Oh, The Pain!

I'm really reluctant to blog about the latest pain my twelve-year-old boy has given me.

But I gotta.

I just gotta!

Let me start off with a big sigh.

*SIGH*

Okay, let's get on with the ugly truth.

"Hi Quirky Tween Son! How was your day at school?" Quirky asked with a big smile on her face.

Tween son kept half his face turned away and replied: "It was okay."

What was that?

I saw... something.

Uh-huh. I did! I did! There it was. I know I saw it! Yep, yep it was... right... right... there! Between the words "was" and "okay" I know I saw the slightest flash of fear cross his face.

*warning, warning, danger, danger*

Yes, the red flags were falling on me faster than the 21 inches of snow that has fallen in Dallas of late.

Immediately, I went into "concerned" mode.

"Are you really okay?"

"Um yeah Mom."

Ack! There it was again and why isn't he facing me?

"Son, look at me."

He pushed his hair forward and looked at me.

"Did you do something?"

"What?"

Oh my gawsh! He did do something! I could tell by the way he said "what?"

I began to pray. "Please, please! Help me handle this the right way."

And a little light went off in my head. I KNEW exactly what he had done.

"Did you, did you pierce your ear? (no-way no how!) Let me see both of your ears right now."

He pushed his hair away to reveal a PIN stuck completely through his left lobe.

(Oh my gawsh, no-way no how! He did, he did, HE DID!)

I was silent.

"Is that a pin?"

"Yea-ah."

"You pierced your ear? With a pin?"

"Yea-ah."

"Who did this? And when? You didn't have this pin in your ear this morning when you left."

"I did it last night Mom, in my room."

"WHAT?" Okay Quirky, calm down, take a deep, deep breath and calm. the. flip. down.

So I learned that the previous night he had taken it upon himself to jab a needle in his ear. All his friends were going to be getting piercings soon and I guess he wanted to beat them to the punch.

"Did you wear that all day? Did you show people?"

(Stupid, STUPID question.)

Of course he did! And I'm quite sure he did so with a lot of pride.

Now what really baffles me is this kid is petrified of pain as most kids are. But he has always been an extra weenie when it came to the slightest pain. So I had a very hard time believing that he had done this to himself.

What ensued next was a nice long painful talk. I was concerned about the "cleanliness" of the self-inflicted procedure. I was concerned because he KNEW how we felt about piercings (and tattoos). It was understood, so I thought, that that was NOT going to happen unless he had MOVED out and was supporting himself. I was hoping that even then he would choose NOT to do something like that.

And this is NOT about judging others who tatoo and pierce themselves, these are OUR beliefs and rules that we feel comfortable teaching and expecting of our sons. They don't have to be your rules, but they are definitely MINE and my husband's.

I can't believe he had the chutzpah to actually do this.

So this kid has lost ALL privileges: no computer, no cell-phone (that really hurts him), no friends, and he's grounded for the indefinite future.

When I asked him, "Did it hurt?"

"Not really."

Well guess what?

It hurts now.

And he's only JUST begun to feel the (emotional and psychological) pain. Long, long, LONG-TERM pain.

Did I mention he's only TWELVE-YEARS-OLD?

Shoot me now!







B.S. No twelve-year-olds were physically harmed during the production of this post. And boy howdy is one certain twelve-year-old lucky. LUCK-KEE!