I have touched on this in the past, but writing about the Love we wish for our sons, got me thinking about teens and dating.

I do not have a daughter, so maybe someone with more experience in that venue can weigh in here.  Though I remember what my parents always told me and what I heard when I used to coach teenagers.

Boys don’t necessarily talk about their heartbreaks/breakups with their friends.  When they do, it’s in a very different context.

“Hey, what’s going on this weekend?” Says Boy 1.

“Party.  Aren’t you going out with Jill?” Says Boy 2

“Nope, we broke up.  Where’s the party?” SAys Boy 1.

It’s always very matter of fact, with the idea that they need to move on heavily implied.  With our own boys, I have asked them if they are ok, do they want to talk about it, etc., etc.  

When I was a teenager, I had a few boyfriends.  When things didn’t work out, my mom made it a point to tell me that these things happen, but that sometimes it is for the best.  Of course, I didn’t want to hear that… I had just been dumped, or broken up with someone I cared about!

In looking back and from talking to her, she told me what she tried to do was make it a point that just because my teenage love didn’t work out (her words… teenage love) didn’t necessarily mean that he was a bad person.  It didn’t mean I was right, and he was wrong, or vice versa. She never tried to shield me from heartache.  She comforted me (when I let her… I was a teenage girl!) and told me that tomorrow things would look different. My dad simply said he agreed with my mom and did I want to go get some ice cream.  Or more often I heard from him that mom was right, and now I needed to get ready for swim practice.

I have friends that have girls, and for many it is a very different outlook.  They want to protect their daughters from heartbreak.  How can they fix it so she doesn’t hurt?  How dare that boy ask another girl out?!

And yet… heartbreak is a fact of life.  Things won’t always go your way, and if you can rise above it and move forward despite the hurt, more times than not, things get better. 

You can’t fix it for your child!  And why would you want to?  Are you going to monitor their lives forever?  Fix the memo to their boss for them? Yell at their boss when they get fired? 

And so what the boy asked another girl out!  Or your daughter asked another boy out… or your son asked another guy out, on and on and on.  Do we expect our children to perpetually wallow in the aftermath of a relationship that most likely, in the end, will mean very little to them?  

Do we expect our children to meet their ‘soul mate’ in 10th grade?  

Kids will fall in and out of love (lust?), and it isn’t our jobs, as parents to fix all the heartache and drama that goes along with this path.  Isn’t it our job to simply be there for them and remind them that, no matter what, we love them?  That, no matter what happens, they can take something from the relationship that just ended?

That better things are right around the corner?