By Jen Slayden
I love baby dimples. On baby legs and on their rosy cheeks. Images of holding my infants and kissing their dimples will stay etched in my memory forever. I knew my kids were starting to grow up when their dimples were not as prevalent as they once were. In my teenage son they are no longer visible, except every so often during a deep belly laugh. What remains on eleven year old Grace’s face is a small dimple in the cleft of her chin. What has replaced the prominent dimples is the onset of prepubescent pimples.
How could it be? It was just yesterday that I was asking another postpartum mother what she did for baby acne. Now I am asking mothers about Proactive cream, and trying to remember what I used as a tween, which in my recollection was Noxema. That fragrance is still embedded in my nostrils years later.
The pimples on my daughter’s sweet forehead do not bother me. Like the popular children’s book “I love you stinky face” by Lisa McCourt, I would love my kids even if they were swamp monsters. It’s what the tiny red splotches signify that I worry about: teenage angst. They represent a whole new era of parenting that I haven’t yet grasped. I am trying to look at the experience as an exciting escapade instead of a frightening journey. In today’s world that is easier said than done!
When I was in fifth grade I had a huge crush on a boy who used to play football every recess. I would stand at the corner of the school house and peek around the corner to watch him score a touchdown and my heart would swell with pride as if I had somehow willed the score to happen. These days in fifth grade some kids are scoring other sorts of touchdowns. Just as forty is now the new thirty for adults, fifth grade today is the new tenth grade for tweens.
So when my daughter told me yesterday that she has been playing football during recess the last few weeks with a group of girls and boys my thoughts totally went into the gutter, even though it was completely innocent. I drilled her with questions. “Who played? Touch or tackle? What positions? Does she have a crush on him? Do you have a crush on him?” Whew! I am guarded and overly cautious.
For now, I am trying to figure out if it is possible for pimples and dimples to coexist. Part of me recognizes the importance of making mistakes, having poor judgment, and dealing with the consequences for my kids to develop socially and emotionally. The other part of me wants to yank them from school, move to an isolated plot of land off the grid, and protect them from an environment that has changed in many ways since I was their age. I want to keep them sweet, innocent and safe.
Grace seems okay with the all the changes occurring, if not completely oblivious to them. The other night she wanted me to cut her hair (dimple moment). It was sweet that she trusted me when all her friends now have hairdressers they see regularly. She asked for me to cut it shoulder length. I resisted, because I was totally attached to her longer hair. I always had my hair cut so short when I was her age, and not by choice. My mom always cut it crooked. I cut Grace’s locks to the best of my ability, but it was definitely not as suave as a professional. She loved it, and I loved her for having confidence in me.
Later in the evening we had a pimple moment. The scene was her and her younger brother Cade. She was annoying him intentionally, and when I asked her to be respectful the conversation took a downward spin. He was to blame, of course. Pretty soon she was acting like a two-year old which was followed by a bout of crying and isolating herself in her room with the “nobody loves me, everybody hates me” attitude. I was tempted to pull out the “naughty chair” but she no longer fits in the seat!
The next night we had peace and harmony between her and Cade as they planned and facilitated a puppet show for me. Grace hid behind the blanket curtain and had several characters that kept popping up including a bumble bee, Frankenstein, a girl, an annoying boy (I think she planned that one during her fit), and a sheep. The personalities changed lightening fast with the story line, all being switched up by the same puppet master. There was a hero, and a villain. The plot was completely congruent to what I have been feeling the last few months in my own changing role as mom. Sometimes I am the villain, and sometimes I am the hero. Grace is the puppet master, and I never know what character is going to show up. In Grace’s story the hero and the villain come to peace with each other. All is well with the world. The End.
Pimples and dimples. Heroes and villains. Tween angst and moments of great sweetness and joy. Daughters and mothers: an amazing mysterious journey with only heart strings attached. I think we will make it, after all.
Jen Slayden is a long time Missoulian who thrives in the chaos of being a mother of three while also being a Certified Life Coach, musician and educator. She enjoys writing about all of life’s little lessons on her blog, which you can find at www.bigskylifecoach.com .
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My youngest son (who is 13) is just beginning to get pimples. It reminds me that he beginning to go through what his brothers have/are still going through.
Speaking of two year olds, there is new research that teens and two year old brains are similar. I’ll try to find the research online.
Well, the title says it all….and there are the tweens, not wanting dimples or pimples…so where does THAT put them?!
You are correct about the push for “maturity”, even though their emotional maturity is dependent on life experience, their hormones and their physical maturity…there the world is, pushing them to act like little adults waaay too early..gadzooks!
Actually, playing football at lunch sounds much better than sitting on the sidelines gossiping, flipping your hair and giggling at the boys….. makes me worry LESS.
thanks for sharing!
Beth
The dimple to pimple analogy works so well for tweens. One moment it’s, I love you Mom and I want to lay my head on your lap and then the next moment it’s Nobody understands me I just want to be left alone. When do you step in and say Enough with the drama kid and when do you let them alone?
Love your blog, thanks for your insights.
Ann
Such good points, everyone!
Beth, I agree. I SHOULD feel good about the football games, and I think I am starting to see Grace a little as a tomboy. It makes me very happy!!
Ann….I just try to enjoy those “lay your head on moms lap” moments to get me through the other, more challenging ones!
Thanks for the feedback, and I’m glad you enjoy my blog.
btw, the title has changed. You can find me at
http://littlelessonsunderthebigskymyblog.wordpress.com/
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