How do you? What do you? Where do you go when you are at the end of your tether? How far does this tether really stretch.. when you're sure its about to snap any moment. How long can we endure? What is the limit? AND when I reach the limit what option is REALLY open for parents like me?
I always thought bad kids were due to the parents.. with little ones maybe its true to an extent, but with teenagers, no matter how hard you showed them morals and the right and wrong way to do stuff, when they want to do something their way there are very few things you can do to stop them.
We reason, we talk, in fact I wrote a great poem explaining how it truly is to be enduring the parent of a teen. And its not a five minute phase they go through, but a really long thing- mine started at 11 with a few things, then the window smashing and a few more things, we've done therapy and boarding school and family holidays, we've tried living back at home now and at nearly 16 I can only say things have escalated in how much he thinks he has a right to do, he has a right to do this and that and to take what he wants and carry on with such an attitude.
Its very hard. We have had a couple of police incidents and a few more that they probably should have known about but we dealt with inside the family. Everybody wants the best for the child but they are so draining - now im finding that everyone's patience is used up. My blog is for the good the bad, the moans and the groans - and after all - This is My LIFE!!
I never thought I would lock up my things or suffer some of the stuff he has been doing - and the problems it causes between the parents when a child behaves like this are unavoidable. The whole family is suffering the teenage curse.
Its hard hard hard. I want help, there isnt really any. In France he is legally stuck to us until he is 18 though he has already tried to leave (at 15). I want some respite and thankfully have some friends who can offer me a weekend here and there to get some sleep and time to think and maybe one normal weekend with my man who only makes it home about one weekend a month).
Hmmmmmm - Life's Tests Huh!
Showing posts with label Children. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Children. Show all posts
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Babylon
Well, life is life.
We have children - we never knew what it would be like, its beautiful and at times its really tough - we work with that - we endeavour to. Now, "Son pushing 16 proves difficult" would be my headline (and that would be mild to all the things I could say but am not ready to admin publicly). I would love to start my blog with something else, but its prevelent maintenant. Feeling it like "The Family" - Have u seen that show!? Yes thats how it is! And really now for the first time I don't blame the parents.
So, thats why I am up at 2am listening to David Gray and SWV on the headphones - some tranquility, some time to think, get things in perspective. This is it. Being strong enough to realise no matter how long it lasts that I am stronger. I don't want to lose this child after so long of nurturing and instilling the right things, but dammit - you can lead the horse to water.. but you can't make him drink right?
So Babylon, A place of peace
God help me
We have children - we never knew what it would be like, its beautiful and at times its really tough - we work with that - we endeavour to. Now, "Son pushing 16 proves difficult" would be my headline (and that would be mild to all the things I could say but am not ready to admin publicly). I would love to start my blog with something else, but its prevelent maintenant. Feeling it like "The Family" - Have u seen that show!? Yes thats how it is! And really now for the first time I don't blame the parents.
So, thats why I am up at 2am listening to David Gray and SWV on the headphones - some tranquility, some time to think, get things in perspective. This is it. Being strong enough to realise no matter how long it lasts that I am stronger. I don't want to lose this child after so long of nurturing and instilling the right things, but dammit - you can lead the horse to water.. but you can't make him drink right?
So Babylon, A place of peace
God help me
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Amsterdam Boat Holiday
Arriving in Amsterdam from Eindhoven was fine, plenty to see on the train journey, a real peaceful feeling warmed inside me when I saw the flat fields rolling away for miles, the windmills and familiar flowers. Met by my partner, who has been working there for six months now and has his own apartment, situated just one tram from central station or a hundred yards from his local coffee shop, he kindly brought supplies: some food and a large spliff for the train.
I have visited "The Dam" several or twenty times before, mostly in harder times when my partner's sister and I have scraped together our giros, got the ferry, and driven over from UK, sleeping the night in my old beemer: -4 degrees and big duvets, all for the love of our herbs.
Never before had i visited Amsterdam as a tourist with children in tow, but for me I was really just happy to be there. We exited the train for the metro and dragged our cases out at his nearest stop, where there were thousands upon thousands of bikes parked up at the station. A short walk later and we were in his cosy apartment, kids exploring while parents smoking.
Next we popped to the market (see separate shopping in Amsterdam Blog!)
That evening we slept at the Novotel, just minutes walk from the apartment but with enough space for us all to sleep comfortably. Returning to the apartment for breakfast, more playing and smoking. In fact a nice family sunday chillout, which to be honest, is something we really miss while Daddy is away so often.
After lunch we checked into our canal boat, where we were staying for the rest of the week. A huge boat, just 5 minutes from central station, with a picnic bench on the roof. Inside was clean and tastefully decorated with a huge living area (or dance studio as my 5 year old declared) and a bedroom at each end of the boat, one ensuite.
After a short time of unpacking we were off for a walk into town, buying some sweets and treats for the kids (to sustain the moaning of car-bred children having to walk for more than 100m at a time).
We were really lucky with the weather as the sunshine had followed us from Marseille. I could have walked for hours, taking it all in, the shops, the hustle bustle, the cosmopolitan mixture of people buzzing past. After an hour or so we stopped for some refreshment, coffee for us and hot chocolate to warm the children. It was a sports cafe, that happened to also be a coffee shop (how convenient!). Of course we enjoyed the smoke (at a separate table), and the children enjoyed resting their feet, colouring and tv for a while. We only stopped twice like this for half an hour during the whole week... was this such a bad thing (please see the article from hubby's blog... entitled Are we the new McCann's)
Next Day we hired bikes, one for Jordan and one for me with a large wooden box on the front, for Kelisse to sit in and our picnic/munchies .. (to fight the cold I put her in a holdall with her fur coat covering her knees and she loved it). We whizzed about for a few hours, up and down canals, passing Anne Frank's house and some other attractions on our way. Lunch at the boat, sitting on top, feeding the ducks and passing seagulls, sipping wine and smoking a head... really chilled out.
In the afternoon we headed for the zoo park, but found that our legs were failing us somewhat, after several years without much exercise to walk and cycle two consecutive days was taking its trial, and we decided to hit the supermarket, forget the zoo and head back... The bike piled high with shopping and child proved too much for me, so my young, fit son had to take over the pedalling challenge - at this point i realised that I really had been doing a work out all day - as his bike was light as a feather and it felt like i was in flight all the way back!! If I lived in Amsterdam I would definitely use a bike all the time.
Late that day we met my partner after work in the lively Waarmerstraat again, where this time Kelisse had Egg and Chips in our favourite coffee shop.. (this was the second and final visit to a coffee shop for me). We wandered back to the boat through the streets of the red light district, an eye opener for my 15 yr old Im sure, but hell, the way we look at it, its better for your kids to have knowledge of the temptations in life with our introduction and explanation, rather than fumble along later and getting into a whole heap of problems. During the walk, I don't actually think my daughter noticed the girls in the windows, she was too busy counting bikes, canals, lampposts and all the other distracting conversations that I engineered. Got back, and I cooked Red Thai Curry.
Next morning we rose early to be first in the queue at Anne Frank's house. It was quite a long walk, much further than it looked on the map, maybe 40 minutes or so, but we didn't have to queue and I think we all enjoyed the experience and gained a little knowledge of what it was like during the war for the Jewish community. The kids had their pre-printed questionnaires that I did for them, giving me the space to take it all in and read my way around the museum in peace.
At lunchtime we met Daddy from his workplace, meeting a couple of colleagues, which left me thankfully with even more inspiration and more bells ringing for me to do my own sites, as these guys are making their thousands from private websites, and have houses in paradise already - they are going to work for? ..fun? i suppose!
That evening we ate at the Pancake Bakery - a nice place, which offered a delicious choice of sweet or savoury pancakes, though the service could have been a little quicker.
On the final day we went to the Nemo Centre (see separate blog entry)
Sad to leave Amsterdam, and certainly could have stayed for the whole week, (even with kids). Before we travelled, I was aprehensive about finding enough things for us to do all week. But now I realise it was a great city to visit, with or without children and will definitely be saving up for another stay on the boat this year.
I have visited "The Dam" several or twenty times before, mostly in harder times when my partner's sister and I have scraped together our giros, got the ferry, and driven over from UK, sleeping the night in my old beemer: -4 degrees and big duvets, all for the love of our herbs.
Never before had i visited Amsterdam as a tourist with children in tow, but for me I was really just happy to be there. We exited the train for the metro and dragged our cases out at his nearest stop, where there were thousands upon thousands of bikes parked up at the station. A short walk later and we were in his cosy apartment, kids exploring while parents smoking.
Next we popped to the market (see separate shopping in Amsterdam Blog!)
That evening we slept at the Novotel, just minutes walk from the apartment but with enough space for us all to sleep comfortably. Returning to the apartment for breakfast, more playing and smoking. In fact a nice family sunday chillout, which to be honest, is something we really miss while Daddy is away so often.
After lunch we checked into our canal boat, where we were staying for the rest of the week. A huge boat, just 5 minutes from central station, with a picnic bench on the roof. Inside was clean and tastefully decorated with a huge living area (or dance studio as my 5 year old declared) and a bedroom at each end of the boat, one ensuite.
After a short time of unpacking we were off for a walk into town, buying some sweets and treats for the kids (to sustain the moaning of car-bred children having to walk for more than 100m at a time).
We were really lucky with the weather as the sunshine had followed us from Marseille. I could have walked for hours, taking it all in, the shops, the hustle bustle, the cosmopolitan mixture of people buzzing past. After an hour or so we stopped for some refreshment, coffee for us and hot chocolate to warm the children. It was a sports cafe, that happened to also be a coffee shop (how convenient!). Of course we enjoyed the smoke (at a separate table), and the children enjoyed resting their feet, colouring and tv for a while. We only stopped twice like this for half an hour during the whole week... was this such a bad thing (please see the article from hubby's blog... entitled Are we the new McCann's)
Next Day we hired bikes, one for Jordan and one for me with a large wooden box on the front, for Kelisse to sit in and our picnic/munchies .. (to fight the cold I put her in a holdall with her fur coat covering her knees and she loved it). We whizzed about for a few hours, up and down canals, passing Anne Frank's house and some other attractions on our way. Lunch at the boat, sitting on top, feeding the ducks and passing seagulls, sipping wine and smoking a head... really chilled out.
In the afternoon we headed for the zoo park, but found that our legs were failing us somewhat, after several years without much exercise to walk and cycle two consecutive days was taking its trial, and we decided to hit the supermarket, forget the zoo and head back... The bike piled high with shopping and child proved too much for me, so my young, fit son had to take over the pedalling challenge - at this point i realised that I really had been doing a work out all day - as his bike was light as a feather and it felt like i was in flight all the way back!! If I lived in Amsterdam I would definitely use a bike all the time.
Late that day we met my partner after work in the lively Waarmerstraat again, where this time Kelisse had Egg and Chips in our favourite coffee shop.. (this was the second and final visit to a coffee shop for me). We wandered back to the boat through the streets of the red light district, an eye opener for my 15 yr old Im sure, but hell, the way we look at it, its better for your kids to have knowledge of the temptations in life with our introduction and explanation, rather than fumble along later and getting into a whole heap of problems. During the walk, I don't actually think my daughter noticed the girls in the windows, she was too busy counting bikes, canals, lampposts and all the other distracting conversations that I engineered. Got back, and I cooked Red Thai Curry.
Next morning we rose early to be first in the queue at Anne Frank's house. It was quite a long walk, much further than it looked on the map, maybe 40 minutes or so, but we didn't have to queue and I think we all enjoyed the experience and gained a little knowledge of what it was like during the war for the Jewish community. The kids had their pre-printed questionnaires that I did for them, giving me the space to take it all in and read my way around the museum in peace.
At lunchtime we met Daddy from his workplace, meeting a couple of colleagues, which left me thankfully with even more inspiration and more bells ringing for me to do my own sites, as these guys are making their thousands from private websites, and have houses in paradise already - they are going to work for? ..fun? i suppose!
That evening we ate at the Pancake Bakery - a nice place, which offered a delicious choice of sweet or savoury pancakes, though the service could have been a little quicker.
On the final day we went to the Nemo Centre (see separate blog entry)
Sad to leave Amsterdam, and certainly could have stayed for the whole week, (even with kids). Before we travelled, I was aprehensive about finding enough things for us to do all week. But now I realise it was a great city to visit, with or without children and will definitely be saving up for another stay on the boat this year.
Monday, December 17, 2007
TV Catchup - An expat's dream website
QUICK WEBSITE REVIEW:
TV CATCHUP
A fantastic site where you can watch all the latest tv and most of a series if you want to find something you can just watch for a few hours - its great. Its free and theres no downloading necessary.. just click and watch
This site gives you Eastenders, Coronation St, basically everything from BBC ITV CH4 ITV2, all the reality shows, many kids shows too... panorama... what do you want! it really is like that!
Only small drawback is that i seem unable to enlarge the size of the feed and sometimes like now, the streaming is a bit jumpy (but hell that could be my hardware (said in an American drawl like i know what im talking about!)
www.tvcatchup.com
Go there - catch up! You don't need to live in another country to need this!
TV CATCHUP
A fantastic site where you can watch all the latest tv and most of a series if you want to find something you can just watch for a few hours - its great. Its free and theres no downloading necessary.. just click and watch
This site gives you Eastenders, Coronation St, basically everything from BBC ITV CH4 ITV2, all the reality shows, many kids shows too... panorama... what do you want! it really is like that!
Only small drawback is that i seem unable to enlarge the size of the feed and sometimes like now, the streaming is a bit jumpy (but hell that could be my hardware (said in an American drawl like i know what im talking about!)
www.tvcatchup.com
Go there - catch up! You don't need to live in another country to need this!
Monday, December 10, 2007
Apology Letter from the Government
Did everyone get their apology...,.
I especially like the bit that says that they might still have the disks on their property.. but they dont know?????
hehe
I especially like the bit that says that they might still have the disks on their property.. but they dont know?????
hehe
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Saturday - another day in the life of..
Saturday - another day in the life of..
Got the car all washed and hoovered and photographed in the crispy sunshine the other afternoon - np
...have now got 6 broken fingernails though, appointment not til Tuesday but weather is still bad enough to go about with gloves on!
Got up today and helped K with some homework, then we went to the park where i had to pretend to be this and that, to get on the roundabout, you know the drill... i drew the line at climbing the tree though. Back for some playing tidying ebaying playing etc, cooking together was really good fun making up our own prawn burger idea and it worked really well...!
Nearly all my xmas shopping done, online or whatever, some ebay stuff sold and lots more bought.... going fine though and feeling quite on top of things.. even got the car online for sale (thats been on my list for a long time!)
Would like to spend some time getting my admin up to date and definitely up for swimming tomorrow morning with Kelisse.
Cant really think to write any more blog - as I think the people upstairs are perhaps playing bowling all around the house - its 1-30 am and they started around 7pm...damn
Going to finish watching my drama on bbc1 - yeh im a UK girl livin in France, wouldnt give up my uk telly though - even download east enders by torrent if i miss it!
Gnite then x
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