When your son or daughter gets old enough to date, you get to experience yet another of the joys and pains of parenthood. Someone once said that when you have a child it is like watching your heart walk around outside of your body. I find this is something that I can totally relate to. Though they cling to you for the first six years, it seems as if they start to pull away from then on, and when they starting becoming interested in the opposite gender, you really feel like the end is drawing near. Teen dating is something that parents have struggled with for a long time, and there are no clear answers because the world keeps changing.

Teen dating when my father was a teen was very easy. He knew what the rules were and he followed them to the letter. He was allowed to date once he was sixteen, but he always had to be home by ten at the latest. When he went on his first dates, I think he told me that he had to be in by eight. Though that seems tough, that’s the way it was with my grandfather. When it came time for his to deal with me, teen dating was something different all together.

Though I consider myself a perfectly sane person, I did a lot of silly things when I first started out with teen dating. I snuck out more than once, and I did end up having sex long before I should have. My father made rules for me about teen dating, but I only followed them when he was looking. I was able to get away with more than he had when he was a teen because he had to work and couldn’t keep an eye on me like he wished he could. That’s not bad parenting in my book, that’s just the way it has to be for some families.

Though my little son is years away from teen dating, I already know that I am going to be tough with him. He is not going to be able to date outside of the home until I say he’s allowed, though He may be able to have guests in my house as long as I am present. The disadvantage that he has with me is that I did just about everything there was to do, and there isn’t much he can do to fool me when it comes to teen dating. He’ll have a curfew and an alarm on her window if I think He needs it.

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