Juvenile

This is rather personal, my family is very close and mean a lot to me, but I will share because this is important. My little brother is 13 years old. He has been my "little baby" because he's seven years younger than me and I mostly helped raise him growing up. He has grown up so much in the past few years when he went to middle school and now is taller than me! I'm not very tall so that's not saying much for him but still, it is crazy. He's been a wonderful brother and son, going to church with the family, never talking back to my parents, always being helpful and nice to others, etc. Since he's been in 8th grade things have taken a 180. He has been getting bad grades all year. My parents have never gone through any of this with my sister or I and therefore do not know how to handle my brother. They have done everything in their power to help him and work with him in school. I thought my parents were doing a wonderful job understanding him and not coming down too hard on him but also giving fair reasonable punishments. His grades started improving and he made it look like he was doing good in classes and everything. I came home from class today and soon after my brother and mom walked in the door. They both looked really upset. I then found out my brother had tried to shoplift at a store with his friend. My world just tumbled around me. I was so disappointed in my brother. I thought that I had a good relationship with him and that I knew mostly everything about him. Today I realized things are changing and I don't know him as well as I used to. I don't know why he did it, he didn't say why really, just said he did it for the "rush". I guess I wanted to share this because a lot of what we are learning in our class, can be applied to some of us every day with our families and lives. I was able to help my parents communicate with my brother today and I think it went fairly well. I am excited to learn more about rebellion and families and developement.