For Honor
Rock n' Roll Doggie VIP PASS
I'm writing this because it's an odd situation that I don't have a lot of experience with, but maybe some others here do.
I am a senior in highschool, and I, for the longest time, have had extreme issues with maturity, and I've even grown to despise kids at school. But I realized that they were just kids, and in fact, so am I, among other relizations.....
But this is something else - Zack.
He is my neighbor that I see on the weekends.
He is a 14 year old freshmen
He lives in a home with his mother, his grandmother, grandfather, aunt who cannot use her legs, and another elderly man that they take care of.
He sees his day on Sundays for a few hours.... sometimes.
We've grown closer, I suppose, because of all the things that have happened over the last two years, and he consistently calls me his best friend. I don't mind any of that so far.
But here is the issue:
There is an obvious need of a male role modle, and also for any sort of friendship in Zack's life. He is very isolated- he has no real neighbors or anything like that, except for me. Zack is a kid with a good heart, but his environment has allowed him to be a child, a baby for too long, and he needs to grow up.
I'm serious, and I'm not being mean.
Every aspect of his personality is immature
- manners; like respect, and hygiene and even chewing with your mouth closed
- school; he doesn't care. He has a great memory, and is very smart, but despite my efforts, he seems to not care
- lazy; with school, but also ......... for instance, I have to call him, hassel him to come to a martial arts class every Friday night, and when he gets there, he just sits in a chair the whole time, unless I taunt him or something, which I don't like doing.
That's the most destructive thing: he interacts with people in a way that causes arguments, or allows him to get upset. That's the only way he associates with people, and I'm confronting him about that. It's just like a child.
This is a diffucult thing to deal with, because it's a situation where I need to show compassion and authority. And no, this is not my problem, but as his chosen role modle, I do play a major role in how he turns out.
This sort of reminds me of all the "Dr. Phil" shows, where the parents say how a child is a lot more work than they expected. I think that really, I have to show more discipline myself, and be on the ball all the time, and not just get lazy and slip into the "game" of insults and such.
and again, no, this isn't my problem, but things like this are nothing new, so I'm not going to simply detach myself from the problem. Also, I don't want to turn this into a thread where I vent about Zack, so if I start doing that too much, just let me know. I hope my kid, as a child, never gets this way..... but..... I'm sure I can use this situation in order to gain expereince for things down the road.
Yes, I understand he is only 14 years old.
But at the same time, he is 14 years old, and not 10, or 7, or 3.
So any advice would be greatly appreciated. I'll bring up more issues, but there are so many that I don't want to overwhelm you on this first post. The worst thing, well, most difficult I should say, is the way he embraces his immaturities.
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But since I am his closest friend, perhaps he will consider my attitude towards this. And personally, I've made the situation worse be being critical to (perhaps to an extreme). So I will beging to monitor my own actions, and try not to "enable" him to do certain things.
but if I could take one simple problem to begin with...... it would be ........... CHEWING WITH YOUR MOUTH OPEN.....
I know it's trivial, but..... it..... sometimes I just have to ......
....... maybe I should just try to sit as far away from him as I can.
But he just says "I'm congested", or "I can't breath through my nose".
And yeah, I'll give him that, but not all the time. He takes anything that might slightly be viewed as criticism and perceives it as being a personal offence.
Kids.......
I am a senior in highschool, and I, for the longest time, have had extreme issues with maturity, and I've even grown to despise kids at school. But I realized that they were just kids, and in fact, so am I, among other relizations.....
But this is something else - Zack.
He is my neighbor that I see on the weekends.
He is a 14 year old freshmen
He lives in a home with his mother, his grandmother, grandfather, aunt who cannot use her legs, and another elderly man that they take care of.
He sees his day on Sundays for a few hours.... sometimes.
We've grown closer, I suppose, because of all the things that have happened over the last two years, and he consistently calls me his best friend. I don't mind any of that so far.
But here is the issue:
There is an obvious need of a male role modle, and also for any sort of friendship in Zack's life. He is very isolated- he has no real neighbors or anything like that, except for me. Zack is a kid with a good heart, but his environment has allowed him to be a child, a baby for too long, and he needs to grow up.
I'm serious, and I'm not being mean.
Every aspect of his personality is immature
- manners; like respect, and hygiene and even chewing with your mouth closed
- school; he doesn't care. He has a great memory, and is very smart, but despite my efforts, he seems to not care
- lazy; with school, but also ......... for instance, I have to call him, hassel him to come to a martial arts class every Friday night, and when he gets there, he just sits in a chair the whole time, unless I taunt him or something, which I don't like doing.
That's the most destructive thing: he interacts with people in a way that causes arguments, or allows him to get upset. That's the only way he associates with people, and I'm confronting him about that. It's just like a child.
This is a diffucult thing to deal with, because it's a situation where I need to show compassion and authority. And no, this is not my problem, but as his chosen role modle, I do play a major role in how he turns out.
This sort of reminds me of all the "Dr. Phil" shows, where the parents say how a child is a lot more work than they expected. I think that really, I have to show more discipline myself, and be on the ball all the time, and not just get lazy and slip into the "game" of insults and such.
and again, no, this isn't my problem, but things like this are nothing new, so I'm not going to simply detach myself from the problem. Also, I don't want to turn this into a thread where I vent about Zack, so if I start doing that too much, just let me know. I hope my kid, as a child, never gets this way..... but..... I'm sure I can use this situation in order to gain expereince for things down the road.
Yes, I understand he is only 14 years old.
But at the same time, he is 14 years old, and not 10, or 7, or 3.
So any advice would be greatly appreciated. I'll bring up more issues, but there are so many that I don't want to overwhelm you on this first post. The worst thing, well, most difficult I should say, is the way he embraces his immaturities.
--------
But since I am his closest friend, perhaps he will consider my attitude towards this. And personally, I've made the situation worse be being critical to (perhaps to an extreme). So I will beging to monitor my own actions, and try not to "enable" him to do certain things.
but if I could take one simple problem to begin with...... it would be ........... CHEWING WITH YOUR MOUTH OPEN.....
I know it's trivial, but..... it..... sometimes I just have to ......
....... maybe I should just try to sit as far away from him as I can.
But he just says "I'm congested", or "I can't breath through my nose".
And yeah, I'll give him that, but not all the time. He takes anything that might slightly be viewed as criticism and perceives it as being a personal offence.
Kids.......