first week, surely by the third or fourth. But if I lock things up (literally in a closet, or by use of passwords and parental control options) am I saying much too blatantly "I don't trust you" ???
Help???
edited to add: Just after I hit "publish post" on this blog entry, I went to check email and I had one new one. BOOT CAMP FOR YOUR TEEN.
4 comments:
how about "These are the rules. Yes, I will check up on you occasionally to make sure we all understand the rules."?
I don't know what to tell you. As 1 of 2 sisters being left alone after school and in the summer, I can tell you that we got along better when we were alone and managed to find things to keep us busy...There were a lot of calls to mom even when we got older....but we survived and managed not to get into too much trouble....I like the check occasionally but you never know when idea, though...
I always suspect my kids cheat. I've got a set that will nark on each other, though.
I do think that if they are used to playing those games in their free time during the school year, it will be all too easy to gravitate back. Whenever you remove something, it needs to be replaced with something else. What do they have to get done? Chores, reading, yard work, etc. Checking up on them does help. Brian can also help enforce when he's around. I would not have a problem finding something that logged the number of hours spent on a computer and then having a dicussion about how healthy that is. Cameron has taken to just playing random games, even when we're watching a family movie. No way. It's neither healthy nor polite to only give partial attention to the things in front of you and automatically flipping that on switch drives me NUTS. If they cheat, you'll end up catching them (they're not THAT clever) and then they'll be busted.
Dude, I just realized that you're back! Yea! I read through everything since April. Wahoo!
Okay, so it's my experience that kids will live up to your expectations of them. Set your expectations and give them lots of alternatives to the things you want them to limit and I bet they surprise you. Explain your rationale of why you want these things limited --my kids respond best when I explain the WHY behind the rule.
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