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I have a 17-year-old son, who’s currently a high school junior. Our district is fully remote, and has been since last March. My son has always been a relatively solid student, if not very enthusiastic. He has had his struggles in a few classes and is unorganized, but has always made it through and at the end of sophomore year as a solid A and B student. This year he has continuously failed classes (even art!), missed assignments, constantly says he’s fine, but he’s not. I brought in an executive functioning coach to help him organize, which worked for a bit, but the issue is still prominent.
Dear Care and Feeding,
Growing up, my mom channeled her anxiety into obsessively cleaning our home. Though it was spotless, this came at the detriment of our general happiness. We were never allowed to have a pet or even have guests over because it would dirty the house, we were frequently late to events because my mom was cleaning and lost track of time, and she missed out on bonding time with us because she was too anxious to leave the kitchen unclean for an hour after breakfast. I vowed I’d never be like her. Well, fast-forward to now, and my home is a mess. I can’t seem to stay on top of ever-present laundry piles, clutter, and the detritus that comes with having three kids.
Dear Care and Feeding,
My husband has a very limited number of dishes he is willing to eat. It’s pretty much: burgers, mac and cheese, pizza, and chicken fingers. Basically the children’s menu of any chain family restaurant. He’s not a super taster (he eats olives on his pizza and drinks coffee), and he doesn’t have texture issues (he dips his fries in mayo and his pizza crusts in ranch like it’s going out of style). He’s just very limited in what he eats. These self-imposed limitations on his diet have caused so many problems for him. He doesn’t want to attend work events, weddings, or extended family celebrations because he doesn’t think there will be anything that he’ll want to eat. He doesn’t want to try any new restaurants and sticks to chains where he knows his “food groups” will be represented. I know it’s bad, and he knows it’s bad, but there’s no changing him so we just live with it.
Dear Care and Feeding,
I was very close to my aunt while growing up. She helped to home-school me when conventional school didn’t work out well, so I often stayed with her. I’m still somewhat close with her, but past occurrences now give me pause regarding her relationship with my children. Perhaps most troubling is that she coached me on toilet-papering houses. She was youngish but certainly an adult by then. Her plans were intricate; the two of us dressed head to toe in black, wore good running shoes that made little noise, spoke as few words as possible, carried dog repellant, and selected areas that gave us the best chance to go undetected or escape. We would usually ride by and observe the carnage the next day. Even if I sometimes remember this fondly, it was clearly irresponsible and somewhat dangerous.