“Why am I being punished?” she screamed at her dad.

“You’re not being punished, you’re being parented,” he quietly responded.

I was cleaning the kitchen and overheard that encounter on the TV show my teens were watching. Engrossed in, Lincoln Heights, they still noticed that I grabbed a piece of paper and wrote down those lines after I cheered the father on loudly.

One doesn’t see that kind of parenting on TV very much. I was impressed.

Parents are afraid of their children nowadays it seems to me, never consequencing the child, resulting in such over indulged kids who think they are entitled to all that their selfish hearts desire.

Sorry if that seems cold of me, this is how I’m starting to view many kids. Working for 25 years in the public school system I saw parents come storming into the school to ascertain that their teenager’s rights were not being violated in any way. Not normal humane rights, but apparently their right to voice an opinion (sass the teacher) or their right to personal space (knocking another kid into next week for accidentally brushing up against them), or their kid’s right to defend themselves when the kid got into a fistfight over a “He’s looking at me funny!” whine.

“Do you know how much I paid for that?” I heard a mom would scream at the principal who’d dared to suggest the teen was inappropriately dressed. Honey, when your panties are hanging out of the skirt, you’re a bit past inappropriate into hoochy mama land.

My all-time favorite, a mom angry at her son for being caught with drugs, “that punk stole my coke,” and then protesting his arrest, calling it racial, when an African-American cop arrested her African-American son.

“Huh?” the policeman responded, confused at the mom’s response who clearly needed to serve time herself over her own missing stash.

And then I adopt older children who’ve had to steal to eat, lie to survive, and sadly act seductive at times to get their way with lecherous folks who had only evil, predatory thoughts on their minds.

This disconnect from reality is what causes adoptive parents to go bonkers, me included, and I cannot begin to explain to others how much family therapy has benefited me as well. I’ve needed resources, services and support from both regular folks and folks like y’all who are also battling the same forces that I find myself up against each day as I try and soldier on in a forward manner.,