Future Teenagers in Love

I can barely write on this because the thought of my children loving anyone outside our family gives me the creeps, already. The thing I keep trying to pre-train myself to say first to her when she says, “…but I LOVE him!” is “I am sure that you do. I remember what that feels like.” I feel like it will be important try to establish some common ground and respect before diving deeper in the conversation. Just because I am older and have experienced the deep love in marriage, doesn’t mean that I should diminish the fact that young hearts have very real feelings. After all, I spend everyday trying to show them, tell them, and model for them how to give and receive love. I can only hope that after I validate his/her feelings that I don’t find myself hopping in the car, driving to the local church, and converting to Catholicism, just to put them in the convent or seminary. I hope that they will learn how important love is yet how to maintain self respect, self control, and to not lose sight of things that are important to them now and to their future.
Our backup plan, however, was established on the day of our 1st child’s birth. We had been expecting a boy, and she was far from it…this beautiful girl was now ours. I looked over at my husband holding her, and noticed a concerned look on his face. He simply stated, “We need to buy land.” I wasn’t sure if the drugs were getting the better of me or if he had lost it so I asked him to explain. With some panic in his voice, he followed with, “to hide the bodies.” The thought of having a daughter who someday would date boys almost took him over the edge. FYI, we do not own land or a gun. However, we plan to buy bullets. When the box of bullets is sitting out on our countertop, the boy is bound to believe we also have a gun….that may work all by itself. Wish us luck.