Parenting in this perilous time

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8 years ago

So, what do I know about raising kids now since mine are all grown? I know quite a lot, actually. Just because my kids are grown doesn't mean I don't still pay attention! After all, we still worry about our grandchildren growing up now.

I was a teenager during the psychedelic 60's. The kids in our home town towns drank like fish. I never did because I didn't like the taste. One time when I was about 13, I was babysitting for a family that kept liquor in their home. One night, I took the lids off all the liquor bottles and licked the insides of the lids. UGH!!!! It was so nasty, drinking was never a temptation to me.

Likewise, I was never tempted to smoke, at least not after the first time! About the same time I was licking the lids, my best friend and I heard that one of boy friends kept a carton of cigarettes down by the creek. We snuck down there, found the stash of cigarettes, and proceeded to smoke ourselves sick. I remember lighting up about 6 at one time and holding them all in one hand and smoking them all at once. Boy, was I sick! Same thing, never tempted again.

It wasn't until after I graduated and went away to college that drugs came to my hometown. Ruined the lives of both my younger brother's classes. Most of those kids are still there, working low-paying, dead-end jobs, hating their lives.

Our four youngest children all experimented with drinking, smoking and drugs, mostly marijuana, to some degree. Our two daughters tried it and quit, the two boys continued until the youngest spent 300 days in jail, for unpaid fines associated with his DUI's. (Like putting him in jail where he was unable to GET a job and thus totally unable to even TRY to pay his fines!) Both boys, who are now 28 and 32, have straightened out their lives, gotten their driver's licenses back, both are happily married with young families, and well-paying jobs, one driving a crane, one welding. They both still smoke, and as a nurse, that worries me a LOT, and the youngest still drinks a fair amount of beer, but boy, he sure doesn't go anywhere when he does. He learned his lesson!.

The two girls and their husbands are borderline active in our church, the two boys not at all. They are fine people, and we love them.

I watch our grandchildren like a hawk, and my husband, who is a retired deputy sheriff keeps a professional eye on them also. So far so good.