Peer Pressure

Jamie got into the biggest trouble he's ever been in this past weekend. I've been letting him go play with the kids up the street. They're all older than him, but one girl just turned 7 and he likes to play with her. He's not allowed to be in their house or back yard. I need to be able to look out and see him. We live on a dead end. The kids play in the road. They set up a basketball goal at the end of the street. I've known most of my neighbors my entire life. We watch out for each others kids. This family is new.

My husband goes outside Sunday to check on Jamie and sees him trying to place something under the tire of the neighbors truck as the neighbor is trying to back out. The neighbor sees him, thank God, and stops. He watches for Jamie to move out of the way and tries again and Jamie does the same thing again. This apparently happened a few times. My husband was screaming the whole time. I come running because I heard Matt yelling. All the kids from that household are standing there watching Jamie do this. Most of them are 10+. Some of them are teens. The neighbor is finally able to back up and I make Jamie come home, of course. The neighbor is furious. I'm sure he was frightened, too. He has a little girl in kindergarten, too. I demand to know what Jamie thought he was doing. He was trying to get Eeyore, which is his lovey, "smushed". I ask him why he would do that to Eeyore and he says, "Because my friend wanted me to." We have the "you don't do everything your friends want you to" discussion. I take Eeyore away so he can get a taste of what it would be like if Eeyore was gone. We discuss death and how getting hit by a truck or a car could make you die. I also told him that he couldn't go out without me again except in the back yard, which is fenced in and we lock. I am very concerned about this new family, but Jamie wants to play with them so badly. I left my car in Knoxville the weekend before last after a trip to the ER where they gave me morphine so I could not drive. I haven't had a car this week. I hear the keypad to my front door beeping and go up front to find the little girl trying to get into my house. Mind you, she is just barely seven. I just have a gut feeling that something is not right with the family.

Jamie had terrible night terrors Sunday night. I felt guilty about the death discussions and taking away Eeyore, but I really wanted to make sure the danger sunk in and for there to be a serious consequence to his actions that he would not forget. The little girl came up to see if Jamie could play and I asked her about what was going on up there. She said that she wanted to see what would happen if the truck ran over Jamie's Eeyore. She said that she and all those kids in the family had been running over his Eeyore with their bikes and had not been able to smush him. I told her that if she and Jamie could not play nice games together that I would not let them play together. I told her that he wouldn't be able to play without me there from now on and that he was grounded for three days. She still showed up three more times and then showed up after school yesterday, too.

Lately, Jamie has seemed really susceptible to peer pressure. He tries to give away the stuff he loves to make other people be his friends. He does whatever they tell him to do. He is immature for his age as it is and it's frightening to me to see him try to buy friendship in that way. I'm so worried about him.