Have you ever noticed how your children and their friends walk at least twenty feet in front of you at the mall, sit three rows in front of you at the theater, and never want you to pick them up within a block of their school? Could it be… your mom jeans? Your lip liner? Or your cardigan peppered in thanksgiving turkeys or wrapped Christmas presents? What exactly is it that so embarrasses your child?
    Don’t’ feel bad, mom; it isn’t you. Yes, those horrible mom jeans look awful; the elastic waist reaches your bra and the back flattens your butt so much you look a bag of cement. And boy mom, those pleats are nasty! But that’s not the main reason your children and their friends feel heat flashes and blood rushing to their faces when you enter a room.
    Your teen or tween children and their friends are simply responding to their age group’s natural desire to establish an identity separate from Mom and Dad. The tween / teen years are the chapter in which children move from emotional dependence on their parents to some level of independence and a desire to be a valuable part of their peer group and youth culture. The opinion of your children’s friends become more important during the teen years because they seek acceptance in a new social order, even at the expense of the stability of Mom and Dad’s unconditional love.
    Being embarrassed by Mom and Dad is a natural outgrowth of this phase of human development. And the tween / teen years have become a standard in comedy such as sit coms and cartoons. Characters from Drake and Josh to Icarly see adults in general as “uncool” squares who limit their ability to grow up. Cartoons such as Jimmy Neutron and Fairly Odd Parents depict moms as shrill disciplinarians whose main objective in life is to restrict fun while Dad is a dolt who collects decoy ducks or carries on irrational battles with the neighbors.
    These depictions, although funny, also demonstrate a psychological reality: the perspective of a child changes drastically as he or she enters the realm of “teendom.” Adults like Mom and Dad know nothing about the intricacies of this vast new world with its own cultures, mores and styles. Challenging authority becomes the norm and isn’t limited to curfew or computer time issues; Dad’s golf pants make him look like “a total quackenbush”* and Mom’s holiday sweater makes her look like an “abeera.”* Further, if your child’s friends see you as “disco debris,” your child may be guilty by association of serious crimes of fashion and coolness.
    Teens and tweens are starting to ask themselves, “Who am I?” and “Where is my life going?” Like so many other aspects of the American dream, everyone wants the next generation to do better than the status quo. Teens want to do better, to be recognized and acknowledged, to be cooler than Mom and Dad. And in order to find themselves, they must first define themselves as separate from their parents.
    Yes, those mom jeans are awful and make you look like a Mac truck; that lip liner makes you look like you have rabies; that turkey sweater makes you look, well, like a serving platter…All that might be true… or not. Your teens might think it or even say it, but their changing opinions, their new found embarrassments, are just a part of becoming an adult.
*A quackenbush is a girly-man. An abbera is a complete idiot.