I remember it well and to be honest, I wouldn’t want to be there again, it was an awful place to be, for me personally I mean. You have no choice, you have to go there too and you have to experience it for yourself to know how it will be for you, but let me tell you this. You will survive it, with the right set of skills, support, resources, stamina and true grit, you will get beyond it!
The first thing you will notice when you get there are the changes in your body, hairs sprouting out of places where they have no business being, spots appearing like they are in competition with the chicken pox, not to mention hair as greasy as fried chicken. The real killer, the mood swings. Anything ranging from sweet Shirley Temple to Cruella Deville in 0 to 60 seconds and to add insult to injury you will have no idea of who you are and will irrationally and radically search for your identity. A smooth ride it WILL NOT be. Attitude, Identity theft, extreme expression through clothes, music, rebellious behaviour, dieting, bingeing, smoking, drinking, sex and drugs, all there for the taking and risking. ‘Lead me not into temptation’ not for all of them anyway! It will get messy, it will noisy, it will get confusing, it will get depressing, it will be fun, it will be a complete contradiction and you will think you are IT at some stage and at some stage you will wish you could be a child again, or an adult and want to skip IT. IT is exhausting……. IT is THE TEENAGE YEARS….AHHHHH
Sure, there will be twists and turns, there will be bumps in the road, there will be times of pure exhilaration, there will be LOVE, there will be HEARTACHE, there will be moments of madness and moments of stillness, but you will have to go through it, so that you can come out the other side of it and find out who you are and what you are made of. The skills you will learn will be mind boggling. The skills your parents will learn will be eye opening…. who knew they could be so mean, strict, sarcastic, fierce BRAVE!
They have been there, seen it, done it, got the T Shirt. They rocked it. It was better in their day, simpler, kinder, cooler. The trouble now is, while they are battling with you and your tantrums, and your mood swings and your cheek and your pushing and prodding of their boundaries, they are most probably fighting their own battle and their own identity crises. The MENOPAUSE, (male and female). The changes in their body, the sweats, the forgetfulness – “sorry, who are you” they ask ” I have no idea” you reply. Mum’s boobs begin to droop causing her distress. Dads boobs begin to develop in a cruel twist to make mum feel less distressed. Muscle turns to flab and dad’s six pack inflates so he resembles buddha and mum has an uncanny resemblance to the michelin man.
While you are on the crest of the wave splishing and splashing and tumbling and flying to a newer fitter more confident version of you, they are well and truly slam dunked into the ocean of ‘What the hell is going on’. The dawning of realisation that ‘youth’ is soon to be leaving you and ‘youthfulness’ has well and truly over spilleth from them and they are heading towards a newer disturbing version of them!
So, hey you, be kind, be good, be healthy and wise, gather those skills, they are worth more than any money buys.
Be kind to your daughters, sons, mum’s and dad’s. The changes you’re all facing, is just a fad.
A phase, a lapse of time in space, try get through it, with dignity and grace. But if you can’t, that’s OK too, after all, it’s just the rebel in you!
© carrie sherbourne and Relay shun sips – itsjustnoteasy.com Blog, 2018. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Carrie sherbourne and itsjustnoteasy.com Blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content
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