Teens and Porn 101

Read and then we'll talk
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/07/magazine/teenagers-learning-online-porn-literacy-sex-education.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

I know this is not a fun topic. But it is a topic that must be discussed. In the olden days (when I was a teen) boys coveted their Playboys, and Penthouses, usually retrieved from their dad's trash. In today's world, those magazines seem so sweet; nude, beautiful, airbrushed, large breasted women..perfection personified. Ah, the days of yore.

Today's porn is live and in-person. As you will see on the video below, 25% of Internet searches are for porn, and I'm sure many of those searches are conducted by teenage boys. Unfortunately, the porn they are watching is not sweet. It is full of women being taunted by men,  and the sex is violent and disrespectful. These video images can shape a young boy into thinking that this is the way girls like sex, demeaning, humiliating and forceful. The number of calls I get from parents of girls who are being harassed sexually by boys is scary. And even scarier is the world we now live in with daily accusations of sexual assault and harassment about the people in our lives who are supposed to be our role models!!

Because of teen's easy access to porn on smartphones, IPADs, and laptops, parents are very much out of the loop. It used to be parents could check the history on their teen's laptop and see what they were up to, at least giving them the opportunity to have a discussion with their teen about the dangers of porn. Masturbation is not one of them. Thinking that women liked to be controlled is one of them. And in the link I have included, porn addiction is another.

Let's not leave girls out of this. A new favorite pass time at sleepovers is to go on sites like chatroullette to watch live, men masturbating. I know, icky!  This is a video social networking site in which you live chat with someone you do not know. Many men are on this site trolling for girls to have video sex with. I have had a number of calls from parents who go down to the basement to bring the girls some food, and lo and behold there is some guy on the computer screen moaning and groaning, and a gaggle of girls egging him on.

If there was ever a time for a sex talk, this is the time. Teens need to hear another side! It is not OK to be exploited, it is not OK to expect a girl to do whatever you want her to do, or for a girl to think she has to do whatever a boy wants. College campus's, high schools AND middle schools are now awash in sexual harrassment cases and date rape. The research is showing that this onslaught of easily accessed porn, unsupervised by parents is behind some of this behavior. This is an uncomfortable topic. But in our current culture we are now learning that respect for women is not something that is a given. It needs to start being taught at a young age, and never stop. It is modeling what goes on your own home, and with your friends, and it is using the daily barrage of news stories as teaching lessons. It is talking and talking and talking until maybe you are blue in the face.

Watch this video with your boys. Talk with them again and again and again. The second link is a fantastic website with a tutorial about how to talk with your teen about porn. Great summer reading!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ya67aLaaCc&feature=player_embedded

https://parents.culturereframed.org/course/parents-of-tweens/

Rascist Texts=Serious Consequences

Kyle Kashuv is an extremely bright 18 year old graduating senior from Stoneman Douglas High School in the Florida suburb where the horrendous school shooting of 2018 occurred. Kyle had high hopes of attending Harvard University. And yay!!!! Kyle was admitted to Harvard!! A dream come true!! Until his offer of admission was rescinded. What could Kyle have done that made Harvard change their mind. It seems when Kyle was 16, two years ago, he and his friends were letting off steam on Google docs, texting each other back and forth. (texts that are unknown and impossible to read from a parent's point of view. (see blog link at bottom of this post for help on this topic) Kyle's texts in particular were extremely colorful, replete with repeated N words and other racial slurs as well as anti-Semitic language. According to Kyle, in retrospect, they were just stupid 16 year old boys trying to be as outrageous as they could be with each other, privately. Except it was not as private as he thought it was.

As usually happens with teens and social media, this conversation was passed around to various friends, cause hey....it was funny!!! and someone screen shot the texts. Cause... you know it might come in handy some day. Well that day came, maybe it was a fellow friend or just another student who did not get into his/her dream school, and was pissed and jealous that Kyle gets into Harvard, an amazing privilege, and how is that fair, after all the heinous and terrible racist and anti-Semitic things he wrote, this student might have thought. And so this student goes back into the texts and photo screenshots he/she has saved for just this kind of thing and sends it off to Harvard thinking/hoping that this might effect Kyle's acceptance. It did! Harvard has been quite consistent in the past when they are presented evidence of questionable moral character of an incoming student. A similar instance happened a few years ago when it came to the admission's office attention that a bunch of accepted boys were making sexist and misogynistic comments about the accepted girls whose pictures they found on some incoming student list. This kind of conduct does not fit with Harvard's expectations.

Kyle is pissed to say the least. He says this is unfair treatment. He was a stupid 16 year old boy, and especially after the shootings he has taken a good hard look at himself, and he is really really sorry. That may be true, but Harvard doesn't care, this is an expectation that is spelled out pretty clearly in admission policy, moral decency and the right to take away the privilege of attending when a moral lapse has been identified.

Has Kyle changed? Does he deserve to be un-admitted? Maybe yes, maybe no. For my purposes it doesn't really matter. What really matters is that kids need to understand that WHATEVER they write, WHATEVER photos they have taken are not and will never be private!!!! This is a very hard lesson to teach, but teach it you must. Revenge is so sweet. And though a teen might have shared these texts or photos with their "absolute best friends" those friends can turn on you on a dime. And when those questionable texts and photos are revealed to people who have the power to make decisions about their lives, the gig us up. It is now out of their control. It goes without saying that all parents hope that the values of respect for all people they have taught to their kids would translate to not writing these kinds of horrible things in the first place. But yet they do!

Ah the unexpected consequences of trying to be funny and impulsive, as many teens are. They do not think before they "speak." Social networking has turned us all into aspiring stand-up comedians. One important lesson though is you gotta know your audience!

Here is the article about kyle and Harvard.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2019/06/17/harvard-rescinds-admission-parkland-massacre-survivor-kyle-kashuv/20bxvExuuedU3uTDmrXeZN/story.html?p1=HP_TrendingBar

"Nearly 80% of employers research job applicants and 70% have rejected candidates because of their online profile." Let the parent lectures begin!!!

If your teen is starting to think about getting a job or internships they need to beware. Or how about looking to become a camp counselor? Perhaps that camp director is social media savvy, and goes on your teen's twitter, or instragram. (you know how teens are so selective about friending people)  If your teen has been posting obscenity laden quips, sarcastic rants or drunken exploits or sexy pics, you better tell them that might not look so good to that pizza store owner or to a camp director, who is looking for a wholesome camp counselor. Or, how about that highly competitive internship, looking for Mr or Ms responsible? I don't think they want to read that "man I got wasted and ....."

Perhaps your teen is will be applying to colleges in the near future.  This is a tough college market. And sometimes that decision might come down to what admission officers have found during their social media sleuthing! Hello Kyle!

This is definitely something that is not on your teen's radar. Someone has to put it there, and it is you!!! As Crosby Stills Nash and Young sing...."Teach, your children well."

Below are more articles about social networking gone bad. Here is how you might use these to teach your kids about cleaning up their act!

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/02/10/texas-teen-tweets-herself-out-pizza-job/

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/magazine/how-one-stupid-tweet-ruined-justine-saccos-life.html?hpw&rref=magazine&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region&region=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well

You might have them read these articles, and say: You  know honey, I get that posting outrageous stuff on instagram is fun, and reading all your friends crazy stuff is also fun, but the reality is that it makes your life an open book to college admissions people, potential jobs and internship employers. I wouldn't want something you think is funny but maybe insensitive or offensive to an objective reader, get in the way of getting what you want. I think it's time to do some "housecleaning." As you go through all your postings, think like a potential boss, or admission counselor, and ask the question: "What impression am I getting about this student, employee from their sites?" You wouldn't want them to say:"wow this kid seems to party a lot, that would probably affect their ability to work, or they use a lot of foul language and sexually explicit language, they don't show much respect for woman or men, I wouldn't want them interacting with my staff, or they seem kind of sarcastic and mean" Help your teens to ask the right questions and send them on their way with a Mr Clean power eraser! And teach them that their friends can be their own worst enemies. Just because they are good friends today does not mean they will be good friends tomorrow. Revenge is sweet!

Here is my blog on google docs! https://joanigeltman.blogspot.com/2019/04/and-you-thought-google-docs-was-just.html

So you have a lot to read. Luckily it's vacation time!!!

When A Punishment Causes More Harm Than Good!!

A recent story garnered my attention regarding the effectiveness of "laying down the law." Parenting a teen is particularly challenging when it comes to finding consequences that both communicate to your teen that certain choices they make come with consequences, and at the same time giving consequences that don't destroy the relationship that you have with your teen. Because truly, in the long run, it is the relationship that you have with your teen that will ultimately motivate their behavior. If a teen feels that everything they really care about has already been taken away, there is no motivation for them to change their behavior.

For example, one parent recently told me that in order for their kids to get cellphones, they must bring home all "A" report cards. Their younger children (not teens) for whom pleasing their parents was still an underlying motivator, rose to the occasion. The older teen, 14, not so much. Getting all "A's in middle school or high school is an unrealistic goal for most teens. Their lives are generally full of many things, friends, activities, and the need to just veg to take care of their overloaded brain full of too many thoughts, too many feelings and too many worries. For this teen, knowing that getting all "A's" was not a goal he had for himself, and knowing that the all-important cellphone was completely out of reach, just gave up with his academics. After all, what was the point? His anger at his parents, and his need now for a "fine, don't give me a phone, I'll just do no work, and get crappy grades. and show you! Which he did! And the kicker here is that this kid is extremely bright. So here we see that a motivator for one kid, is a complete disincentive for another, and a backfire for the parent.

I want to give you a few tips on setting consequences that have a chance of working.

1. Any consequence should be time-limited and short. Teens make mistakes, millions of them, it is a truth of this stage. If you choose to use grounding, or taking away computer/phone. Keep the time short. One weekend, or one week, and let your teen know, we get you made a mistake, there was a consequence, now lets start fresh. Part of the conversation needs to include, lets figure out what you can do differently so you don't find yourself having to stay in or not have access to your phone/computer. This problem solving phase is actually wayyyyyyyy more important than the consequence. Punishment alone never, and I mean this, never is what changes behavior. Otherwise why do we have such a high recidivisim rate in our prisons. 
2. Do not set your teen up to fail. Make sure that your expectations are realistic, remembering that teens are impulsive, emotional, risk-taking, and inexperienced, do not think things through, and do not like to be told what to do.  
3. Most importantly include your teen in decision making, rather than you being the rule-maker. When your teen can take ownership of the process, they are more likely to follow through. Let's take curfew for an example, if you set the rule, "you have to be home at 10:30, and literally all their friends really do stay out till 11, you may be setting you and your teen up for coming in late. Rather have this converstion: 

Teen: What time do I have to be home?
Parent: What time do you think is fair ? (trust me your teen will not say some ridiculous time, it might be a little later than you initially would have given)
Teen: 11:30
Parent: What do you think I will be worried about if I say yes to 11:30
Teen: Will probably say something like, "you're worried, I will be late, or out doing something you don't won't me to do.
Parent: Yes those things do worry me. What are YOU going to do to make me feel OK about those things? (This is where your teen has do some thinking. and that is a good thing. He/she is motivated to think, because they see some room for compromise here.
Teen: How about if I call you 1/2 hour before at 11 to let you know I will be home by 11:30 (if they don't say that, you can help them come up with this or another plan)
Parent: That sounds good, so what will the consequence be if you don't call me at 11
Teen: They will probably say, I can be grounded for the next night or one night the next weekend. (the consequence is in place, and it is now the teens responsibility to follow through)

This whole process is designed to help teens take responsibility and ownership of their decisions. Now you just have to sit back,and if they are successful, you can praise them with  a job well done, and if they don't follow through, you don't have to say anything, no lecture needed, just a "sorry it didn't work out for you tonight, I look forward to spending the night with you tomorrow or whenever the next weekend night is. That's it, no fighting , just a little shrug of the shoulders, over and out.

PS Is your teen home for the summer? Why not host an Ask The Expert Party and I'll come over for coffee or a glass of wine and help you and your friends learn how to get through the summer without going crazy from your teen. call 781-910-1770 for more info!

Why Is My Teen Demanding and Full Of Entitlement?

Teens are by definition demanding, narcissistic, and spoiled. Why? Because they do literally think about themselves almost exclusively all the time. Their newly developed brain can be held somewhat responsible for this. As the teen brain grows, it allows teens to think in ways they have never thought before. For the first time teen's are spending hours and hours thinking about themselves and the people in their lives. Being introspective is like a drug. There is no right answer, and there are endless possibilities to explain their behavior and the behavior of their friends. If I do or say this, than maybe this could happen, but if I do that, than that could happen. They have become the center of their own universe, which is a major shift from when you their parents, were the center of their universe. And like all good narcissists, they only see the world in terms of how it affects them. So if you are late picking them up from school, and they had to hang around by themselves, because all their friends had already left, than you have perpetrated a heinous crime, even if the cause was traffic beyond your control, a meeting that went late, or a flat tire. Honestly, they have no sympathy, no empathy, just anger at you making them feel like a loser somehow for leaving them standing alone for someone to see what a loser they are.

The good news, is that this is temporary insanity, unless, and this is a big UNLESS you fall victim to their accusations.!  DO NOT feel that you have in any way screwed up because guess what...shit happens, and you are not to blame, and you do not have to accept blame and then feel that for some reason you have to make up for all your supposed inadequacies by giving into the insatiable demands your teen, in a narcissistic haze put on you. On the other hand, and equally important, is you don't have to lecture your teen ad nauseam about their lack of empathy etc etc. And here is the best tip I can offer in these situations when your teen accuses you of something you absolutely know is not true, and is a function of this acute case of me me me me. You simply look at them, give a little smile, a head tilt, and shoulder shrug. No more no less. Nothing you are going to say will be heard anyway. They won't be this way forever unless you reinforce the behavior with feeling and acting guilty.

Free at least, free at last.. No worries, your kids will eventually shed their self-centered skin and become the loving, caring, kind person you know to be in there!

Do you work for a large company? I'd love to give one of my mini-seminars to you and your fellow staff members. My lunch time talks are extremely popular and can be tailored to meet the needs of parents with kids of all ages. email me: joani@joanigeltman.com or call 781-910-1770

My Teen Has A "Bad-Seed Friend"!

A mom wrote me the other day with this dilemma. She has a 14 year old daughter whose friendship with a girl a year older had caused her daughter a great deal of trauma last year. They succeeded in helping her separate from this girl. There was a big team effort from the school, the daughter's therapist and a lot of love and caring from this mom and dad. Parents, school and therapist saw a huge change in this 14 year old.  She began to have a happier disposition, a reconnection with old friends, and a lot less anxiety and misery. A win win. 

Mom thought this friendship was a done deal. This school year has been a good one, with little drama now that this friend was out of the picture, not only emotionally, but physically as well, having moved on to an alternative high school for teens with attitude and behavioral issues.  Everybody breathing a sigh of relief. And then... A request from her daughter last weekend to go to a semi-formal dance a few towns away with a friend mom loves, and another girl...the girl from last year that had caused her daughter so much angst. Mom was shocked. She thought this girl was gone and forgotten. But here she is again. Mom had been keeping up with this girl by reading her daughter's facebook, and had been reading about all her drug and alcohol fueled partying escapades which she freely described  to all on facebook.

There was a simple answer to this request from her daughter..NO. Mom understood her daughter's disappointment, understood she wouldn't be happy with her answer, but felt firm in that decision. The daughter, not so understanding. She pulled out the "you're the worst mother ever" line. A sure fire guilt producer. And this mom wrote me wondering whether she was the worst mom ever. I am here to say NO. 

Mom wrote: "She seems to gravitate to these kids because they “accept” her. She does not have a huge group of friends, and is trying to make new ones, but is having trouble. These troubled kids all accept her, because misery loves company. Help!!!!! 

The bottom line is you can not control your teens friendships.  When your teen hangs with kids you don't like, and feel don't bring anything positive to the table, you can often feel helpless in your ability to intervene. But, and this is an important but, you can have influence, which is different than control. These parents, school personnel and therapist definitely had influence in helping this 14 year old see that this friend was a downer, and the daughter was able to separate from her. 

This is hard work for a young teen. There is nothing more flattering to someone to have someone show interest in you, especially the "bad girl". These girls or boys are usually charismatic, fun, risk-taking personalities, who often prey on more passive, insecure types. They can seem especially attractive to those kids because they do all the "friendship work" for them. Making the plans, and orchestrating their social life with all the kinds of things that feel so hard for them. This mom really "gets" her daughter's motivation, and it must feel so exhausting to have to go through this all again. 

Certainly, saying no to situations that you know will be unsafe is a number one priority, like the dance. So maybe you will get the "worst mom/dad award that weekend. so be it. But the bigger job is to continue to help your teen to navigate this relationship and help her to be successful in forming new ones. Some "I get It" help. You can say to your teen: " I get how X can be a fun friend. Tell me what you like about them? And secondly, So what do you think worries me about X?" lecturing your teen about all the ills of this "bad seed" will only make them want to defend this kid. What you want to do is get them to articulate what's attractive about this kid, and to articulate what they think worries you about that. When it comes out of their mouths than they are an active participant in the discussion. They hear the words they are saying, and can take ownership. When you just lecture and talk at them, they shut down, and may be missing important information. 

Helping kids find positive relationships, especially for those kids who lack confidence is really the bigger task. Sometimes it takes a little sleuthing. If you know your teen has an interest in something but is shy about getting involved you can go behind the scenes. For example, say your kid is a good artist and getting involved with scenic design for the spring musical or poster design for the prom  would be a boost to their ego. So you might go to the guidance counselor or art teacher or drama teacher, and see if they might personally approach your teen to help, saying they heard they were a talented artist and could really use their help. This gives your teen access to whole new group of kids. Or perhaps your kid isn't into sports or theater or anything at school, and helping them to find a job or internship where there are other kids would help. The work here for kids who have a hard time in the friendship department is to help them get access to a wider network. Maybe that's a job, or volunteer work, some school activity. But what you need to know is that this kind of teen will not be the one to go find these opportunities. So saying things like" Why don't you sign up for....fill in the blank will fall on deaf ears. Whether its finding new friends, or signing up for activities, they just don't have the confidence. The work is helping them develop the confidence. So do a little behind the scene work. This is a little bit like the "secret life of a parent" here. You want your teen to feel like he is being asked not that his mommy or daddy is doing it for him. 

Navigating friendship comes very easily to some and not so easily to others. Recognizing and understanding that this might be your teen's challenge is important, helping them to feel confident and successful is your goal.

For Parent Coaching Services in-person or by phone or Skype, contact me at Joani@joanigeltman.com. Summers coming and with that a lot of unstructured time, host an Ask The Expert Party with your friends. we'll talk about all the things you want to talk about and I'll leave you with a "goody bag" full of strategies to get you through the summer!!

A Plan For Summer Planning

We're coming into the summer countdown!"Idle minds are the devils playground." No truer quote applies when thinking about teens and summer. If you haven't yet gotten into the summer mindset, here is your wake-up call! Everybody needs down time, but 10 weeks of down time for teens can spell t-r-o-u-b-l-e, especially if you are a working parent. If you anticipate leaving your house for work at 8 AM with your sleeping teen snug as a bug in a rug, thinking that all is well, get you head out of the sand. The devil will be over to visit.

Regardless of good intentions, too much time = too much potential for temptation. We're talking sex, drugs/alcohol and general mischief. Once boredom sets in, which it always does after the initial bliss of no structure, look out. The planning should start now. If you have a younger teen, 13-15, this is a bit harder. They are too old for day camp, too young for most jobs, and too inexperienced or  not motivated to find something on their own. Many older teens are unmotivated as well, or lack the confidence to find something on their own. So the first thing is to have realistic expectations of how much your teen will do independently to make something happen. Your job is to make your expectations clear, that is step #1. "I get you are looking forward to the summer, and having free time to hang with friends. We want you to have time for that too, but it's also important for you to have other things going on for you as well, either  a job, or a volunteer/educational/internship experience, or camp, something that gives you a feeling of accomplishment and purpose. How would you like to go about this? What kind of help do you need from us?. Here is the deal, the question isn't, do you want to do something or not? but what is it you would like to do?"

This can be a slow, painful process, as mostly you will get a lot of "I don't knows." If you have some extra money, there are many great programs that cater to particular interests of teens. If they want a job, expecting that they will have any idea of how to go about looking for one is unrealistic. Do this together, making a list of the kinds of places that are of interest to them, and then drive them around to pick up applications, and sit with them as they fill them out. If you just say to your teen, go get some applications, and have you filled our those applications probably not much will happen. I worked in a work/study program for 14 years with teens, and rarely did I find a teen who felt confident enough to follow through on expectations. What looks like laziness is actually low-self esteem.

It is important to let them know that if there don't seem to be any jobs, then volunteering or interning is the fallback, that you will provide them with some kind of stipend. But, and this is important, if they choose to be idle, and do neither, then you will choose  not to provide them with any summer spending money or phones to keep up their snap streaks. Being on their phone day and night or 24/7 fortnite is not gonna happen without some kind of engagement in something! Sitting around with both nothing to do, no phone, no video games, and no money is not fun, and will get old really really fast. So provide incentive and reward for those idle minds, and keep that devil at bay.

Contact me for parent coaching services or to present to your school, business, or community organization. joani@joanigeltman.com 781-910-1770

It's Prom Season!!! Be Prepared!!

With Prom night looming, its time to talk about the safety issues of prom night. A parent called me recently with this prom night delemna. Her 15 year old daughter had been invited to a prom. The kids in this group had decided to rent not just a limo, but a party van which seats 20+ kids. The plan was to all go in the party van to a restaurant for dinner, sans adult supervision and then head back on the van to the prom. Sounds like fun!!!! Except the sans adult supervision. Though it is verboten to drink on these party buses, where drivers are trained to make sure kids get on the bus as alcohol and drug free as possible, the stop at the restaurant would be a perfect opportunity for some pre-party alcohol/drug prep. No watchful eyes of limo driver or parents. I'm guessing mulitple visits to the restrooms provide ample opps for quick and dirty booze/drug comsumption.  Not safe!!!! This is drinking at its least safe. With a small increment of time teens will power drink so that they can reach the desired "highness" before re-boarding the bus. This is a prime-time for kids drinking potentially lethal amounts.

Expectations, expectations, expectations. This is night that has been planned for months, down to the most finite detail. Not least of which is how to sneak, hide, and invent new ways to party so the adults won't catch them. A few years ago it was water bottles. Teens, feigning dehydration, brought in their innocent looking water bottles into the prom party. No need to even hide their drinking, it was "just water". It didn't take long for the chaperones to figure out that ploy as kids vomited all over the dance floor, and passed out.

Moving on, last year, a few students ate some brownies, a lovely gift from mom to snack in the limo. Only these brownies may have come from mom's oven, but not mom's recipe, being full of pot. The kids still throwing up on the dance floor, (must have been some pretty strong pot) were sent by ambulance to a local hospital. Let's just say, there will now be no food or drink allowed into the prom. So much work, such creativity, all in the name of getting high.

The message here is that teens are extremely motivated to find new and different methods of partying before the party. I remember a community drug/alcohol committee I served on many years ago. Around prom time, the committee met with the group that included a number of high school students. When asked about a "sober prom" all the students said that kids would almost rather not go to the prom if they couldn't party before fearing they wouldn't have fun if they weren't drunk. That just made me so sad.

There is work to be done here. Below are some tips on helping your teen have a safe prom night:

"I Get It" Opportunities:

• I am so excited for you.
• I know how much fun you are going to have.
• I know there will be some situations that you have never been in before, lets figure out what they might be and put a plan together. 

Prom proofing your home:

• Lock up all alcohol and prescription drugs
• You drop off your teen's backpacks and sleepover bags to houses they will be going to either pre-prom or post-prom. (This helps with the hidden contraband kids pack in their backpacks)
• If kids come to your house to pre-prom. Supervise. This is when a lot of kids try to imbibe since they can't drink in the limos anymore. 
• If kids come to your house to post-prom, be the keeper of the backpacks and bags. Stay up all night if you are having an all night sleepover. One parent I know made it a requirement that all parents whose kids were coming to her house after the prom had to call her personally to let the parents know the rules of the house. No cars, parents were responsible for picking their kids up in the morning. This guarded against any kids sneaking out and possibly driving to get booze or drive drunk. Any teen caught with alcohol would have to be picked up by the parents immediately. 
• For those parents who think it's ok to let kids drink in your house to celebrate prom night as long as you take their car keys thinking you are now the "responsible parent" Listen up. First of all it is not your right to make a decision about kids that are not your own to drink. That is every parents right and responsibility to make their own rules and expectations about alcohol and drug use for their own kid. Also just because you are giving them "permission" and may have purchased the booze, don' think that means that kids will drink responsibly. That just means kids are going "yippee" we can get trashed! Getting trashed also means getting sick, passing out, getting alcohol poisoning, falling, tripping, get the picture? Also what happens if one of those kids you have given"pemission" to drink has a medical condition you don't know about, and alcohol exacerbates it and there is a medical crisis. And finally, IT IS ILLEGAL TO GIVE MINORS ALCOHOL.

Prepare and help your teen plan for:

• Getting in a car with someone who is buzzed.
• Unwanted sexual advances
• Drinking and drugs at a house party

Strategies and scripts for getting out of unsafe situations:

• Make an "escape plan" using text message code word

Provide scripts:

• I'm allergic, alcohol makes me sick
• My boyfriend/girlfriend wouldn't want me to fool around with anyone else
• My parents drug/alcohol test me
• Thanks I don't need a ride, I'm going with someone else
• I feel like crap, I'm going home

If things get out of hand, and a friend is out of control and wants to drive:

• Get a few friends together and grab the keys from the kid who shouldn't be driving.
• Text the parent in the house that there is a problem in the basement, or outside
• Go to the bathroom....for a long time. Text me, and I will meet you around the corner

Proms are fun and are memory makers. Really, don't be scared with everything I just wrote. I just want you to be prepared, and for you to prepare your teen. When you "get" that this night can be full of surprises, and that the awesomeness of it all can make it hard to stay safe, you are being smart. Be excited with your teen, and help them to be safe.