|
Dear Jean: I am a 31-year old, single
mother of two I love my son and daughter to death. My son has always been my very best friend. We have always been very close. Over the last two years, my son has been almost unbearable to live with. I am still close with him and we still have positive moments together, but the disrespect he shows me daily is overwhelming! I am still friendly with my ex-husband, who still plays a very prominent place in my son's life. My son lives with me but sees his Dad on a very regular basis. I am practically engaged to my boyfriend of two years, and although my son adores him now, prior to a few months ago, my son couldn't stand my boyfriend. My boyfriend can't stand the way I am treated by my son, and in fact feels very strongly that my son needs a good butt whooping. I do agree with my boyfriend at this time because it has gotten so out of control, but my first choice is never to spank my children. I have recently slapped my son, but it has no effect on him. He is not scared of me at all. Up until recently, my consistency in discipline has been awful. I know that it is because of my always giving in that I am going through this with my son. I am trying to really crack down, to take away privileges, but I don't feel that it is effective. My son gets home from school each day by 3:00 PM and is home alone until I get home from work at 5:20 PM. He is always on the computer, his grades are suffering, he doesn't listen to ANYTHING I ask him or tell him to do. I have completely stopped doing his laundry because I can't get him to put his clothes in the hamper for me to wash them. He knows how to do his own laundry, but he doesn't do it. I can't find his bedroom, it's literally buried under all of his clothes. He has been wearing the same dirty clothes to school for months. Quite frankly, the sad thing is, I don't even care. I will not pick up a 12 year old's bedroom anymore! He does no chores around the house. In fact, I can't even get him to put his backpack in his room or at the kitchen table. He walks in the door and literally drops it right on the floor. I am a compulsive neat freak and I don't think it's asking too much for a 12-year old to help out. I do everything. He can't even make a simple meal for himself without leaving food droppings all over the place. What can I do?? I love this boy more than life itself. He is extremely bright and absolutely the most handsome kid I know. I want my loving son back. I'm at my wit's end. My boyfriend tries so hard to stick by me, but he feels I am a total wimp of a parent. The fact is, I know I am. I have felt sorry for my son and for myself for so many years because of things I have gone through. My son's father was very abusive towards me. I am in control of my life, I have an awesome career, I am very intelligent, I am happier now than I ever have been with my boyfriend, and I thought I was a good mother to my children. Please don't tell me to see a counselor. I have been for years. They are wonderful for listening and making suggestions here and there. Even my son saw a counselor on and off. It's not the answer to this particular problem. Why are children these days so brutally disrespective of their parents and peers? I would've been whooped with a wooden spoon if my mouth was even a fraction of the tone my son uses with me! Have we all just lost total control of our morals here? Is society so wrapped up in who has what material posessions that we don't appreciate the simple family values anymore? Is there hope for me and my son? My ex husband thinks it's just me. He doesn't see what really goes on in my home. My boyfriend does though. And it's not just me! I'll admit, I lose my temper and I yell. I also probably have one of the foulest mouths a woman can have. But, I must say that if you met me, you'd never know that a cuss word could ever come out of my mouth. I'm very emotional and very sensitive. I want nothing more than to be an effective and moral role model to my children. They deserve growth on the right path! Please advise me as to how I can effectively reach out to my son in a positive but firm way. I need him to understand why respect is so very important. He knows I love him. Believe me, I probably tell him too much. Do you have any suggestions for me?? Thank you so much. Jean responds: Hi, Thanks for visiting at parentingadolescents.com, and for sending in a question. As I read your long letter, I circled a few phrases... perhaps my sharing with you where my eye/mind fastened is as good a way as any to begin to share my thoughts with you concerning your upset with your 12-year-old: "Over the last two years,
my son has been almost unbearable . . . " "I have recently slapped
my son, but it has no effect on him . . . " "I am a compulsive neat freak . . . " "My son's father was very abusive towards me" "I would've been whooped with a wooden spoon . . . " "I lose my temper and
I yell. I also probably have one of the foulest mouths a woman
can have." I wonder if you are struck by the meanings that emerge when you also read these excerpts from your letter put next to each other.... for instance, - that the time during which your son has been difficult corresponds to the time of your taking up with a new man in your life (jealous of losing you, afraid that this new relationship also won't work for you, feeling torn--loyal to the man he's known as his father vs. the new guy) - that your son has to BEHAVE as though your anger at him, your yelling, even your slapping, "has no effect on him." Believe me, believe me from my deepest heart and years of clinical experience: your slap, your yelling, your anger have a deep and destructive effect on your son! He cannot afford to let you know how much you hurt him... he may not be able to let himself know, even, how much these actions hurt him. He is trying to be both "strong" ("nothing hurts me") and to put some emotional distance between him and you. HE IS AT AN AGE WHEN HE NEEDS EMOTIONAL DISTANCE FROM YOU. If I could say only one thing to you, that would be it! It's that much harder for him to get this distance, when in the past you have been so close, and when you are not married to a father he can look up to! Your anger hurts him, but it has one good advantage--it makes him feel less close to you! He is frightened to feel dependent on you, close to you--he needs to know he can begin to move away from you, to "become his own man." But when you treat him violently, he has to believe that you REJECT HIM, and this is not the best way for him to gain distance. He needs to feel, instead, that you RESPECT him--just as you need to feel he respects you (more on respect below). That you respect that he is different from you, that you respect that he needs his space, that you respect that he isn't a little kid any longer whom you can order around.... - yes, he has to earn your respect. But YOU also have to earn HIS! In this day, respect is earned, not given to parents carte blanche.... In the old days, yes, kids were coerced (beaten) into "respecting" their parents--but did they? They had to ACT like they did, or they'd get beaten--but no kid who was beaten (or whooped with a wooden spoon) by a parent as a routine response to "disrespect" really learned to respect a parent that way. In fact, look what happened to you: you married an abusive man.... you grew up thinking being abused was "normal," and what you deserved... this is not "respect" for yourself, as I'm sure you've learned in your counseling by now. If you want your son to respect you, START TREATING HIM WITH RESPECT, as well as treating yourself with respect! How? -- Here's how: STOP yelling, threatening, saying nasty stuff about or to him. STOP hitting or threatening to hit. STOP worrying if he wears the same dirty clothes every day for the next million years, if the deal is clear that he doesn't get his laundry done by you unless it's in the hamper. LET HIM BE AT CHOICE IN WHAT HE DOES--if the deal is: if he does A, then B will happen, then let things happen accordingly. IT'S HIS CHOICE. THIS is the appropriate way for him to put some distance between him and you! STOP making rules you don't enforce. ENFORCE the rules you make. INVITE HIM to talk with you calmly and caringly about how you all can live more happily together. Tell him there have to be some rules--but not many. Invite him to formulate the rules with you and the consequences for stepping over the line. Make rules only in areas where there's already been a problem with his behavior. (If he messes up in new areas, don't give him a consequence the first time--but make a new rule.) When he steps over the line, enforce the consequence religiously and without criticism, lecture, complaint, etc. Like the cop gives you a ticket when you speed, period. (Lots of instructions on this in our Archives --read them.) APOLOGIZE when you lose control. Tell him you're wrong and you're working on it. ASK HIM TO GO TO HIS ROOM UNTIL HE CAN KEEP A CIVIL TONGUE IN HIS HEAD if he's out of line in yelling or swearing at you. DON'T YELL OR SWEAR BACK! Here's how it might work with the backpack: Tell him nicely that the backpack thing drives you nuts, but don't act like you're right and he's wrong. Not everyone has to be a neat freak! God doesn't love neat freaks more than the rest of us, so far as I know! Just ask him nicely if he'll put the backpack anywhere but at the front door or wherever he's putting it now. Then tell him that, if you do find it there, you're just going to toss it into a corner of the garage, to get it out of sight, out of mind, and he can retrieve it there when he wants to. Or, if that seems too easy on him, tell him that it bugs you so much you need a strong consequence, so if you find it there from now on, you're just going to lock it up in the closet (car?) until the next morning. HOWEVER, I advise you to choose your battles! Is the backpack thing really so important that you want to use your energy to go toe to toe with him on this one point? If so, be my guest--go for it--but I'd suggest you save your thunder for really important stuff, like school attendance and academic performance. If you believe his being on the computer all of the time after he gets home (which I can tell you is so common for boys this age!) is really bad for him in some way (if you really believe that and not just you're mad at him for not being more helpful), tell him from now on you're keeping some part of the computer (have your boyfriend figure out which part!), and he can use it when you get home, for an hour an evening. If he hates that idea, tell him that you're willing to reconsider if he does (name a chore that would be helpful to you) every day for two weeks after school... then you'll return the computer part for him to have access to it after school, provided he continues to do that chore.... as soon as he slacks off, take the computer part away again. These are just suggestions.... as soon as you calm down and stand back, you'll probably be able to come up with more creative ideas for working with your son than these. What I want you to get is that YOUR SON IS A GOOD KID, and he's trying to be a man in whatever way he understands that. Good luck and feel free to write back. Jean. Disclaimer: Ms. Walbridge's
response to your question is |
children.
My son will be 12 years old in two weeks, and my daughter is
5-1/2 years old. My son's real father died when he was 6-1/2
years old. He has been raised by my ex-husband from the time
he was two. I was married to my ex-husband for almost 5 years,
at which time I asked for a divorce. My daughter was 1-1/2 at
the time I divorced her father.