A First

Alyssa came home one day last week and said that her friend, T, kept asking her (Alyssa) to come over to her (T’s) house and spend the night.

I asked Alyssa if this is something she actually wants to do or if she wants me to be the mean mom and say she can’t.

She gave it some thought and decided that yes, she really did want to spend the night with her friend T.

And here is where my own neuroses come in. I am vaguely relieved that Alyssa’s first sleepover experience with a non-related person is with this particular friend. And why am I relieved, you ask? Because I’m a horrible person who doesn’t not trust teenage boys around my nine year old daughter (and I won’t trust them when she’s 16 or even 19 but we’ll face that when we have to.) T’s mom is a widow and T has an older sister.

So, that means there are no strange men or boys whom I’ve never met around my sleeping daughter.

I know. It’s probably crazy to worry about that but I can’t help it.

And those of you with sons, I’m sorry for feeling this way. I know that YOUR sons are awesome, wonderful people who would never hurt anyone. I do know this. But I don’t know the brothers of her friends and so I don’t trust them. I’m sorry for that but there it is.

She came home last night and announced, “T wants me to spend the night this Friday.”

She looked at me expectantly. I asked again if she actually wanted to do this. She swears she does.

So I called T’s mom to make sure this wasn’t something A and T had cooked up between them or if T’s mom was in on the whole thing.

She is. She’s also okay with the fact that bedtime might roll around and Alyssa might need me to come get her.

So we’re going to give it a try.

My baby is growing up and it scares the crap out of me.