When is it too late to be a parent?

[Dispatcher]

I have never been a parent. That is, except for a grown step daughter I have because I married her mom.
Mostly what I have learned about parenting has come from watching other people's mistakes....the mistakes my parents made with me and the mistakes of my step daughter and her husband in regard to their son.
They never gave him any discipline or responsibility when he was growing up, and by the time he was 18 he was stealing from school, dropping out of school, smoking pot, and shacking up with a very lazy girl.
Now finally alarmed, his parents tryed to reign him in....and when the teen turned 20, it looked like things were starting to turn around. He dumped his old girlfriend for a nice girl who wasn't a loser, and he started working on his G.E.D.
But when he turned 21 (recently), he started back on the road to self destruction. He went back to his old girlfriend and old ways and his future doesn't seem to bright. And, like most guys that age, he is thinking with his little head instead of his big head.

The point is, is it too late for his parents to start doing the job of parenting that they were supposed to be doing all along?
Like I said, I'm not a true parent per se, so you can say I'm full of shit....but it seems to me that a parent's job is to prepare kids for life....something my own parents didn't do.
I learned the hard way...the School of Hard Knocks, and I fear my step grandson is headed that way....at full throttle.
You could say, "Well, it's none of your business how they raise their kid", and you would be right...that's why I sit on the sideline and keep my mouth shut.

I know kids have their own free will, independent of their parents.

But I still have to wonder....when is it too late to be a parent?
When is the die cast, and there is no going back?

[7960]

Originally Posted by Dispatcher

The point is, is it too late for his parents to start doing the job of parenting that they were supposed to be doing all along?

Yes, it's too late for them to parent. Now their only hope is reason (which I'm guessing they haven't taught too much of, either) and leading by example. Their time for parenting is over.

But I still have to wonder....when is it too late to be a parent?
When is the die cast, and there is no going back?

There's no way to answer this question. I have more than one friend with a 10/11 year old that's a little piece of shit kid. I'm sure they could probably bring him back around if they wanted to. I know a few kids 16/17 who have no problem telling their parents to fuck off when their told what to do.

So I guess I'd say the answer is somewhere in between, but it depends on the parents and the kid.

[Rhianann]

If a child starts misbehaving what can you do really? There are so many laws protecting children, they have completely stripped parents of their own rights. Luckily mine don't behave like that. Kids are highly influenced by their peers once they reach a certain age and there's not a whole lot you can do about it. They are too old for timeouts. It's illegal to spank them. Reverse psychology never works, I know I have used it lol.