i guess this could go here

What is with kids who are barely teenagers(13/14) looking for a serious relationship? It is not just on this site i have seen this, but in my school district kids are saying "i love you" and "we will be together forever" at 13 years old.

They know not what they say. But they will soon once they see things go wrong a couple times. Although I am sure they are coming after our heads for this post alone. XD run.

I think they're serious about it, like most other things. When/if (I say if, because I know people that have been together since that young an age) it disintegrates, they will be serious about that as well. I don't think it's a matter of "you're too young to be feeling that", I think it's more "you still haven't discovered your needs". At that age, you're incredibly responsive to your own emotions, so how you respond to others becomes vivid. Age really just brings the practical things, knowledge of what you need, a thicker skin, awareness of when someone is being a dick, etc. But for love, and emotion? 14 sounds about right to me.

I really didn't have my first true boyfriend until I was 15 nearing 16. Before that I had tried to date some online friends but things didn't work out to being a dating experience etc. Starting around 8 I felt like I wanted a boyfriend and had many crushes from there on. I don't think I could have been deeply in love with a guy at 13/14 since I was still unsure of what I was looking for. Several times when I have dated I felt like it could last a long time, but it hasn't so far and hasn't been worth hurting myself over or whatever. I don't think it's a necessity to have a boyfriend in middle school at all, I know a lot of people from my grade who didn't. Yes, it excluded me and them from the middle school dances and stuff but we made up for it by hanging out. I think it's more of a worry in high school because that's when more people are dating and learning about who they'd like to be with for long-term relationships. A learning process does occur and can throw you through several dating opportunities and falls, but it's not all bad.

I don't think there is anything inherently wrong with that 7th/8th grade age range "dating" or considering it a serious relationship. That being said, whether they'll still be together when it comes to the end of grade school is usually pretty low and parents should be semi-involved with their childs relationship and keeping things in check until they get older.

Cecil, Parental involvement needs to be tempered with the child being able to recognize when they are being handed a line of crap. My first relationship wasn't until I was in college, my ancestry is German, theirs was African, and my mother took issue right from the start when we were just friends. Later on when a cousin was married to a black gal with children from a prior marriage, my mother gushed over "how nice she was". Taught me that my mother was a hypocrite, bigot, and she didn't want a mixed race relationship under her roof. I hate anyone who is a hypocrite and/or a bigot.

Yiff, I'm not saying the parents need to be involved in every aspect of their child's life in that regard. I'm just saying they don't need to let it get out of hand. Sleeping in separate rooms on sleep overs, no overly explicit contact, etc. Kids are going to be kids regardless, but there's nothing wrong with parents instilling some ground rules when it comes to a relationships.

It is rare for a relationship at that age to last that long but you can blame the media for that. Kids see romance movies and scummy mtv shows and think hey I can do that, I should do that when really they can't handle it at that age and shouldn't even be thinking about it they should be having fun as kids. Back in the day it might have been acceptable but at least in the USA we have a much longer life expectancy so we no longer have the need to rush into a relationship and kids can stay kids longer than before but they choose not to because the media and possibly society as a whole pushes dating as important to kids. As in if you are in high school and you've never been on a date you are usually picked on for being a loser. Really I say no one should be picked on and kids should stay out of dating till at least 16 and than only date for fun not to do anything serious until you are at least an adult. There are exceptions but they are not the rule.