I’ve been blogging for a while now – since my three oldest kids were around 10, 8 and 5 years old – since back in the days when C  and newbaby on the way were as foreign an idea to me as a Martian invasion.  Since that first blog post, I’ve blogged through marriage, the end of a marriage, a horrifically painful divorce, re-entry into the full time workforce, single parenting, working motherhood, falling in love, remarriage, blended family life, pregnancy, miscarriage, childbirth, breastfeeding, baby and toddlerhood, and I’ve blogged lots and lots and lots about H, J and E as they’ve grown from little kids into much bigger kids. They are now 18, 14 and 12 years old (!!!).

I’ve written before about the fact that as my three eldest, much blogged-about kids have grown, I’ve become more and more circumspect about what I share about them on my blog, in my published essays, and in the past two years, on Facebook and Twitter. Now I generally always ask them before I write anything that so much as mentions them, but sometimes I still screw up and they ask me to take stuff I’ve written or posted down.  Last week J hated a photo I had posted of her on Facebook, and just today, H called me to ask me to remove a Facebook status update I’d written referencing him.  So I did.

I’ve joked before that the reason I keep having babies is to make sure I have blog fodder because truly, as the kids get older – beyond the little kid years – I am tremendously conscious at all times of protecting their right to tell their own stories in their own ways if and when they ever feel like doing that. J in particular seems to be a budding writer, and I hope all of my children flex their writing muscles in one way or another as they become adults.

But see, here’s the bummer about the fact that I can no longer be as open on my blog about what’s up with my parenting and with my older children: the best thing about having a parenting blog is the support and information that you get from other parents going through the same thing. When your baby has colic, and you blog about it, you are reassured by hearing from blog readers who have been there, done that, and who have lived to tell the tale. When you can’t figure out how to gently wean the toddler, you can talk about it on your blog and immediately hear from all kinds of smart mamas who have great advice on the best way to handle the transition. And on the day you first walk your five year old into her kindergarten class, you can spill your maudlin musings on the end of childhood into a heartfelt blog post, and you’ll get plenty of virtual hugs from members of your blog community who know what that first day of school feels like for an attached mama.

But just about the time that parenting gets a lot trickier – age 13 or so – you find yourself completely constrained by respect for your kids’ privacy and their need for autonomy from sharing very many of the truly meaningful details and struggles of your life as a parent. Sure, you might tell an amusing anecdote here and there, or gloat about that lacrosse game he won or the play in which she starred, but you really can’t talk about the harder parts, the darker parts of parenting a teenager- the adolescent equivalent of those nights when your newborn cried so much for so long that you felt like tossing him out the window and running away.

Parenting my eldest child through teenagehood thus far has been the most confusing, unexpected, terrifying, humbling, distressing experience of my life, bar none. And really, that’s all I can say about it – here on my blog or anywhere else.  Our culture nowadays allows for and even welcomes open discussion of the most minute and personal details of pregnancy, childbirth and the challenging parts of parenting babies and young children. But we rarely talk openly outside our closest families and friends about the hard parts of parenting adolescents.  I think this is due in large part to the fact that frankly, it’s embarrassing when your teenager isn’t meeting your expectations in some way. You find yourself feeling ashamed of your parenting.   If your three year old throws tantrums at Target, no one seriously believes you are a bad parent or that your child won’t grow out of it.  We’ve all been through that and can relate.  But for the significant minority of us parents whose teenagers struggle in a major way with big, important issues, you are facing your most terrifying fear – that you are actually, truly, for realz  a bad parent. You look around at the bright, shiny, happy teenagers you see in other families – the National Merit Scholars and the soccer stars and the 17 year olds who volunteer at the homeless shelter every weekend and you wonder, what did I do wrong? Where have I failed him – my baby? And can I fix this somehow? Does anyone ever make it through tough times like these and emerge to find a healthy, mature, finally grown-up child on the other side of it? You wonder these things incessantly, like a nonstop thought loop running through your brain and your heart every single day. But you keep it mostly to yourself, and you certainly don’t draw attention to the situation, to your obviously complete failure as a parent by discussing it outside your closest circle. You sure as hell don’t blog about it.

But boy oh boy would I love it if it became acceptable and the norm for those of us parenting bloggers who do have teenagers to talk as openly about the challenges that come with parenting our kids through ages 13-21 as we do about diapers and breastfeeding and cosleeping. Because honestly, compared to this, that stuff was a piece of cake.  But the combination of our own shame and respect for our teenagers’ privacy keeps us silent. Keeps me silent. And that’s really too bad, because I know that those of us who are going through these horrific, ass-kicking struggles with our beloved teenage offspring could use some of the same kind of wonderful support that mamas of babies and young children get when they blog about that no good, very bad, super rotten day when the preschooler melted down at Target.