I got put in my place tonight by my 15 year old (a good thing)

I got slapped with an unusual parenting moment tonight.After I put my 8 year old son Chase to bed, I was doing the usual nightly routine of picking up the house, and getting things ready for tomorrow. My 15 year old son Richard is still awake playing with friends on a video game. This is routine. He asked me, “what’s the plan for tomorrow?”I said (a little frustrated admittedly) “same thing ... I go to work. Chase goes to Amy’s. You stay home. You ask me this every night.” The second it left my mouth I cringed. I said it a little snippy. Not purposely, it’s just been a long day.Richard stopped his game. He said, “ I know mom, I just wanted to talk with you about anything.”Honestly it felt like I’d been slapped. I was so taken aback by this. I dropped what I was doing and sat on the couch and asked him about his game. He talked for almost 15 minutes straight about his game, what he was doing (he’s building a country complete with its own government and military). He stopped talking and just said “I love you mama” with a big smile, and went back to playing his game.I sat there for a few minutes really thinking about what just happened. I think so often we get wrapped up in our own lives and problems and making sure chores are done and laundry is done that we forget that our kids also have their own lives, problems and insecurities. We get so wrapped up in the everyday bullshit and figure that just because our kids are playing their video game or with toys...that they don’t need or crave our attention even while they are doing these things.As the only parent in this house, the burden usually falls on me to get stuff ready for the next day. Between work, kids, practices, the gym etc I feel like I’m always so focused on “what next do I have to do?” and I forget to slow down.There really is no point to this post other than it really made me realize that even at 15 years old, my son still wants to be engaged with me and have those little but meaningful interactions. via /r/Parenting http://bit.ly/2REZnMZ