In case you didn’t know, I’m a mom. My goal as a mom is not only to get all of the difficult unpleasant parts of parenting right, but to do it without my kid totally resenting me for it. Which can be rough when you are raising a teenager!
I do my best to be fair when it comes to the scolding and punishments, but I had trouble figuring out how to be the cool fun mom without totally undoing the things “meanie mom” had to do. That’s where Doctor Who came in.
I noticed my son watching a lot of Doctor Who reruns and chatting about it with his friends a couple years ago. Like most parents would, I decided to investigate since I really didn’t know much about the show even though I’d heard of it loads of times.
Over the course of a few months of watching on Netflix I started chiming in when I would see my son watch an episode that I had also seen. This got him asking me how I knew that there was a human Dalek or that bow ties are cool. The fact that I was interested in something he thought was cool intrigued him. He mentioned my interest to one of his buddies and got the response
“Moms don’t like cool stuff they like mom stuff.”
For me, that felt like a challenge! And yes I know a grown woman feeling the need to prove herself to a teenager isn’t exactly mature but I dare say it was fun! At first it started with my son’s friend asking me questions about the show that he didn’t think I could answer. Things like “What’s Bad Wolf?” or “Who’s the Master?” and so on. When I was able to get it all right he told my son
“She’s not too bad for a mom.”
Then a few weeks later the boy’s mom calls me to say she got tickets to some Doctor Who cinema event and really doesn’t want to go but her son does and wants to invite mine. I told her I’d happily take them. I was, in fact, thrilled to go! I think taking them to that first cinemaevent really sold it to them that I was genuinely interested in something they were.
So when they announced that there was going to be another theater only event for the season 9 prequel. I was excited. I told the boys “find out when it is and I will take you and even buy snacks!” SIDENOTE: Snacks at the movies for teenage boys cost a small fortune. It could easily run $20 a person just for snacks.
So I got to be the cool mom again. I took my son and 2 of his friends the, original I mentioned and another that actually binge watched everything he could on Netflix so he would know what was going on. We had a BLAST!!!
We actually talked about our favorite Doctors and Companions, made a game out of who could get the trivia questions before the previews answered fastest and they even talked to me about other things like some of the fun apps they enjoy and things they can’t stand about school. When they got a bit too hyper it only took a second to get them to chill out because they still remembered I am an authority figure.
It’s nice to be able to have things to do with your kids and their friends that you all enjoy. There’s nothing worse than feeling like all you’re good for is a set of car keys and a ride. That’s why it puts a smile on my face to hear things like this:
“You know your mom is actually kinda cool…you know for a mom.”
But the best part is when my son responds
“Yeah she is pretty cool isn’t she?”
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