I was going to write an email to a highly respected friend who happens to be the oldest sister of many younger siblings. But public blogs work too. Plus if Diana happens to read this, it's okay.
Last month, I was finally able to give my opinion to my parents about Diana going to UW-Lacrosse next year. I think that it is good for us to go away for college because parents like mine can be really stifling. It's a good opportunity to grow, but at the same time I can understand the fears of my parents because Diana has been behaving very badly lately.
She goes away for whole weekends without letting my parents know where she's going or where she's been. True, if she did, my parents would disapprove and lock her up. What I'm nervous about is something happening between now and the first semester of her college year. I just want her to graduate, survive summer, and I think she will be okay.
But my parents are being increasingly concerned and Diana's behavior isn't helping matters at all. I've talked to her about it, to just be patient with the partying because as soon as college starts, she's free to do whatever she wants - no one is going to yell at her for staying up until 4am on Friday. If she just demonstrates good behavior for the next 6 months, it'll show my parents that she'll be able to handle college on her own. Things will go smoothly until she leaves for school in the Fall.
She pretends to listen to me, pretends to agree, but then as soon as my back is turned and I'm tucked 3 hours away into Menomonie, she keeps repeating her own patterns. What all her sisters find even more irresponsible is that she has dragged younger high school girls into these out of town drinking parties.
My parents can only suspect the worst, they don't know anything for sure. I know the basic gist of it, but there are some questions that I don't know if I want the answers to.
I don't want her to wind up married, whether its forced or voluntary. I don't want my parents and her to face a standoff creating irreparable damages. Both sides are really stubborn and stupid, making it really easy to come to the breaking point. I think the only reason it hasn't hit that yet might be because my parents haven't forced the issue, they've only passive aggressively walked around it. Maybe this is good? I have a feeling though that it doesn't give Diana any boundaries. No one in their right mind would do what my parents want, so instead Diana does whatever she wants. (When I was younger, my mother told me not to have any friends because school is solely for learning. She also told me not to date during college, which is why she knows nothing about my love life and suspects I will be an old maid, or worse a lesbian.)
I don't know what to do because both sides are so incredibly stupid and stubborn -- nothing I'm saying will help. Diana won't be flexible and do some of the things I suggested... meanwhile my parents are ineffectively yelling at her, but at the same time won't disclipline her. I've chastised my parents about this before when they say they can't control their kids. "You're the parents, you have 6 kids in the house, why are you tolerating this?" often this is in regard to the fact that when I am usually the only child that voluntarily helps out around the house. My siblings are so spoiled and selfish. Discipline really broke down after I left for college because I was the bossy drillmaster that kept everything together.
The great thing too is I found out i have to now worry about Mai Xue who I was hoping would be less stressful than Diana. I guess MX has been letting boys from Wausau come over, maybe to even stay the night. It's nothing dirty, but it creates a situation that lacks any sort of supervision at all since my 20 year old brother is negligent and my parents are out of town or oblivious. It would be one thing if I knew these boys, but since I don't -- I highly suspect that MX and Diana have very bad judgement on boys at their age.
I'm hoping Mai Kou will be okay. She has a good head on her shoulders and out of all my sisters I think I relate to her the best. She's the only one who'll have a conversation with me about global warming. The rest just want to talk on their cell phones with their boys.
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