Reply To: Going off the Derech

aries2756-while your theory sounds great, and may work some of the time, it wouldn’t have worked this past Shabbos. First of all, I wouldn’t have thought to expect that my son would embarrass me and the entire family in front of our friends and neighbors the way he did. I guess I am still pretty naive in thinking that he does care a tiny bit about us. The degree of selfishness is beyond words, as well as his distorted sense of “who’s embarrassing who”. And I’m still trying to recover from the chutzpah, that he has the nerve to hang out across the street in the middle of the night until morning, with a mixed crowd of loud teens, and then get angry that my husband saw him and ’embarrassed’ him by looking at him! My husband actually woke up in the middle of the night, and went to get some air (it was a hot evening). He was in shock when he saw my son there, and stared in disbelief. Then my son had the nerve to scream at my husband when he got home, that he embarrased him! It didn’t occur to him that his hanging out in front of our building embarrassed us? I’m not sure if I should cry rivers of tears, or just stop crying completely….

I will, however, try to apply your advice to Pesach.