BOY-MOMS DON'T CRY

By now, the discussion around Adolescence has died down, and our distracted world has moved on to other topics that enrage and outrage. But as a boy-mother, I just can’t get it out of my head.

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A criticism of the Netflix series was that the final episode should have been about the family of the girl who died; it was instead about the parents and sister of the 13-year-old boy who killed his classmate. As a boy-mother, I disagree. Of course that story should be told — perhaps in a sequel — but Adolescence was a story about a family grappling with a reality most of us don’t imagine we will go through. There is the flawed father who loses his temper and who through conversations we know was distraught at his son not being able to play football.

And the mother. In the final episode, there’s a scene where the mother is hanging up her coat as she comes home. It is her husband's birthday, and they have just been confronted with public humiliation and ostracization from the community. You feel her crumbling, but then she pulls herself together and puts on her face.

It shows what most parents of children who make big mistakes go through: anger, guilt, shame, fear. Parenting teens is all about the bewilderment of not knowing what is happening in their lives, while trying to fight your own battles, and doing your best for your child. With sons, this ‘best’ is double work.