Don’t have sex. Don’t drink. Don’t do this and don’t do that. This is what we hear when we tell the truth.

The lying starts with small things. No, I didn’t go hang out at the mall, I stayed at the library to do homework. No, all my friends were drinking but I wasn’t. No, nothing happened with *insert boy-friend name here* and me that weekend you were out of town.

We lie because we gain nothing from telling the truth. We lie because we want to avoid the admonishing. We lie because at the end those admonishments will not change how we act.

Granted, those admonishments are called for. It’s natural that they worry. They see themselves in us. They don’t want us to repeat the same mistakes that they made. But isn’t making those mistakes a part of growing up and a part of becoming an adult? Don’t we have the right to make those “mistakes”?

Because some choices are should be our choices. Some decisions are left for us to make. Sure maybe out parents only had sex after marriage and were ivy-league valedictorians. But should that automatically mean that we should only have sex after marriage or work for that 4.0 GPA?

No, those are decisions left for us to make. And believe it or not, we love ourselves too. We do not wake up one day and think; “I’m going to make stupid decisions from now on and screw up my life.” Getting pregnant at sixteen, getting AIDS or becoming a drug addict is not exactly on our to-do list. Our future matters to us, perhaps more than how much it matters to them.

So then why do we hate the admonishments so much? Why do we slam the door and crank up the music, roll our eyes and sigh? Perhaps what frustrate us are not the worries themselves but rather how they express them: first comes the initial GASP! Then comes the endless questioning. “WHO did that? WHY didn’t your try to stop it?” The show ends with the grand finale of threats. “If you don’t promise to do drugs you can’t go to parties anymore. If you don’t promise to not have sex, we are canceling your summer trip. If you don’t keep up your grades, you can’t play *insert favorite sport here* next year”

These accusations and threats not only are loud and obnoxious but also question their trust in us. Why should we have to “promise” those things if they had trust in us. Do they really think that we are THAT messed up?