My Hands Are Tied

I am feeling SO much better today. Thank you for the laughs and good wishes. It's weird to not be able to move much, but have NO physical signs. My lovely husband referred to me as a Lamborghini. He said "you are hot and great 90% of the time, but when you brake down, you BREAK DOWN! And the repairs are costly. But you're worth it." All I could do was laugh because, DAMMIT, he's right! Although this time, all he had to buy to "fix" me was some Calamine lotion. Oh and he had to cook dinner one night. Even though all he did was throw a frozen lasagna in the oven. Still, he cooked it all the way through! YAY go hubby! ;o)

As I wasn't feeling so well, we found out my niece had her friend cut her hair...with a razor. We found this out because Nae was on Myspace and apparently Niece had told all her "friends" about it. Nae goes to Nieces pictures to see her new hair cut and OMG there are very inappropriate pictures of Niece on her page!

Niece is 13 years old but has the body of a 20 something year old and is VERY naive (or so we though). BAD combo! Her parents are completely oblivious of where this is headed. Well her father is. Her mother, I don't know, honestly. She took action, but not strict enough action.

When we saw the pictures her mother freaked out, called Niece and Niece's father and they had a talk about it. Her father made her take down the one that was the most inappropriate, but didn't look at the rest of them. Niece's mother took care of the rest, by calling her and telling her to take them down immediately. Which was done, but STILL. They were on the Internet already and I would be VERY surprised if they weren't copied onto some boy's (man's) computer. Plus they can be accessed through cache. She just does not get how serious this is. I don't think ANY of them do.

Husband and I made a point to talk to Nae about it, since that is all we can do. We aren't Niece's parents. We can't do anything. Our hands are completely tied. Which is so frustrating because I can see where this is going! Why can't they?!

Her punishment was, she was grounded from the computer for a month. That's it! Her page wasn't deleted. Her phone wasn't taken away. She was not told she couldn't go over to her friend's house with whom she took these pictures with anymore. Nothing! Just grounded from the Internet for a month. AAARRRGGGG

We told Nae that if she EVER does anything on the Internet even CLOSE to this, we will give her computer to Zilla. I swear if that was Nae, she would be in SO much trouble right now. She would be DAMN lucky she was sleeping on a bed!

I just want to say thank you to anyone who I have emailed with (Stacie) and asked for advice and you gave it to me AND made me listen! I'm not dumb. I know kids do stupid things on the Internet and off the Internet but I also know Nae is different. But I also know how fragile the pre-teen and teen years can be. I don't want to ever be so blind and think "oh not my kid" because YES it could be. If my "innocent" 13 year old Niece is doing it, then it could just as easily be Nae. This wasn't as much of a wake up call for me and Husband, as it was a confirmation on how right our decisions were that we made months ago.

I feel terrible that there is nothing I can do for Niece. I really hate that my "subtle" suggestions aren't being taken seriously. I hate that these parents are doing a damn thing about this incident. I am so frustrated because the road those kids are going down, is going to lead them in a bad direction. I will be very surprised if they get good grades this school year and none of them aren't doing drugs. Seriously.