Fighting with your teenager
Q: I don’t know what to do about my teenage daughter. She refuses to follow house rules. We have rules about when and how long phone calls can be. She sneaks around and uses the phone behind our backs. And she ignores us when we tell her to get off the phone because others in the house are expecting a call or want to use it.
She is also supposed to do her own laundry and clean up her room regularly. But it is such a big battle to get her to do it.
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A:Only teenagers can decide, ultimately, if they are going to do something. Parents can set up consequences, which must be enforceable, and let the teenagers decide if they are going to experience them.
Using a telephone is a privilege, not a right. That privilege is based on showing respect and carrying out one’s share of the household duties. If a teenager is balking at doing certain tasks, like laundry or cleaning up their room, simply announce that, at a predetermined time and date, her phone privileges will be suspended until those chores are done. The odds are she won’t believe you until she fails to do the chores and loses the privilege.
Losing use of the phone is not punishment. It is logical. After all, the teenager is only punishing herself by putting off doing those tasks. Once she realizes she is fighting herself, not you, she will stop fighting or arguing and get the task done.
The first time a parent tries this, however, do not get into an argument about the rule. You are the parent. You have the right to set reasonable house rules. Only when a teen realizes you aren’t going to change your mind will she accept the situation and realize she is the one who must decide to do something.
Too many parents have the belief that the bigger the consequences and the greater the punishment, the quicker the teenager will learn to obey. It doesn’t work that way. Long-term consequences only create resentment and hostility. Short-term consequences that have some reasonable relationship to the behavior at hand tend to work much better. The teenager can see some sense in the rules, and also quickly learn to use them for her own well-being.
The key in raising teens is to keep your cool. Choose not to get upset. Set out fair consequences and rules, with short-term and reasonable consequences. Then if anyone wants to get upset about it, let the teen use up his or her energies. If you are relaxed, you’ll handle the situations better. This is tough. That is why you need to back off and take time-outs on a regular basis.
To contact Peter Griffiths, e-mail him at petergrif@sk.sympatico.ca.
