101 ways to embarrass your teenager.

[LoisInTheMiddle]

I have discovered what fun it can be embarrassing teens. And so easy.

I always knew that teenagers found their parents embarrassing and my 14 year old DS has now reached that stage. What I didn?t know was how little it takes to cause intense embarrassment and humiliation.
I have turned into Lois from Malcolm in the Middle. Apparently I am the most embarrassing person on the planet. Did I dance at his school disco? Kiss him in front of his friends? Wear something unsuitable for my age? No, nothing like that

This is what I did.
We were on holiday in a self service restaurant at the pool bar. Alongside the cutlery were some table mats so I took four knives and forks and four table mats and set them out on our table. DS1 sat down and said, while looking as though he wanted to crawl under the table,
?Mum , how could you??.
?What have I done??
?The mats. No one else has table mats.?
?Well I thought they improved the sticky plastic table?
?Mum, I beg you, please never do the table mats again?

Of course I made it worse by laughing.

Mums of teens tell me yours. Have you managed to humiliate your teen with anything as trivial?

I was a teenager a very long time ago but when I was about 13 or 14 my mum took me to a jeans store. I was complaining that a lot of the jeans were very (too) slim in the hips and, in an attempt to console me, she said, very loudly, within earshot of two very handsome older teenage males "Oh, never mind, having wide hips means you'll be able to have babies more easily..."

I still cringe to this day when I think about this situation.

Send Grandad to pick her up from school ..... in his cookie monster furry slippers and painting clothes, get him to wait outside the main gate cooeeing her from the minute she appears from the door, till she has walked right down the school path, a good 200m

Then as she tries to ignore him but get into the car at the same time, say in a loud voice,
'Hello my baby, no kiss for Gramps????'

I once rapped, not even in public. Now I threaten them with doing it again if they are slow to go clean rooms, etc., and it always works.

my mum was an expert and causing embarrassment. as a grown up i know she was talking the piss a bit.

talking about my periods with complete strangers - check

getting hammered in a restaurant at lunchtime with a friend then thinking it was ok to turn up to my school to pick me up and talk to all my friends about sex and how you have to make sure youre not doing it for the boy. this was number one moment of sheer humiliation i was 16.

never bothered with privacy in changing rooms gathered 2 shop assitants for their opinion to see if my bra was the right size - check

plus millions more along the same lines. the drunk thing was a one off though.

i think its parent right to humiliate their teen to get back at their own parents! i have lots of photos of DD in the bath, getting her nappy done etc for her first boyfriend

Our daughter was SO worried we'd dance at her uncles wedding
We did a good show of chatting to relatives ignoring disco until huuby tipped me the wink, then we were on the dance floor, John Travolta stance, fingers pointing in air,

I live for embarrassing my kids!

I sing very loudly to supermarket music in a very enthusiatic way...I have also been pulled up by the supermarket (asda) manager who had seen me racing up and down the aisles using the trolley as a scooter cos he had seen me on cctv and had to come into the store to find out what the hell I was doing but ended up crying with laughter when I told him I was trying to make my kids cringe

Last year I booked to see the Circus of Horrors with my 2 eldest sons and a load of their mates ...and turned up wearing a basque, tutu, fishnet stockings and 5 inch heels much to the horror of my eldest son who refused to sit next to me during the performance...but was delighted later when the cast of the show came to me in the foyer afterwards and gave me lots of freebies and the promise of tickets for this years show because I had made such an effort ....see it pays to be an embarrassing parent!

Has anyone on here ever seen that scene from Saving Private Ryan where they rest up in a church and they're all reminiscing about their home life. One very young soldier starts talking about his mother and says she used to work nights in a diner and when she came in would look in at his bedroom door but he would always pretend to be asleep. He was quite tearful about it and he said - "I dont know why I did that - she only wanted to say goodnight and ask me about my day, talk to me for a while".

Its really heartbreaking - have seen it a few times - always gets to me.

It must be a teenage thing - they just seem to want as little communication with adults as possible - maybe this is just my experience - but boys more so? My grown-up DS was very affectionate as a child and we are still very close but sometime during his teens he stopped saying - I love you too Mum - though I do know he definitely does.
Think thats probably why that scene gets to me.

I just think they suffer from acute embarrassment at that age - sorry think I've gone off the thread a bit!

Just had a horrible thought - I hope the time I ran across the field of vision of the line judge - whilst cheering on aforementioned DS - at a county track and field event and getting tannoyed to get back behind the barriers was the trigger for any of this detachment

of deVere, 'nanky, tarkle etc' did make me wee a tiny bit.

My daughter didn't speak to me for a week because I'd said 'Hello' to her friends. Though if I had said nothing, that would've done the trick, too.

If ever I'm down, or if I want to just have a laugh, I add my daughter to my Facebook. I know she'll reject it in a huff (and I don't want her seeing mine anyway!) but just the thought of her little face when she sees that request - it makes my day!

Or the time I ran alongside shouting encouragement at him from the sidelines when he was being narrowly 'beaten' by another boy - for the whole of the last 50 metres. The boy only just 'beat' him despite my unwavering support right to the line - but as I went to 'commiserate' my son - I noticed the other boy still running(?). He hadnt pipped DS at the post - DS had lapped him.

sorry - wasn't the trigger

Posted this on MN before but it's such a good'un.

If your daughter's new, first boyfriend is sitting on your sofa being all polite and nice-to-meet-you, do make sure you steer the conversation round to the subject of his mother's current shock pregnancy. Above all ensure that you speculate clinically and at length about the relative likelihoods of a little brother/sister based on how much sex his mother is probably having with (hated) step-dad, in terms of how "fresh" hated SD's sperm is.

This was my mum btw.

On the off-chance that I take any of my kids to school, I am absolutely 100% definitely NOT to drop them off at the lay-by but instead at least 2 blocks away! Unless I'm in my camo's, in that instance I somehow instantly become cool

Other instances with the eldest (he's 12) include:

• When a friend of his called our home number, he said "Hi, is [our surname] there?". Well, since I share the same surname as my son (ironically), I thought I might have a bit of fun.

"Yep?" "Ah y'alright mate, you fancy going to the cinema to see the A-team?" "Ah sorry no, I don't agree to such violence in this current political turmoil" "Wha-?" "You mean you disagree with me? Well-" Unfortunately by that point said son had walked into the room, kicked me in the shin and grabbed the phone off me. I thought it was hilarious but apparently I'm no longer allowed to pick up the phone EVER. DW and two younger sons thought it was hilarious too!

• Going to the park to kick a rugby ball around, I kicked it into a tree behind him where there were some people from his school stood nearby. Apparently that was highly embarrassing too and he ordered that we must leave immediately (I had to get the ball from the tree :()

I'm sooo looking forward to this three times over!

I'm soooooo looking forward to when my ds is a teenager (he's only one and I'm already thinking of ways to embarrass him - bad mummy, bad, bad mummy! )

On the upside though I don't have to wait as my sister happens to have ds 14 and dd 12 so I can practice on them......!! Only problem is, no matter how hard I try (and I try bloody hard trust me) my niece thinks I'm cool and fun!! My nephew on the other hand is quite a different matter!
I've been trying out my best 'embarrassing Auntie' routine on him which involves

• Shouting 'Natty Watty Woo' down the street at him when he's playing football with a dozen or so friends
• Commenting on anything on facebook even if he asked me a question
• Asking for/giving him a kiss and cuddle (even if nobody else is around)

My favourite ones of all times:

• Beeping my horn at random person and waving like I know them
• Stopping my car and asking random stranger if they know how to get to xyz, if they say 'no' I then proceed to give them directions to said place 'so they know for next time'
• Pointing out sexy men in the street and saying I think they have a sexy bum/fit body/cute face etc
• Taking him clothes shopping and asking an assistant for help if I can't find what I'm after

Oh there are sooooo many that I'd best stop or I'll go on forever. The one he hates the most is commenting on facebook. He keeps asking me why I have to write on his wall as it's his wall and can't I just send him a private message!!!! Noooooo, because if I did I wouldn't be able to embarrass you in front of your friends and new girlfriend. Mwwwaahhhh hhhaaaa hhhhaaa hhhhaaaa

Please keep going though I need more ideas!

Oh I forgot to add:
Reciting nursery rhymes with a twist, ie

Jack and Jill went up the hill
To fetch a pail of water
Jack came down with half a crown
And it wasn't for fetching water

Hehehe oh the power! Think I may go post this to his facebook page now while he's asleep and as he doesn't usually get up until late, verrrrry late, a lot of his friends will get the chance to read it before he knows about it!!

Loving this thread

DS only 16 months so can't join in yet BUT I can remember my most embarrassing moment as a teen...

...my parents turned up to parents evening at school (embarrassing in itself) on a rainy evening when I was 14 wearing matching yellow oilskin jackets and trousers.

Oh. My. God. I was absolutely mortified.

They totally did it on purpose. Didn't admit it at the time but they do now. I was a horrible teenager so fair play to them really

oh i delight in embarrassing my children.

here is my excellent story.

ds1 brought home his first proper girlfriend for tea.

i set the table and served the meal and we all sat.

girl started to tuck in to the meal. and i quickly said (in solemn tone)

" SHALL WE SAY GRACE?"

girl stopped on her tracks, gob full of food, looking very ashamed of herself.

DS1 looked mortified as he knew what was comming as it is a family joke.

so we all put out hands together

bowed out heads

and shouted "GRACE!"

then rapidly tucked in , all killing ourselves laughing.

she saw the funny side

ds is just 12 and is starting to show alarming teenage traits.

I find I can make ds do anything to stop me singing along to the music in Asda. Even better in the local shopping precinct they play "all the oldies" over the tannoy. Ds was pleading with me to stop singing "When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that's amore" in a very loud voice.

But - best of all, is seeing a girl from his school in Waitrose and saying in loud voice, "Don't you know that girl, ds?" Hee hee hee.

Loving 'Grace' Custardo. :)

Pretty much my entire existence embarrasses my two, but nothing tops my mum walking in on my bf and I having a quickie one afternoon when he was staying over.

BF was too mortified to leave the room. She was not fussed.

When he finally sidled into the kitchen whilst she and I were cooking supper she very calmly, without turning away from the stove, said "You have a very nice arse, don't you?"

As he started to blush she turned around and finished him off with "But its funny, I always imagined you would be bigger than that."

It's an old book now, but have any of you read Treasure: Trials of a Teenage Terror by Gina Ford. Tis hilarious - a gem on every page.

Duh! Gina Davidson, not Gina Ford. Quite the wrong age group.

I can't see the point of going out of my way to embarrass them - except, of course, as a direct act of revenge [evil]. Mumsnet please note we are direly in need of an evil emoticon! After all, why go to any trouble when you can be annoying just by being yourself? However I did tell DS1, when he first started being teenagerish, that I regard it as not only a parent's right but her bounden duty to embarrass her children as often as possible. Anything I did after that was pretty much covered by that philosophy. And if he said "mum, you're being embarrassing", I would reply coolly "tough!".

I also told them that I carried them for nine months, did all that eye-crossing birth stuff, years of sleepless nights, nappies, tantrums, ailments, expense, you name it, and that's fair enough; but expecting me to change into a different person for them is a little too much to ask. As far as I can tell the poor blighters are still labouring under that guilt trip. Now they're in their 20s they make lots of tea for me and do all the heavy lifting!

Dancing in supermarkets, check; but I just do it because I like the music

Love it Jaybird - your mum sounds brilliant - I think mine would have chopped us both up - .

Suda - love the fanatical mum at the track side. Did he give your photo to security at future events ?