Oh No Teenageritis

April 1st, 2012 was a big day for our household. My oldest daughter officially turned 13. That was also the same day that she became infected with a common disease I like to call Teenageritis. It infected her brain first, but then seemed to spread throughout her body. This isn’t a fatal disease and most people are able to fight through it. Mysteriously, Teenageritis only has about a 7 year lifespan and it seems to heal itself.

Common symptoms of Teenageritis are:

• An uncanny amount of knowledge is acquired in a short period of time. Those infected know everything about everything.

• The filter between brain and mouth disappears. Think of it like a snake’s skin. One must lose it to grow another that is better and more effective.

• A cell phone type apparatus grows out of the infected person’s dominating hand. If said apparatus becomes unattached for any length of time, the infected person is unable to function.

• The infected person is prone to uncharacteristic lapses in judgment. They are no longer able to fear the consequences of their actions.

• The body suddenly requires huge amounts of food and sleep in order to survive. Starvation is lurking around every corner just waiting to claim the lives of our young.

• The body slows considerably. What once took 5 minutes to complete now takes 3 hours.

• Decisions begin to require the input of many other infected children. No fewer than 3 infected people must be contacted just to decide what shirt to wear every morning.

• Hearing loss. Infected people will try to compensate for this shortcoming by pretending to listen to sounds and words screamed at an extremely high level. They call this music. Do not be fooled.

• Memory loss. You have to repeat yourself numerous times when asking someone with teenageritis to complete a task. Even then, do not be surprised if they don’t quite remember everything.

• They start speaking and writing in code. Ya R U? is a complete sentence spoken frequently. So is U 2. I’m sure this is just to confuse adults. It works.

There does not seem to be any medicine that helps those infected with Teenageritis manage these symptoms. Sometimes a good healthy dose of grounded helps for a few days, but then the disease is back full force. It is highly contagious and can lie dormant for years. Studies show that once someone in your household is infected the rest of your children have a chance to start showing symptoms at an earlier age.

The good news is that Teenageritis, while an annoying ailment, is completely curable. If you keep your head and don’t panic, these symptoms tend to start slowing their progression at around age 18. By 20 most kids have completely recovered and have regained control of their brains.