Despite her growing pains, I try to embrace every second of my soon-to-be seven-year-old’s daily existence, for soon she will no longer be my little girl genius regularly sharing such shards of wisdom like: “Mommy, you know why Velcro shoes are so great? Because you can hear when they untie.”
Soon she will be a big girl genius in her own mind, actively bucking any parental guidance I subconsciously (or blatantly) try to influence her with.
Soon she’ll be a teenage, not unlike my friend’s son, who decided to flex his growing independence this past weekend by getting on a motorcycle his mother prohibited him from riding.
Like many parents, my friend feared that her 16-year-old would struggle to maneuver the bike well enough to get from point A to point B, and take unnecessary risks in order to impress his friends.
Guess what?
She was right.
This weekend my friend’s son spent two nights in a suburban New York hospital, as he recovered from injuries he sustained after being thrown from the motorcycle his mother forbade him to ride.
Guess where my friend ended up spending Saturday and Sunday night?
In a recliner next to her son’s hospital bed, trying not to utter the words: “I told you so.”
According to the New York Department of Health, every week in The Empire State, roughly11 motorcycle drivers ages 15 to 19 years old are hospitalized because of injuries received in motorcycle crashes.
By the way, statistics show the risk of dying in a motorcycle crash is 16 times greater than dying in a car crash.
Parents may understand that driving a motorcycle is more difficult than driving a car, as it requires more agility, coordination and alertness, but how do they convince their risk-taking teens of that fact?
I wish I knew the answer. Shy of giving them a tour of the morgue where motorcycle accident victims come to rest, I am not sure how to find a foolproof method to scare sense into a stubborn teen.
What do you do to keep your teens off motorcycles?
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Do you let your kids drive with friends?