Q:My wife and I are having a never-ending argument. We have a 13-year-old boy who is getting into trouble. He is not coming home in the evenings when he should be and not doing well at school, and we caught him smoking. I want to spank our son when he is sarcastic to either his mom or me. My wife says no to spankings. This argument is hurting our marriage and is not helping our son. Do you have any suggestions that would help us deal with him?
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A:The debate about spanking is prevalent in society. Whether or not you agree with spanking, you have to admit that corporal punishment for a young boy is dangerous.
Many kids at 13 are openly defiant toward authority. If you try to spank your son, he will either resist you or perhaps hit back. What may have started as a simple punishment then degenerates into a physical confrontation between the two of you that no one can win.
My guess is that you and your wife do not always agree on what is right and wrong for your son and that is where you need to start your discussion. The goal is to encourage your son to straighten up his life, co-operate more with others around the house and take his schoolwork more seriously.
You need to focus on what you want your son to start doing and what you want your son to stop doing.
Then you can look at rewards and punishments both of you can accept. You should have punishments or consequences when he is being sarcastic and rewards when he starts to show interest in his schoolwork.
You both may agree to ground him, send him to his room or take away his computer privileges when he is difficult. Rewards of special treats could be dished out when he settles into his study hour after supper and gets his schoolwork done.
You have to let your son know what the new rules are and that both parents are together on this plan. He will likely test your resolve with some misbehaviour to see how serious you are about the new rules.
You have to be patient because life is not going to change for the better around your house for a while, but your chances for success are better with clear rules and co-operating parents.
Jacklin Andrews is a family counsellor from Saskatchewan. Contact: jandrews@producer.com.
