Confessions Of A Mother Of A Teenage Boy

I think teenage boys are God's way of testing not only our patience, but also how much we can stomach. You haven't seen "disgusting" until you have removed six moldy, festering bag lunches from a locker.

This is but one of my experiences as the mother of a 13-year-old boy. I am starting to realize that my son is in the running for one of the most disgusting creatures on God's earth.

They ignore the manners you have been teaching them since they were toddlers and prefer instead to amuse themselves with such behaviors as burping and unleashing other bodily functions at the dinner table. They forget to flush toilets. They leave a trail of trash, dirty dishes, clothing and school papers throughout the house.

They also stop talking and prefer instead to mumble incoherently and grunt. I have heard of tribes in Africa that communicate though a series of grunts and clicks. I am considering sending overseas for a translator.

And they lose things. His cell phone was missing for over two months before he finally found it under his bed. The only reason he bothered to look for it was because I refused to get him another one. He is constantly looking for his ipod.

Although we have developed a system of binders with folders, notebeooks and pencils for each of his classes, he refuses to use them. He prefers instead to borrow pencils and paper off everyone from the person sitting next to him to the school custodian. Homework papers are shoved in the bottom of his locker, his backpack, or in the pocket of his jeans. Many are lost or simply never turned in.

Most of the time, my patience with him is at its breaking point. In my weaker moments, I think that mothers who eat their young out there in the animal kingdom may have the right idea.

But then they do something that reminds you that they are, after all, still your "little boy" even though they are now taller than you. The other day as he was walking out the door for the bus, he looked back and shouted, "Love you, Mom!"

So, for now, I will resist from either killing him or grounding him until he is thirty. At least until his grades come out.