Teenagers Are Expensive

Ok, you thought having a baby was expensive? All those diapers and formula, daycare and doctor's visits?

Wait until that precious little baby is a teenager. Kids get cheaper for a little while when they are between the ages of about seven and thirteen. Doctor's visits are fewer, there aren't as many wants, nobody cares too much about clothing labels. People are happy with a bike, a skateboard, and a Wii. For about six years you are deliriously happy with your economic state and you don't even know it.

Then, the barrage of expenses hits like a ton of bricks slowly emptying out of the back of a dump truck. A few bricks at a time, until the whole load finally hits you during your child's sophomore year in college. As you are saying goodbye to the teen years forever, the outflow of money is still rising. You are bleeding green by that time.

What could possibly be so expensive? Here's a list:
*a car and insurance (but, yes, your child can help pay for part of that, even though his/her school work may suffer - lol)
*clothes, clothes, and more clothes, only of a very expensive kind approved of by the in crowd (see Chrissie's previous post)
*braces and 7 retainers lost in the cafeteria trash
*dances and dresses/tuxes to wear
*lessons and sports of every imaginable kind
*eating out with everyone else who is eating out
*school - now I know it doesn't seem like school should be expensive, but it is. Clubs, trips, AP Exams, Science Fair, projects, Prom, lost books, choir dresses, fundraisers in which you buy almost all the stuff....it's expensive
*senior pictures and activities
*college tuition
*sororities and fraternities
*that $17,000 expected family contribution the fafsa thinks you can pay - twice if you have two children in college :)

Has it occurred to anyone else that we might need some Depression Era tactics fairly soon? Higher gas prices are beginning to take their toll on people's budgets, as well as on businesses in our area. Wal Mart told me the other day, as well as other merchants in the city, that shoplifting is on the rise. That cost, like health care abuses, gets passed on to one person - US, but it only matters to us in our own individual pocketbooks.

How do you save money in certain places? Use dryer sheets twice? Take your lunch to work? Eat out only five times a week (just kidding)?

Just this past week I had my children's line disconnected. My son, John, is the last one living at home for the summer and he uses his cell phone most of the time. I should have disconnected it last summer, but it was the very last vestige of my former life with children at home, knowing their names were listed in the phone book at our address. Although it cost me money to have it disconnected, it will save me money in the long run.

If you have any great ideas for saving more money, let me know. I know many of you have successfully put your children through professional school and I admire you greatly!