My daughter had a car accident: a Suburban backed into her right front fender. She kept her cool, ca!lled the Police, called my wife, and tended to details/business. She was shocked when she told me as all I had to say was praising her for how she handled the incident, including her emotions!

You are no alone.

When my kids were in that age, I bought them fluorescent/reflective vests and helmets to wear when they play with bicycles. Since NO ONE around wore any safety stuff, they were too embarrased to wear them in front of their peers . I ended up sticking reflective tape all around their bicycles.

I think that more and more doses of love and FRIENDSHIP are essential. We dads and moms sometimes take parenting too far with instructions and advices that we don't notice we are not that much FUN compared to their peers.

All I can suggest is to go back in time, YOU become a teenager yourself, and have more fun with them. When we becomes part of their FRIEND group (rather than parents) , they would call us more often.

Q to chaosmagnet

Can you please educate me about this (find my firends) function ?? Sometimes, I need to find my son who won't answer the phone. (He's not a preenager , but still behaves like one).

The version I'm most familiar with comes with the iPhone. There's a Find My Friends app. My oldest's iPhone is connected to my account with Apple, so if she (very foolishly!) decided to let me stop "following" her with Find My Friends, there's a different app called Find My iPhone that lets me find her phone, remotely lock it, cause it to emit a "I'm lost" sound even if it's muted, or remotely wipe it.

Android phones have similar functions. Some carriers have non-smartphone services to find phones (and their attached offspring) for a price.