Smells Like Teen Spirit: Why Teenagers Are on the Nose

What kind of poltergeist takes over our beautiful cherubs and turns them into teenagers?  Their room starts off smelling of baby powder, clean linen and eucalyptus and then something goes terribly wrong….

Let’s make something clear from the start.  This is not an exclusively male issue.  Girl teens can surprise you too with their freaky and funky ways. You see, things start happening both inside their bodies and outside.  Parents change too.  Maybe it is a pheromone given off by the slowly maturing human, but all of a sudden we stop supervising every little aspect of their life. Gradually things turn nasty. Real nasty!   We stop laying out clean clothes for them. We stop opening their mouths and checking the effectiveness of their tooth brushing technique.  We stop yelling about the wet towels and stinky socks on the floor.  We stop asking if they used shampoo. We stop checking their school bags for green furry sandwiches and we stop scrubbing their sports shoes.

Hell, we stop going in their rooms full stop because we are trying to give them PRIVACY.

It doesn’t take long and the whiff begins.  When it starts, it is confined to the nest but, left unattended it can permeate into every cranny of your home. It is powerful stuff and this is how it begins. They never open windows and any room left like that will turn noxious.  It is like they love that they are developing their own musk and marking their territory with it.  They sleep for hours breathing in and out of an open mouth that could do with a good shave and yeah I am talking about their tongue.  They have terrible eating habits and endlessly produce enough methane to power a small country.  Getting the picture. They aren’t even up yet.

They eventually stumble out of bed wearing the same clothes as they did two days ago and make their way to the dunny. Grunting in response to morning salutations from the kitchen.  Sooner or later they appear in the kitchen, flop into a chair, grunt and reach for food.  They inhale bowl after bowl of cereal with great dexterity and speed.  Amazing really… their eyes are still shut.

Eating, eating, eating, swilling, some more eating and swilling and then finally some grunting.

They head back to their lair and figure out what day it is.  Right, it is a school day. CRAP! They pick up random uniform items from the floor and proceed to smell each piece to guage the “Freshness”.  Yep. Set.  The school bag has last weeks footy gear in it and the flies are circling.  Turf them on the floor.  Good to go.

After a big day of thinking, sweating, running, sweating, hormone producing, sweating they return from the other world.  That is the world where they have their share of pressures and often feel awkward about their changing bodies.  A world where everything is changing and they have to re establish their spot in the pecking order of their peers. So they come back to their den and it is exactly how they left it.  Perfect.

You see, they are struggling with the transformation too.  They know the time has come for them to brush their own teeth etc. They are  worried that they may not be able to handle all that adult life expects of them.  They are overwhelmed, so be patient or just don the hazchem suit and get in their room yourself.  After all, it is important they keep themselves nice or they will never meet someone, make friends and move out.