Julie Bowen Talks Teen Driving

In case you really feel such as you’re the final to learn about something occurring in your teenager’s life, Julie Bowen is correct there with you.

“Being at midnight is a terrifying milestone for me,” the actress and mother of three teen boys, 17-year-old Oliver and 15-year-old twins John and Gustav, confesses throughout a chat with SheKnows. “Like, is {that a} girlfriend? Are you guys concerned? Thank God for the brothers, as a result of they’ll typically point out, ‘Yeah, this occurred … sure, they have been going out’ — or, sorry,” — she corrects her teenage terminology — “‘They have been in a ‘situationship.‘”

It’s onerous to go from figuring out every little thing about your youngsters to being very a lot out of the loop. However as any guardian of youngsters can attest, there are a lot of issues that What to Anticipate Whereas You’re Anticipating simply didn’t warn you about (the nerve!) … like “situationships” or anything, actually. Elevating a teen generally is a tough highway, particularly when you get to the purpose the place literal roads are concerned. Studying to drive is a type of large milestones that carry youngsters extra freedom and their dad and mom extra grey hairs, and Bowen is within the thick of it; we have been capable of commiserate over the ups and downs of getting a teen driver because of her current partnership with Hyundai, acknowledged by U.S. Information & World Report because the producer of among the greatest automobiles for teen drivers.

“My largest concern is their overconfidence about driving typically,” the Fashionable Household star says of her boys. “They suppose they know every little thing, after which they’re afraid to confess what they don’t know.” Is it as a result of they’re players, who suppose their years of “driving” race automobiles onscreen equates to real-life expertise? We agree that we aren’t positive, however one factor is for sure: you’ll be able to’t simply crash into one thing after which “respawn” IRL, and there are very actual — and really dangerous — variables related to really being on the highway. “[Video game] tracks don’t have cease indicators and drunk, distracted individuals merging onto the 101,” Bowen quips.

Once we’ve acquired new drivers on the highway, surrounded with distractions, it helps slightly to know we’ve the expertise accessible to trace their location in actual time. Most of us are glad it wasn’t round when we have been youngsters, but it surely’s a particular benefit now that we’re dad and mom. And although you’d be hard-pressed to get them to confess it, youngsters don’t at all times thoughts somebody figuring out the place they’re. “My youngsters are at all times like, ‘Mother, why are you monitoring me? … You’re such a bizarre stalker,’” laughs Bowen. “But it surely does make them really feel secure. It makes me really feel higher, too.”

In fact, with all of the applied sciences we’ve at our disposal, there isn’t a single security function accessible that may forestall poor teenage selections. That reality isn’t misplaced on Bowen, or some other guardian of teenagers, therefore the lecture we’re all acquainted with. It’s a parental speech that usually elicits an eye fixed roll and an “I knoooooow, Mother,” — however, hopefully, it’s additionally the one which replays in our teenagers’ heads after they’re in a potentially-precarious scenario.

“‘You’re by no means going to get in bother in case you name me, in case you suppose you’re in any type of a scenario the place driving is a foul concept,’” Bowen says she (always) tells her youngsters, in typical mother trend. “Sure, you’ll be able to have all the protection options on the earth … however there’s no substitute for utilizing your judgment once you’re with a bunch of fool youngsters who might or is probably not impaired on something, and that’s a no driving time. They’re so bored of listening to me say, ‘No capsules, no powders. By no means, by no means, by no means, by no means get behind the wheel of a automotive once you’ve been within the room and also you smelled one thing humorous. Sure, take an Uber. I’ll go broke on Ubers.’”

Fortunately, Bowen says the one teen driving drama she’s handled to this point was when considered one of her sons by accident ripped a little bit of siding off the storage with the automotive. “That’s why I acquired psyched about the entire Hyundai alternative, as a result of they’ve so many security options and issues like the automated backup … which makes my youngsters really feel a lot extra assured about, you realize, not ripping the wall off of the storage once more,” she laughs. “Like, perhaps as soon as was sufficient.”

Earlier than you go, try how these movie star dad and mom’ tales about instructing their teenagers learn how to drive.