Parents in denial

aj725
Sun, 04 Jul 2010 17:44:34 +0000

OP – while the parents (at least mom) may be in denial, it does sound from your recent posts like she “gets it” but doesn’t want to admit it bc it’ll make her son look bad and will make her look like a bad parent. The comments that he gets Ds bc he’s bored; everyone with grad degrees is miserable in life and we’re glad our son won’t be etc. are all just excuses bc she knows that the way it’s going, he may not go far in life. The fact that CC has even been mentioned suggests that they know that MIT/Ivys etc. may not be in the cards down the road, regardless of his brilliance.

What is your nephew like? From your description, he sounds like a group of boys I knew in HS – they had 3-4 friends, only ever hung out or spoke to them, seemed fairly angry or like loners to everyone else – would barely engage in conversation or eye contact with others, often wore only black, some had very little interest in appearance/hygene which made it even harder to befriend anyone else beyond their group of 4. While it’s fine to have 3-4 close friends, rather than 50 friends – it seems like for people like this, hanging out starts as video games etc. and spirals into drugs/alcohol as they’re so disinterested in anything else that everyone is doing (and think everything else is so stupid and pointless). I’d worry less about college and professional goals since he is so young and more about the path he’s on. Those 3-4 kids may be a part of the problem bc they may be reinforcing the idea that everything at school and everyone is stupid (i.e. mocking him if he wants to get involved etc.) At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter whether he goes to an Ivy or not, but it does matter that he can be a responsible, engaging adult who can adapt and function – be it at CC, a state flagship, a top 10, in the work force etc.

Is there anything he has an interest in or would even want to try out – like a sport or a part-time job? If there isn’t, I would convince his parents that they have to force him to pick something and stick with it for a period of time. Doesn’t matter what it is, but it will force him to spend time with others, see what they’re like and there’s a good chance that when he sees that other teens are fairly happy in their lives, he’ll emulate the things they do. It’s far better that he emulate someone that is a solid B student, a member of JV basketball who holds a part-time job and has a relatively good group of friends, than to sit around with 3-4 other miserable kids talking about how everything is stupid while separating himself from the world. There’s also a chance that he’ll find an adult who he’ll see as a mentor/role model who won’t treat him with kid-gloves like his parents do; no guarantee that’ll happen, but often coaches, young managers at part-time jobs etc. are looked up to – because they understand where kids are coming from and give them things to think about without lecturing/scolding the way parents/teachers do because they aren’t responsible for the kids.