I'm scared of having teenagers....

[Twiglett]

I just am ... eeek

You are right to be....

they get too much bad press

it's not as bad as all that, honest

me too - DS1 (5) has already been inviting the teenage (16/17yr old) girls from church home to play on the playstation with him!!!

Mine will be under 5 forever....

so is mieow and me. i will have 3 teenage girls. oh gawd.

I do wonder whether this is what boarding schools are all about Twiglett...
but aren't you getting some practice in with your older child? Ds is definitely in mini-Kevin mode some days and he is only six

I shall introduce you to my 14 year old stepdaughter one of these days. She's fantastic. MI and Blu will back me up on that. Good fun, sensible and getting ridiculously beautiful.

tell me the nice things please .. I already remember how fowl I was as a teen

Fantastic company for watching the X Factor and Strictly Come Dancing too!

sorry .. foul .. I was a little carried away by the weird thread there

SNAP Twiglett.

Just the other day I said to my mom that I don't want teenagers. She reassured me by telling me how lovely I was as a teenager (not).

And so much more self-sufficient than littlies.

I adore teenagers. My favourite age!!!!!!!!!!!!

I love having teenagers

Actually I have to say - if my two boys grow up to be teeangers even a fraction as nice as my friends kids I'll be very happy.

They're all really lovely kids (girls and boys), polite, helpful (got 4 of them on my babysitting 'rota' LOL), and just really really nice.

DS1 is 13.5, he is actually a lovely kid. Really friendly, affectionate and funny. Obviously he has his off days, but don't we all ?

It is so refreshing to see this kind of response

I was sure there must be a good part in having teenagers .. and certainly my teenage nephews and neices are fabulous (but that's small doses) ... tell me more good things

Ok, good to go shopping with and have lunch (UNLIKE 4 year olds and babies). Watch crap telly with you and snigger at the outfits on Strictly Come Dancing. Still affectionate and nice. Will happily sit in their room watching a DVD or reading an Agatha Christie while you can be a child-free person again. Don't need the backbreaking physical help that small kids need. Have interesting thoughts and ideas and conversations. You can do stuff together like cook or watch an old movie and it is actually a joint enterprise, not slapstick.

And when they get all arsey, moody and off the rails, we just pack them off to Custy who will knock 'em into shape for us.

Twiglett - remember teenagers do anything for money - cleaning their rooms for starters! and you can have great fun embarrassing them in front of their friends, get the old photo albums out that sort of thing

they make a nice cuppa
you can rob their clothes and make-up
but the do rob yours too
they can go to the shop
they tell you all the gossip about their bimbo mates

Yes, can make you a cup of tea! And may prevent you ossifying into a parodic old age of 'who's that singer then, eh? Can't tell if it's a boy or a girl'

excellent supply of drugs too

it's once the teenagers hit their smug thirties that worries me, telling me what to do and trying to get money off me for deposits on houses and hating my boyfriend and the clothes i wear

there's always brat camp