Leaving the Brat Behind

The earlier in life problem person turns his life around, the better. LOVESICK IN KENNEWICK, WASH. wrote in to Dear Abby:

I am a 16-year-old guy in my sophomore year of high school. I am known as a friendly, outgoing guy who gets along with girls.

Great.

My problem is, I used to be one of the biggest jerks who ever was. I was involved in fighting and other things I won't go into. But I turned my life around.

Good for you.

In my youth, I got into scuffles with one guy who was a year older/ahead of me in school. We used to be on the same team in a sport outside of school. When I was in eighth grade, and thus my last year of junior high, his parents shipped him off somewhere. But I didn't notice, as people were joining and dropping off the team all of the time, and I just assumed he was busy over at the high school in 9th grade.

After I got to high school, there he was – because he was only gone for a year. I didn't have problems with him anymore, but that change really didn't hit me at first. The pieces were put together when we had this big two-day motivational seminar at school. No kidding – in addition to all of the assemblies telling us we should have self-esteem, that we should be nice to each other, and that we shouldn't do drugs – we took TWO DAYS of a break in classes to have a bunch of feel-good pow-wows. One of those was this big session in the gym where half the school was having a group hug while the other half was taking various "classes" (like one on how to use condoms). I suppose these things were supposed to make up for driving references to Christianity away and telling us we're nothing but mutated slime. But, of course, they couldn't tell us why we should feel good about life and be nice – just that we should.

But I digress from my digression.

So in this big group hug session, some stranger who got paid big bucks spoke for a while, telling us we were all okay, and we should be nice to each other. Mind you, I never touched drugs, but this stuff could have driven me to try them. Since he didn't want to do any more work than he was required to, the speaker then had an open mic session to let students, who were not being paid, get up and pour out their hearts in front of half of the school (or, at least, half the school minus those who were ditching).

Up to the mic went my old sparring partner, who thanked everyone for noticing he was a different person since he came back from his time away. It finally all made sense to me. I guess I had figured had simply matured while in 9th grade, but it was more than that. His parents sent him somewhere to – I don’t know... deal with his issues, learn anger management, figure out which drugs to take... I have no idea. I don't know if he was at military school, mental hospital, Chinese slave labor camp, or some secret isolated religious camp. Whatever they did, it worked. At least, it did for the next few years. I have no idea what became of this guy after high school. For all I know he had his penis cut off and got boob implants and female hormones. I tried to look him up online, but it turns out there are a lot of people with that name, and most of the Facebook hits don't have pictures and do not reveal any info.

What I do know is that he didn't cause any trouble for anyone the rest of his time at high school. ...Or, maybe he learned to privately kill all of his enemies and dispose of the evidence so that nobody caught on.

As for me, I used to get into trouble mostly when I was in elementary school. I got better in junior high, and even better in high school, to the point where I'd stuff my emotions and even let people assault me rather than losing my temper and responding... becaue that would be "fighting" and wrong.

Anyway, the point of this digression is that kids can change.

I was going out with an amazing girl, "Samantha." She always kept me in line, but was sweet about it. Recently, because I was ashamed of my past, I lied to her. She found out about it and, needless to say, she was very hurt. When I saw how hurt she was, I was sick to my stomach knowing how much pain I had caused such a trusting girl.

It could be a good sign that he was sick to his stomach – it could mean that he has a conscience and hated that he hurt her. Or, he could be feeling guilty about his past and upset that it still haunts him.

I don't know much about where he lives – only what's on Wikipedia. But most likely, he's not going to see much of this girl once they graduate. He doesn't say whether or not they are having sex. Based on what was printed of his letter and what wasn't printed, he sounds like he could be falling into the "friend" category with all the girls at the school, and that could be a problem if he stays in that pattern into his adult years and then tries to look for a wife, or puts himself in the clutches of some schemer.

My best advice would be for this kid to avoid sex at that age anyway, focus on studies, hobbies, family, and his MALE friends, and don't be so serious with any of the girls at the school. He appears to really care about this girl, and she sounds like a decent human being, so he should apologize to her, tell her he's changed (as she should be able to see), and that he still has a hard time with his past following him around and shaming him. And do both himself and this girl a favor by not getting so deep with her.

My guess is that this guy doesn't have an available father, which would help explain the past behavior and his writing to freakin' Dear Abby with this question rather than getting what he needed from his old man.