Where was your first date?
Well, the back to school dance has happened. The girls had a blast. My tween was asked to the dance (a date), while the eldest ask someone out on a date while at the dance. I’m able to talk to my girls about this because they know I won’t lock them away in their bedrooms only to slide hot pockets under the door at meal times. But teen dating is NOT what it used to be.
When I was a teenager, my mom drove me to the movie theater in the station wagon, dropped me off with a few bucks, and for all I know she went over to the parking lot and sat for 2 hours reading a book, because she always seemed to be there right after the movie to pick me up – I never had to call. She (we) would wait until my date's mom would show up to take her home (this of course was always a very awkward time). It’s probably why I didn’t date much until I was able to drive myself.
Today, our tweens and teens are setting up “dates” during school hours; “lunch dates” all alone out by the bleachers are fairly common I hear. Group dates are always fun, but they have their own set of problems; the peer pressure within a group date is pretty high. Teens even go out on Church field trips and end up on a “date”.
When I was a teen I had to call the girl to chat (which was rare) or to ask her out. Today, cell phones do the chatting for them; text messaging is all they do. But beware mom and dad… sexting (texting with sexual overtones) is not uncommon. It’s 4pm and do you know where your teens are? If you’re still at work, the chances you really know where they are is slim. You can reach them on their cell phone easily, but unless you have GPS to their phone good luck on really knowing where they are.
What’s really scaring about this whole subject is simply type in Teen dating in Google as I did to prepare for this piece. Too many of the hit results had to do with teen dating abuse / violence. This is a prevalent and frightening issue today. I went ahead and took a look at the CDC statistics:
• 1 in 11 adolescents reports being a victim of physical dating violence (CDC 2006).
• 1 in 4 adolescents reports verbal, physical, emotional, or sexual violence each year (Foshee et al. 1996; Avery-Leaf et al. 1997).
• 1 in 5 adolescents reports being a victim of emotional violence (Halpern et al. 2001).
• 1 in 5 high school girls has been physically or sexually abused by a dating partner (Silverman et al. 2001).
• Dating violence occurs more frequently among black students (13.9%) than among Hispanic (9.3%) or white (7.0%) students (CDC 2006).
• 72% of eighth and ninth graders reportedly "date" (Foshee et al. 1996); by the time they are in high school, 54% of students report dating violence among their peers (Jafe et al. 1992).
So, when is the magical age to start dating? Given the above information I’d say 25, but we all know that is not realistic. Our kids start dating without our knowledge around 13 or 14, and many times even earlier (such as ‘lunch dates’). As always the best we can do is talk with them. Share with them your concerns, set expectations and enforce boundaries, while at the same time giving them choices and the freedom to be themselves.
For more info: Teen Dating / WebMD
Comments