On parenting a "T'ween" girl...



This sassy look used to be cute on my child...but now it's becoming a reality!

Pssssst. Hey moms of sweet little toddler girls: I’ve got a secret but before I spill, you’d better sit down and hug your little tu-tu-wearing girl really tight and take in all of her sweetness right now. I’ll wait.  You see, I was once where you are. As I tucked my three-year-old daughter into bed I thought I had so much time before she grew tired of tea parties and bedtime stories. I had my mind set on or about age 11 or 12 before the dreaded moodiness of teenage hormones begin to seep in and invade the walls of our happy little home.

My own darling daughter Marlena was born in March, 2005. When you’re walking your fussy baby at 2 a.m. you do a lot of trivial thinking. I did the math and I knew that 2018 was the year she’d turn 13. But that was a loooooooong way off, I told myself.

 

 

My pre-baby memory told me that nine-year-old girls are FUN. They can be your little helper at home, and playing with others is a dream. They play with their dollies and they chatter endlessly about girly things. No one fusses or argues, they’re perfectly agreeable about everything. Sleepovers are a dream, they giggle until midnight and then drop off to sleep, only to wake up and skip outside to play some more ‘till their parents come and round them up. There are no petty complaints or mild jealousies because of course, that’s only in high school and then only in the first year, right?

Yeeeah that was some funny fiction right there but listen up: here’s what they don’t tell us mommies of girls. Those milestone markers for each age….you know… the ones that say they will be potty-trained by 18 months and outgrowing the binky by two are NOT exactly accurate.

Just as I haughtily thought I had sailed through the terrible twos, only to discover that age THREE was the year my sweet chubby cherub morphed into a little three-headed monster, the traditional baby year markers are flawed. There’s no easy way to break this to you so I’ll just tell you that nine… is the new 13.

I know. It was a shock to me, too. I learned this only the other night, as I sat at my computer, wide awake at 3 a.m., scrolling the Internet desperate to find everything and anything on how to deal with “tween drama.” This HAD to be a fluke, I told myself. This bickering with the little girlfriends she loved and was always begging to have over for playdates. The increasingly frequent spats I was having with this child who only five minutes ago thought I hung the moon. The eyerolls, foot stomps and the change from the way she used to call my name “Mommy?” to the now overly-exasperated “MOOOOOOOOMMMMM…”

Marly still has a little bit of her chubby cheeks left and she still carries her “Snoodle,”  her equivalent to a blanky. Yet after consulting nearly every mom I know and trust who has or raised daughters, I’m afraid the evidence is stacked against my delusions.

It seems I’ve entered into uncharted waters. I’m now parenting a “tween.” I used to hear that term and laugh, before I had one of my own. To me, it was strictly a marketing term designed to pitch beauty products to a younger audience. I mean, c’mon, a nine-year-old is still a sweet little girl who plays with Barbie Dolls and reads Tiger Beat Magazine.  She still believes in fairytales and she loves her mommy sooooo much, right? After all, I did…or did I?  It’s one of those things I’ll never be able to ask my mom but I recently asked my dad if he remembered me being so….well, teen-age-y….at my daughter’s age.

“Ohhhh, I don’t know,” was his answer. “Your mother handled all of that stuff.”

I know there were squabbles. I vividly remember having a screaming match with my mom on picture day as I scrambled to get out the door that morning. I don't recall what it was about but today I still detect puffy eyes whenever I look at that picture of myself.

When such little dramas arose, however, the most I ever did was slam my bedroom door, throw myself onto my little bed and scream into my pillow for 30 seconds. That usually did the trick and I’d be out the door and back into the sunshine in mere minutes.

With my daughter, the smallest things seem to be filled with such drama and it takes less and less to make my once sweet-natured child angry. Most days she’s happy and carefree and thankfully, at least as far as I can tell, I’ve been able to keep her fairly innocent to things I know are just around the corner. Lately, though, there are more moments when it feels like she’s morphing out of the sweet little girl I love right before my very eyes.

It recently occurred to me that maybe I’m watching MYSELF morph from the mommy she idolized only last year into the dreaded "nag" mom all teens think they "report" to....how could it be that I had a love-fest with this child just last summer?


These days, even reminding her to make her bed or get some reading done before school starts is tantamount to me "yelling" at her and in her eyes, acting as if she'd committed a major crime. Another hallmark of dramatic teens, and hence, T'weens, is exaggerated overreactions. To.Every.Little.Thing.Mom.Says.

She seems to be growing bored of me, too. For instance, when I turn off the radio during our commutes, so that we can just talk, I’m now met with a deep sigh and an exasperated plea to turn Ariana Grande back on so she can hear the rest of her song. NOW.

Even though I pride myself on being a hip mom, dressing appropriately without being frumpy and being able to keep up with kids’ pop culture, I still seem to easily embarrass her just because I’m her mom. The other day she glared at me all through lunch because I asked her, while shopping at Target, if her bike shorts for underneath her school jumper were getting too tight and would she like a couple new pairs. First came the eye roll, followed by the punctuated whisper, asking if we HAVE to talk about that HERE? In the store?  You’d have thought I’d discussed the birds & bees in mixed company! After all, I was standing in the school uniform area where the bike shorts were conveniently on display…

The girl drama that is a rite of passage for all of us seems to come about way earlier and it's way more intense than it was when I was her age.  I also see more drama stemming from technology, these days.  For instance, we all know how an innocent text, minus cadence and facial expression, can send even the most confident adult over the edge if something gets lost in translation, am I right? Imagine, then, how badly a little girl can overreact to an innocent text message that goes unanswered or worse, is met with a one-word answer.

“Is she mad? I think she’s mad. Do YOU think she’s mad?”

“Mommy look at this picture. Do you think she sent that picture because she’s trying to show off that she went to Disney and I haven’t gone yet? They think it’s lame that you haven’t taken me to Disney yet. WHY haven’t we gone to Disney yet?”

“I KNOW she's not texting back because she doesn’t care about me.”

She only has my old iPhone that she uses to play games and text a few approved friends but this texting business is tough for little ones. It can be tough on their confident mommies, too. I’m doing my best to keep her use of that little used iPhone to a minimum and no number of her own till 14...of course I remember saying she'd not wear dangly earrings till 12, too...

This drama, coupled with the fact that she lives in a house built into the side of a hill, with no kids to play with living in the immediate neighborhood and no flat land or sidewalks on which to ride her bike and you can see my frustration this summer. Unless I drop everything to call another parent and drive her to their house at least a few miles away, she’s either reading or she’s bored and all that time on her hands makes her THINK.TOO.MUCH.

Our anticipated move in the coming months will remedy at least this part, I hope, and perhaps living in a neighborhood filled with kids her age, like the one in which I grew up will remove some of the current angst and drama and replace it with the more fun, carefree aspects of being nine or 10. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

Still, I know that this “tween” phase is only a small preparation for what lies ahead a few short years from now, when I imagine my daughter’s colorful, bling wardrobe will change into Goth black and her mood will follow.   

Just as I sat here tonight trying to finish this entry, my moody girl from earlier climbed onto the couch beside my desk, put her little arms around me and kissed my cheek.

Marly: “Whatcha writing about?”

Me: “You, actually.”

Marly: Are you tellin’ about my dance showcase today?”

Me: “I’m writing about how hard it is to watch you grow up.”

Marly: “Awww Mommy, I already told you! I’m gonna grow up to be a singer and dancer and when I make enough money I’m gonna buy you and daddy a big mansion and I’m gonna buy one right next door for me with a connecting underground passage so we can just run back and forth in bad weather.”

Me: (tears welling up) “I’d like nothing better, beebee.”

Marly: “OK now come tuck me and all my babies into bed, Mommy.”

And just like that my so-called “T’ween” was in her bedroom kissing every stuffed animal goodnight as I called each one by name. Tonight I lingered longer than usual after she fell asleep, feeling both a sweet joy and a tough tug at my heartstrings as I reflected how far we’ve come these past nine years,  knowing how quickly the next nine years will fly, all the while thanking God for it all.

 

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