Dealing with a teenage kid is learning to be an adult

Having crossed an important milestone in my own life – completing half a century – seems to coincide with a big challenge in life – dealing with a teenage son. Everybody warned me that it was a critical phase in their life, and I need to be careful in bringing up teenage kids. But I believed I was quite capable, and did not really pay any special attention to figuring it out.

In a recent incident, I ended up losing my cool and doing something really stupid and looking back, I realized the true significance of having a teenage son – recognizing that he is not a kid anymore! It sounds so obvious and trivial, but for a parent who has seen his kid growing up from a little bundle in his arms, it is not easy to see that his son has grown up into a young man.

I had to really take a fresh look at the kid see the young man emerging from within.

And I realized that having grown up kids, I had to grow up too!