Senior Week in Ocean City: How heinously are your kids behaving?

[Anonymous]

What do you think?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/senior-week-how-heinously-are-your-kids-behaving-in-ocean-city/2012/06/10/gJQAjwGTUV_story.html?socialreader_check=0&denied=1

They will be in college soon; why can’t you trust them for one week with their childhood friends? Vs.: No flippin’ way.

excerpt:

They had a plan:

“None of this drink-drink and pass out right away,” said the kid with the trucker cap askew and the lollipop-stick legs.

“Yeah,” agreed his even lankier sidekick. “So what do we do?”

I was dodging herds of bikini babes and packs of panting young men to keep eavesdropping on the pair.

Lollipop was excited. “Long, sustained drinking. Sustained. We just keep drinking and drinking.” He took a swill of his Cherry Coke.

This was zero hour in a rite of passage for thousands of high school seniors: the month-long bacchanal in Ocean City known as Senior Week. And these two characters were on the ground early, making their plan. And Cherry Coke wasn’t part of it.

Senior Week is a tradition that has been dreaded by Washington area parents for decades. It’s the annual migration of newly graduated, newly liberated, barely legal teens to the shore, where they party, plot, puke, hook up, scheme, swim, roam, dirty dance in foam and — for about 10 percent of them — get locked up for everything from underage drinking to drug possession to assault.

For the kids, it’s a week-long dress rehearsal for college frat parties. For their mothers and fathers, it amounts to a parenting final exam.

“Do I let them go to Beach Week?” is the senior parent anthem sung for months beforehand. On discussion boards, at PTA meetings and swim meets, it’s usually split about 50-50.

[Anonymous]

I went to Beach week. I was a "good" kid - I didn't drink, didn't stay out late, didn't sneak around. During beach week, I drank, stayed out all night with strange guys we randomly met, had a great time.

Will I let my kid go? Yeah but truthfully I will give her a ton of parental type warnings and then bury my head in the sand and pretend she is not drinking, not staying out late, not meet random guys.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went to Beach week. I was a "good" kid - I didn't drink, didn't stay out late, didn't sneak around. During beach week, I drank, stayed out all night with strange guys we randomly met, had a great time.

Will I let my kid go? Yeah but truthfully I will give her a ton of parental type warnings and then bury my head in the sand and pretend she is not drinking, not staying out late, not meet random guys.

Yup, me too. Sex (with my boyfriend but still), drugs (just pot but still), drinking... I shudder to think of my kids doing it but it's such a rite of passage and I managed to survive along with all of my friends.

[Anonymous]

I was a good kid and managed to behave myself in OC. Didn't drink, smoke, or hookup with random folks.

[Anonymous]

I drank. Way more than I should have. Nothing else. But a friend was date raped while drunk.

[Anonymous]

I was not a great kid and I wasn't interested in the mess that is known-beach-week. I went with some church friends to Deep Creak Lake, swam and goofed off, and had a great time.
If the shtick of beach week is ti be without parents, there are plenty of places to go to exercise independence without the threat of one thousand other troublesome teens.

[Anonymous]

Our beach week was in Myrtle Beach. Oh, yeah. Sex (with boyfriend, on the beach, in hot tubs, in random hotel rooms) drugs (pot and booze) and rock n roll. Also caught a ride home (5 hours) with a random friend of a friend who was probably drunk with a suspended license.

I was a very good kid. I survived. But I do shudder to think how it will be with our daughter. At least we have about 10 years!

[Anonymous]

eh, my parents are strict immigrants, did not understand the concept, did not let us go. 20 years later, i don't think i missed out on anything. fwiw, i had a great summer with local friends who were in the same boat. i don't think this is a "rite of passage".

[Anonymous]

Went to beach week in junior and senior year and had a blast. The stories I could tell would make for an excellent movie. Ah....memories.

[Anonymous]

Pardon my ignorance (I'm new here!), but how do the kids pay for this?

[Anonymous]

"Okay, not the only mom in the club. Surely, I was the only one wearing Spanx, then."

LOL

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pardon my ignorance (I'm new here!), but how do the kids pay for this?

Thier parents pay (or at least mine did).

[Anonymous]

I'd let DS/DD go when they're old enough. Like the PP said, I'd give a bunch of parental warnings about safety. I was a pretty good kid in high school and didn't get into any real partying until college, but I have to say that I look back on those times pretty fondly. Yes, things could have gone very wrong with all the hooking up and drinking, and I realize how lucky I was. But, I feel like there's such a freedom when you're that age, and you never get that time back!

Now that I've been (very happily!) married for 10 years, if DH and I want to get drunk and have sex on the beach, it'd require SO much planning, LOL! I'm glad I had those experiences at that time in my life because it was tons of fun, and after a certain point, it's just too tough to replicate. I'd definitely feel like I missed out if I hadn't been able/allowed to go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pardon my ignorance (I'm new here!), but how do the kids pay for this?

It varies. I always worked as a teen and paid my own way.

If my son goes in a few years, I will expect at least a partial contribution. Vacations don't drop from the sky free.

[Anonymous]

I was a pretty good kid in h.s. with strict parents. Went to beach week which was pretty tame for me. Drank some, smoked some pot, sex with boyfriend. but that's it. If that's the most my kids do, I'd be relieved. My only concern is them drinking/driving or do something really dumb like diving off a balcony into the pool and missing (the pool).
The good thing about beach week, as I recall, was that you really didn't need a car. You pretty much just walked to other hotels to party. So I guess there's only so much trouble you can get into (fingers crossed).