Daughters

I had an eye opening experience last week with Miss Priss.  A while back, I allowed her to go on facebook.  Without her knowledge and for safety reasons, I log on her profile once or twice each week and check to see who she is talking to privately.  (I can see everything else from my own profile.)  For the past few months everything has been good.  She talks to friends from school and church, as well as our preacher, his wife and our youth minister.  Since she had been showing that she can be somewhat responsible, we purchased a cell phone for her birthday.  We decided to get the cell phone because of sleep-overs, church events, and ball games– it is easy to keep track of her whereabouts if she has phone.  This also gets checked periodically, without her knowledge.  (Because, let’s be honest, if she were doing something she knows she shouldn’t, she’d be sure to cover her tracks.  I want to know what is going on with my kiddos.)

Last week, we had a bedroom issue with her.  Specifically, her room looked like a clothing factory exploded in it, as did her bathroom.  She gets one gentle reminder of this daily responsibility, and knows there are consequences if the reminder has to be repeated.  Well, the reminder had to be repeated several times.  Why?  She was too busy texting.  So, I told her the next time she neglected her room, I was taking her phone away for a few days.  On Wednesday morning, I stepped into her room and the clothing factory explosion had multiplied.  I didn’t dare look in her bathroom.  The bedroom was enough.  I took her phone.  She went to school.

About three hours later, her phone went off.  It was a text message from a name I didn’t recognize.  (Aha, a new contact.)  Since I didn’t recognize the name or number, I scrolled through the messages until I saw this “Do you have pic message?”  Instant red flag.  (She does not have a camera phone for this specific reason.  Nor does her phone have net capabilities.)  After reading all the inbox and sent messages, I switched over to the net and checked her facebook.  I found that she had added a new male friend they night before, and had communicated via personal message– where they exchanged phone numbers.  I clicked on this male friend’s name (a name I did not recognize) and found that he will soon be twenty years old.  My temperature immediately rose and I’m sure steam was pouring from my ears.  Right then, at that moment, I sent a message to this person and told him, very directly, to never ever contact my daughter again… and reminded him of the legal implications if he did.  (Her age vs. his.)  I then blocked him from contacting her on facebook.  After about half an hour of fuming, I changed her facebook password.

When she got home from school, we had a very very long talk.  She confessed that she’d ‘met’ this -boy- through a friend from school (who is also on facebook and is also in the seventh grade).  She thought since her friend -knew- him it was okay.  She learned quickly that it was not okay.  I learned that she is not nearly knowledgeable enough about boys and the internet.

Priss didn’t understand why I was so upset about her giving her phone number to a complete stranger; or why I was upset that he asked about ‘pic messaging.’   She just didn’t understand the dangers, or the things that older kids (practically grown men) do with picture messages.  Nothing good was behind a near twenty year old asking my daughter if she had picture messaging.

So, we had another talk.  About the dangers of the internet (in more depth than any previous talk); and we had a talk about boys and girls.  We had ‘the’ talk.  This talk wasn’t something I wanted to have with my twelve year old daughter, but one that was obviously necessary given the attention she gets from boys, especially older boys, and the fact that she is in junior high.  (And there are girls younger than her that have already given birth.)  We had a good talk, just she and I, and she now understands things from a mature perspective.  (I have always had the sex talk with my children, one on one, and explained the truth of sex, pregnancy, STDs, etc.  Being a victim of child molestation, I want my children to learn the truth– not something their friends tell them, or worse.  Knowledge is a great defense, in my opinion.)   She also understands it from a Biblical perspective, which was one of the most important things I wanted her to learn.  She understands why a boy asking about picture messaging can be a bad thing (ever heard the term sexting?) and she understands why she is not allowed and will never be allowed to be friends (or boyfriend/girlfriend) with someone who is more than two years older than she is.

During this, she found out that I do check her facebook and cell phone regularly.  If she were older, I may hear “you don’t trust me” or “you invaded my privacy.”  I explained to her that (1) my job is to teach her right from wrong and ensure that she makes good decisions, (2) I wouldn’t be doing my job as her mother if I didn’t do everything in my power to make sure she is making good decisions, and that includes checking facebook, cell phones, and email if necessary, and (3) until she is an adult and capable of making responsible decisions, there is a limit on privacy.  And I certainly learned a big lesson in all this– this world is extremely dangerous and I have to do everything I can to prepare my kids for it.

So now I ask you:  how did you have ‘the talk’ with your teens (or have you had) and how did they respond?  How do you handle privacy with your teens and does it depend on their age?  How do you handle daughters and boys/dating (or vice versa if you don’t have a daughter)?  And… if you haven’t done any of these things yet, how do you plan to handle it?  (So many questions…)