Senioritis Setting In

If you have a graduating senior this year like me, you know well about senioritis. Most graduating seniors have suffered from it for at least the last few months and us parents are suffering too!

senioritis – noun – a supposed affliction of students in their final year of high school or college, characterized by a decline in motivation or performance – dictionary.com

And when they say decline in motivation or performance, they’re not just talking about school. That motivation carries over to home too!

It can be really stressful as a parent to watch your usually motivated teenager start to waver. Forgetting school assignments, not putting in the time to study for tests, stressing out over the smallest thing. Especially when your child has worked so hard to this point.

As I think about my own son graduating and as I watch him start to sluff off schoolwork a little more each day, I worry.

Will his college still want him?
Is he missing out on key GPA points?
Will he regret his decisions later?

But even more than that worry, I want to make sure that Jack’s last memories of his childhood home are good ones. I don’t want to be the nag that drives him away.

I also know that even though Jack is now 18 and heading out to college, he’s still a kid sometimes. His mind is consumed with teenage angst and stress over what’s going to happen in the fall. He’s saying good-bye to friends and life as he knows it today. I can’t blame him for forgetting to pay graduation fees or for not turning in an assignment that feels like busywork.

Yes, our young adults need to learn responsibility, but we also can help them out by holding them accountable and reminding them (without nagging).

As an outgoing senior, Jack isn’t going to lose his athletic scholarship or his college admission–barring any illegal mistakes he might make, which I highly doubt will happen. I’ve decided that the best place for me to be is in the middle ground:

Loving mom who does a lot of reminding. But whose sanity remains intact.