• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
Michael G. Thompson, Ph.D.

Michael G. Thompson, Ph.D.

New York Times Bestselling Author and International Speaker

  • Home
  • Books >
    • Hopes and Fears
    • Homesick and Happy
    • Raising Cain
    • It’s a Boy
    • Best Friends, Worst Enemies
    • Speaking of Boys
    • The Pressured Child
    • Finding the Heart of the child
    • Mom, They’re Teasing Me
    • Raising Cain (Video)
  • About
  • Workshops
  • Photos
  • News
  • Calendar
  • Contact

Meanwhile: When teens push parent’s panic button

MT · Jan 3, 2006 ·

An op-ed article by Michael Thompson, originally written for the Boston Globe was republished in the New York Times on January 3, 2006. The article covers sensitive issues that parents of teenagers face. Here’s an excerpt:

The show-stopper was a 42-year-old man, the father of two elementary school children. “My mother thought I was really a responsible boy,” he reported. “She would have been shocked to know that I was on the roof of the school, prying off the skylights with friends so we could drop 65 feet into the school pool … in the dark.”

Well, there it was, every parent’s deepest fear: that our children will do something risky and we won’t be able to stop them, we won’t even know. We’re terrified that even a responsible boy could lie to his mother and drop from a roof-top skylight, in the dark, 65 feet into a school pool. And how did he feel at the time? “Great!” he said.

You can read the full article here.

Copyright © 2025 Michael Thompson, Ph.D.. All rights reserved. Photo of Michael Thompson, Ph.D. by A. Blake Gardner/Binnacle.

  • Home
  • Books >
  • About
  • Workshops
  • Photos
  • News
  • Calendar
  • Contact