The Paranoid Parent of Teenagers

3:15, the dog wakes me up. What’s her deal? She pees all the time lately. She’s getting to be an old dog, I guess. Wow! That was fast!

I get up to let her out because that’s what I do. That’s why I exist…to her. I am the one who will respond and always have, so no one else has had to. No one else is in practice for this kind of work—just me.

Okay, so here’s the problem. It’s now 4:03am. Nearly an hour I’ve been laying here. First, I climb back into bed with complete hope that I will be able to just dose back off….Then my feet start to itch. I’m talking full on itchiness. I try to ignore them. Sometimes this works and the itchiness goes away. Well, it does…kind of. There are other times that I give in and scratch them, and I scratch them and I scratch them, and somehow, that satisfies things so I can go back to sleep.

No sleep. I realize that when I went down to let the dog out, just as my feet hit the bottom stair, that a
door downstairs banged against the door frame—as if someone had pushed against it. Uh oh! Is someone in the house? Add to that the fact that as I go to check it out, I see a light on under the door to the garage. Has someone gone in or out during the night?

And so it begins….The mom worries. Ugh! Totally FORGET sleep. I’m so done!

My brain starts creating possibilities….If I were a teenager, what would I do? If I were a teenager who really had no understanding of a parents worries, what would I try to get away with?

Seriously serious situations enter my brain. The door bangs again—3, 4, 5 times. Okay, that’s it! There is no pattern to the banging, and it really is just one bang and then nothing and then another bang a few minutes later. Is there a window open because someone’s gone out of it? Is someone paying someone a midnight visit? What is going on?

Well, let’s just say I’m grateful for the flashlight app I downloaded on my phone, but I’m cursing the creaking stairs. Ugh! Darned old house. A dead give away for sure. They’ll hear me coming and quickly act like they’re sleeping…..At least that’s what I would have done at their age.

Yup. I know it all. I was one once. Loved my parents dearly, but y’know, a kid’s gotta be a kid—but not on my watch. Why do I think it’ll be any different for me than it was for my parents? Well, that’s exactly it!.... I don’t.

That’s why I’m up.

Just for the record....Everyone was in bed. No windows or doors were open, but my imagination still was and the door continues to bang.

Happy 5:30!