Rob

Children give parents a lot of shocking moments. My oldest daughter, Jami, gave me many and so did my youngest, Jessi, before I got one of the most surprising shocks from my middle daughter. My Jeanette was always the easy one to raise. She was, if anything, too compliant, always trying to please everyone. She never had to be told to do her homework, never threw a tantrum even in her terrible twos, she was too easy to raie. Her sisters seemed to always be getting in some kind of trouble and I was always grateful taht I didn't have to worry about Jeanette like I did them but I also always felt like I was somehow neglecting her. She was given rewards for her good behavior that the others were not and I know I somehow hoped that in some way made up for some of the neglect. But it also caused more problems for her. Her sisters were, and actually, now that they should be grown, they still are, jealous of the priviledges Jeanette received when they were in their teens.
Of course it was her sisters who told me when Jeanette went through her secret rebellion.
Jeanette had made a new friend when she was 14, Brandy, and began spending a lot of time at her home and also spending the night. I dropped Nett off there many times myself. Right about when I started teasing Nett that she was making up her friend Brandy because I had never actually never seen her, Jami told me that jeanette actually had a boyfriend living at the hosuse she was spending so much time with. His name was Rob, the local high school pothead living in the basement of his drug addict mother's house. I was shocked and felt like a really dumb deer caught in the headlights. I talked to Jeanette who of course didn't deny a story so easy to check now that I was looking directly at it. I spoke to the mother, Linda, who was the biggest psycho case I had ever met. (I would later see her medical records and find out that her IQ was listed as below 60 besides her meth addiction.)
I was terrified. It had gone on so long that I was terrified of losing Jeanette completely if I tried to brutally separate her and Rob at this point. So I had to play it cool, show my dissatisfaction and just make new rules for Jeantte that would put a little distance between them, like no more overnights, but Jeanette thought she was in love. It looked much worse than love to the rest of us. She thought the sun rose and set on Rob and somehow thought he knew more than she did and turned to him before making any decisions. Jami started calling her a Robalite and it was a good description and the term would last for the next fourteen years as we watched this relationship continue.
I tried to get to know Rob but over the next fourteen years I never saw him straight and sober or not being Eddie Haskel, my own name for him. You remember Eddie. He was the smarmy friend of Wally on Leave It To Beaver who always acted extra polite in front of Wally's parents while he was a complete jerk and trouble maker when he was off with other kids.
Keep your friends close and your enemies close. When I couldn't get them apart I let Rob move in with our family. At least they were out of the crazy woman's home and maybe I could try to teach Jeanette some of the things she would need to know, continue raising her, and keep her in school.
Rob thought he was a great musician and his only goal in life besides staying stoned was to be a rock star drummer. He had a ragtag band and I started letting them practice in my basement which would go on for the next four years or so. I had to shelve the hope of the relationship ending any time soon, she really was a Robalite, so I jumped on the band wagon so to speak to try to make Rob's dream come true. I never liked any of the music his band played but I started trying to promote them and even bought Rob band equipment when he needed it. I once even went so far as to try to finance him a whole new set of drums but I couldn't because my credit ws too far extended at that point.
After a couple of years I knew Jeanette, being a female, was pining for some kind of symbol of Rob's love for her so I talked to him abut getting her a ring or something. I ended up financing a platinum diamond ring for him to give her that he was supposed to pay me back for $10.00 a month. I never got a dime on that ring and have no clue what ever happened to it, I assume it ended up in a pawn shop for a drumstick or something.
Things went on like this for years until I started having trouble with my own marriage and hosuehold. My husband lost his job, he and Rob had a lot in common especially when it came to work ethics, and I started a home day care to earn money. by now we were living in a $200,000 home in Keystone and our payments were $1500 a month. I tried to get any of my girls to help me with the day care but none of them would so a friend who I'd helped out helped me. We were open 24/7 and the workload for two women was unbelievable. I began to resent the expense of supporting Rob and his band who still came every Sunday to practice leaving me a sink of dirty glasses and a short supply of drinks in the house. top this off, I am trying to run a day care and Rob is growing marijuanna in my basement and the smell became so overpowering it smelt like I was breeding skunks. I decided it was time to talk to Rob and Jeanette about my situation and their lack of contribution and the added stresses I didn't need at this time. They refused to talk to me and I tried an ultimatum, talk to me or get out, and they moved back to his mother's basement. Rob never got over how horrible I was because he had to destry his pot plants to make the move and he started his campaign at this time telling everyone that I was the crazy one. What I always knew would happen was happening, he was working to cut me off from Jeanette now that I wasn't kissing his skinny ass.
Their drug use went way beyond pot even before this. I don't know what all it included but I know they had started tripping on mushrooms and likely a lot of other things.