Parenting Teens and Dating: How to navigate the road to healthy teen dating.
What are the chances that your child will go through life without ever driving or dating? Pretty slim, in fact in most cases, both are inevitable. What formal training do you have planned for each of these critical events in your kid’s future? Why do they want to drive and date in the first place?
Surprisingly, the Driver’s Ed manual does provide a perfect instructional parallel that every parent can use: We can teach our kids how to date just like we teach them to drive. They can even earn their “Graduated Dater’s License” when they demonstrate evidence of dating for all the right reasons. We can show them how to determine clunkers from show-room prizes, separate Gremlins from Ferraris. We must understand that our own little darlings are being tuned-up, painted, and assembled into their own dating “vehicle.” They will become either sleek smart machines that handle well and avoid collisions or beater cars that might need repair for the rest of their lives. Our student’s “success” could well depend on how we, as parents, mold them and teach them before they venture out on their own. We are “instructors” and “mechanics;” we can use common road signs and simple driver’s education tools to keep our babies safe and focused on the path ahead of them. Do you want to see your daughter crash headlong into an oncoming street thug or parallel park with the Student Council president? How would you feel if you stood silent while your son accelerated inappropriately towards a wreck of a girl, when you had the means to keep him “inside the cones”?
In both dating and driving you want the same things for your child: no speeding, no accidents, no bad influences or distractions and please keep them from having to use the insurance! You thought unsafe driving was expensive? Without parenting teens, the cost for unsafe dating is enormous.