I am the mother of three teenage boys and I am so proud of each one of them. Chris is 18; Matt is 16; Jack is 14. They are all bright boys and they have so much potential. They are all strong individuals, and sometimes it's hard for me to believe that I raised each one of them. They have unique personalities and outlooks on life, with individual strengths and weaknesses. I wouldn't trade any of them, at least most of the time! That, of course, is a joke.
Chris is the oldest and probably the one that I worry about the most, although if you were to ask him, he probably thinks I worry about him the least. Whether most parents will admit it or not, there is always something special about your first born. This is the child that you first started having dreams about, thinking about who they would become as they grew up. Chris will always be my first baby, no matter how old he gets to be. As an 18 year old, he believes that he is smarter than I could ever possibly be. And even though I remember thinking like this, it is so hard to sit back and allow your child to make the mistakes that he or she must make to grow into an adult.
Chris has always been a kind, compassionate child. When he was in kindergarten, his teacher told me that in all her 25 years of teaching, Chris was the most compassionate child she had ever had the pleasure of teaching. This made my heart swell with pride for my little boy. The teacher told me that there was a little boy in the class that year who was severely handicapped. The child was confined to a wheelchair and was what we used to call profoundly retarded. The boy had an aid who went to school with him everyday, and took care of all his needs. Most of the other children in the class ignored the little boy. After all, it isn't a lot of fun to play with someone who can't play back when you're five years old. But Chris didn't ignore this little boy. He made a point of trying to include him in class activities, would sit by him at lunch, and would spend recess with him. I was, and still am, proud of my son.
Chris has always been an incredibly bright boy, and was placed in the gifted program at his school. He competed on the academic team, and in the fifth grade, he won a citywide geography bee. Chris was also able to meet President George W. Bush because of a creative writing piece that he completed in the third grade. But, as time went on, Chris started to have problems in school. I kept telling the schools and his doctors that he had ADD, but they kept telling me that he was just an active boy. They were all wrong.
Chris managed to graduate from high school, but his grades weren't good enough to get into a four year college. We made the decision that he would start out at a community college, get his grades up, and then move on to a four year school. But the pressures of college and living on his own for the first time proved to be too much for him, and he left school just a couple of months into it. Right now, Chris is working full time, and is planning on going back to school next year. We are working with our doctor to get him evaluated for adult ADD, and he has started taking an antidepressant to deal with other issues. Chris is also starting to realize that I know a little more than he has been willing to give me credit for in the past. I know that he is going to be able to get a handle on the issues he is dealing with, and will go on to succeed.
Matt is my 16 year old and is probably the most like me out of my three boys. He is more introverted than his brothers, and much more interested in academics. From an early age, we've known that Matt was incredibly bright, and he has proven us right many times over. He was placed in the gifted and talented program in sixth grade, and has always made excellent grades. Since about the third grade, I've told him that next school year is going to be harder, and he would have to start studying. Matt is a junior in high school right now, and I'm still telling him next year will be harder and he will have to start studying. He just laughs at me now.
Out of my boys, Matt has always been the most sensitive, and the ninth grade proved to be so very hard on him. On one of the first days of school, Matt fell coming down the bleachers at school. The nurse looked at his foot and ankle and told him that he was fine. When I picked him up from school, he could barely walk to the car. I took him to the ER, and the xrays showed that he had fractured his foot and severely sprained his ankle. We were starting to see signs of social anxiety disorder in Matt, and his fear of talking to people kept him from saying anything to his teachers, or asking to go back to the nurse.
Matt stayed home from school for a couple of days, and when he returned to school, he fell on the bleachers again while trying to come down them on his crutches. Matt wouldn't ask his teachers to let him prop his foot up, or ask for help carrying his backpack which weighed close to 50 pounds with his books in it. I kept calling the school, begging them to help Matt. And they kept telling me that he just had to ask. No matter how many times I explained that he wouldn't ask, they wouldn't do anything to help him. The orthopedic surgeon treating him decided that it would be better for his foot if Matt stayed home and let it heal. We arranged for a homebound tutor, and this worked. But when it was time to return to school, Matt had a complete breakdown.
He was out of school for six months. I got Matt into therapy and he was diagnosed with severe depression, social anxiety disorder, and agoraphobia. When it was time to start transitioning him back to school, I worked closely with the district psychologist. A meeting was arranged at the school, and it took five adults to get him into the school. It was at this meeting that his guidance counselor apologized to me. She said that she really had no concept of how bad things were with Matt. Slowly but surely, we got Matt back into school. Matt completed a years worth of class work in three months, and was able to start the next school year as a full sophomore.
And now, you couldn't tell that he ever had a problem. Matt is taking advanced classes and is carrying a 4.3 grade point average. He scored a 33 on his ACT, which was the highest in the school! Today, Matt is already researching colleges and is going to apply to several Ivy League schools next year. We couldn't be more proud of him!
That brings me to my baby, Jack. There is nothing like your baby! Jack is 100% boy, and has more energy in his little finger than I have in my whole body. Jack is athletic and loves to play just about any sport, but his favorite at the moment is basketball. School has never been the most important thing to Jack, but he is just as smart as his brothers. This year, he has really started to work hard in school. Not too long ago, he told me that he has watched what Chris and Matt have both done, and he decided that Matt's way is better. Right now, Jack has all A's and B's.
For the most part, Jack is a happy-go-lucky kid. He makes friends easily; he is quick to laugh and he seems to find something funny in just about everything. Jack has a great sense of humor and uses it to get himself out of trouble. He learned pretty quickly that if could make me laugh, I tended to go easier on him. So what flaw does Jack have? He has a very short fuse, and I think that comes from being the youngest in the family. Unfortunately, Jack loses his temper very easily, and this scares me somewhat. We have had to have his hand xrayed more than once because Jack lost his temper at someone and punched a wall. So far, he hasn't broken his hand!
Chris especially knows how to push Jack's buttons, and he does it just for fun sometimes. The two of them fight like cats and dogs and it has just about driven me crazy. On Christmas morning, the two of them got into it this year. Jack had gotten a video game for Christmas, and Chris asked if he could play it. Jack told him no, it was his present, and he wasn't going to share right that moment. Chris called Jack a name, and the next thing I knew, the two of them were restaging the Ali-Frazier fight. By the time I got them separated, Jack had a bloody lip and Chris had a black eye. I keep telling Jack that one of these days, he going to pick on the wrong person, but he just laughs at me. And no matter what, he will always be my baby!
For all their faults and failings, I feel so blessed to have these three boys in my life. They have brought me more joy than I ever thought possible. Being a parent is the hardest job in the world and the most rewarding. I wouldn't trade my time as mother to Chris, Matt, and Jack for all the money in the world.
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