Making kids mind

[MandaJo]

@chaika

I don’t think that is a good idea. The advice in that post is not terribly helpful for ordinary parent/child relationships. (“Drop tackling” is really not a stellar child-rearing strategy IMHO.) It is even less helpful in a situation like the one you describe in the OP, where the parent has essentially abdicated his responsibilities and is now shocked to the core that his child is acting out.

Exactly. What will your friend do if he “drop tackles” his daughter and she starts struggling/kicking/biting? Is he going to defend himself? THAT conversation goes well: “See, officer, I *drop tackled *her to make her mind, and then she started to fight, so to defend myself, I had to punch her.” Cuz I gotta tell you, on a jury I am not voting to call that self-defense.

He probably should call the school and ask to speak to the counselor. There’s not a ton they can do, but they might be able to put him in contact with some social services that can help.

[watchwolf49]

One thing I did with my kids that might be helpful is giving them their adult rights incrementally … I think at 14 I let the kids choose their own bedtime, at 15 they didn’t have to give me their internet passwords … 16 was the whole driving thing … by 17 the only rule was permission to spend nights elsewhere …

The important thing was it was a set schedule … my kids always had something to look forward to AND it acknowledged them becoming more mature … it was also very helpful to me establishing an adult-to-adult relationship with them … some parents forget to do that …

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@MandaJo

Exactly. What will your friend do if he “drop tackles” his daughter and she starts struggling/kicking/biting? Is he going to defend himself? THAT conversation goes well: “See, officer, I *drop tackled *her to make her mind, and then she started to fight, so to defend myself, I had to punch her.” Cuz I gotta tell you, on a jury I am not voting to call that self-defense.

Yeah. If there were a guide on raising children that included drop-tackles and taunting (“Please fight, my biggest dream in life is to ground you again for as long as possible!”), I gotta say I wouldn’t rush out to buy it.

Shag compared raising kids to training dogs, and I’m actually with him there. This would be a terrible way to train a dog, would likely result in a dog that was either vicious or neurotic or both. Anyone who knows anything about training dogs tells you that a reward system that peacefully establishes pack leadership is going to be superior to a system based on Taunts and Tackles: The Shagnasty Way.

[Shagnasty]

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

Yeah. If there were a guide on raising children that included drop-tackles and taunting (“Please fight, my biggest dream in life is to ground you again for as long as possible!”), I gotta say I wouldn’t rush out to buy it.

Shag compared raising kids to training dogs, and I’m actually with him there. This would be a terrible way to train a dog, would likely result in a dog that was either vicious or neurotic or both. Anyone who knows anything about training dogs tells you that a reward system that peacefully establishes pack leadership is going to be superior to a system based on Taunts and Tackles: The Shagnasty Way.

The whole “drop tackle” thing was a one-time event. I won’t go into too many details but she made a very serious threat to her own safety and tried to run out the door to carry it out so I restrained her physically because it was the only option I had left. This is the same child that tried to walk home 5 miles at night during the winter on a busy road with no sidewalks because she got mad at someone. Luckily, someone called the police and they picked her up and brought her home. She is capable of a lot more than many kids are when she gets upset or angry. I don’t normally use physical restraint but there is a time and place for lots of different parenting strategies including extreme ones if they are warranted especially for threats to their safety.

[Shagnasty]

About encouraging them to fight idea, it works because they won’t ever do it and it takes the wind right out of their sails. My oldest said “Dad, when you tell us to fight it just makes us mad at you and like each other”. Hmmm, who would have guessed that? Maybe someone that knows them better than anyone.

[MandaJo]

@Shagnasty

The whole “drop tackle” thing was a one-time event. I won’t go into too many details but she made a very serious threat to her own safety and tried to run out the door to carry it out so I restrained her physically because it was the only option I had left. This is the same child that tried to walk home 5 miles at night during the winter on a busy road with no sidewalks because she got mad at someone. Luckily, someone called the police and they picked her up and brought her home. She is capable of a lot more than many kids are when she gets upset or angry. I don’t normally use physical restraint but there is a time and place for lots of different parenting strategies including extreme ones if they are warranted especially for threats to their safety.

Well, you just advised someone to try it with a 14-year old drug-using daughter with older boyfriends in the house in response to generic defiance. Maybe you want to walk back the advice part of it a little?

[HoneyBadgerDC]

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

Yeah. If there were a guide on raising children that included drop-tackles and taunting (“Please fight, my biggest dream in life is to ground you again for as long as possible!”), I gotta say I wouldn’t rush out to buy it.

Shag compared raising kids to training dogs, and I’m actually with him there. This would be a terrible way to train a dog, would likely result in a dog that was either vicious or neurotic or both. Anyone who knows anything about training dogs tells you that a reward system that peacefully establishes pack leadership is going to be superior to a system based on Taunts and Tackles: The Shagnasty Way.

My wife bought me a dog as a present for my first Christmas. She was older and more mature than I at the time. later she told me she bought the dg to see what kind of father I might be before she would allow herself to get pregnant. I have to admit that I learned more about parenting from my German shorthair than any other single thing I can think of.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Shagnasty

The whole “drop tackle” thing was a one-time event. I won’t go into too many details

No, no–please do give us enough details, now that people are talking about what a bad idea it is, to justify your behavior. We love that sort of thing around here!

[nearwildheaven]

Like, how old was she, and what did she do to get herself grounded?

[jz78817]

@Mavic_Chen

Pardon my ignorance, but how does grounding work? How do you stop them simply getting up and going out? What is the incentive for them to stay indoors all that time? (a curious non-parent).

Uh, the “incentive” is that if you break your grounding, the leash gets tighter and tighter.

and if they get up and go out anyway, they come back to find the doors locked and they can’t get in.

[RivkahChaya]

My aunt and uncle docked allowances and took away dessert when we were little. When we were older and were grounded, they either wouldn’t drive us anywhere, or took away keys to the car. When my cousin Malky had a job, he was allowed to go to his job when he was grounded, because it was an obligation, but my uncle drove him there and picked him up, so he couldn’t go anywhere else. Then, if he got a paycheck while he was grounded, they held onto it until his grounding was over.

I only got grounded once, but another time, when I seriously screwed up in school, and got a “smoke-up,” or a notice of a potentially failing grade in PE (because of my attitude) I had to do exercises every morning until my grade came back up.

They (my aunt and uncle) had all the power, and we knew it. They were kind people, who took good care of us, and only threw their weight around when it was necessary. But no one ever considered anything like trying to take the car keys during a grounding, because they would report the car as stolen. At least, that’s what we speculated they’d do, and believed they would do.

We behaved ourselves as teenagers (mostly-- Malky was a handful), because we believed in their authority, which they had spent our lives establishing. On top of that, though, we loved and respected them, and really, when all was said and done, did not want to disappoint them.

Someone who is just starting to lay the foundation when the kid is already 14 has a lot of work. It’s not impossible, but it’s going to be really, really hard.

[DorkVader]

@Dangerosa

It might not work. Kids just walk out, and leave for days if they think that your rules are bullshit.

There is a point with a kid - and by fourteen its there - where you can’t impose rules because they can walk out. You have a legal obligation to keep them safe as possible - and you want to keep them as safe as possible because you love them, but you need to acknowledge that them running away is a real possibility.

When they turn eighteen you can tough love them - my son’s behavior got a lot better when he turned eighteen and knew we could throw him out. Until then, at fourteen, they know they hold the cards - unless you are willing to call the police on drugs, call the police on statutory rape, or risk them running away.

They can. My son did just that. He wouldn’t talk to me for about 2 years after that because I encouraged his mom to have the police pick him up. She had them call me to come get him. I let him spend the night in a holding cell. I wasn’t getting up at 1 am for a one hour drive one way to get his sorry ass. Took everything away from him but the bedroom door and made him earn that shit back. It worked eventually, he gets it now that he’s an adult with a brand new baby and all.
Kids are variable, the things I did with him wouldn’t work for his older brother or his younger brothers. I honestly didn’t expect HIM to be the problem child either.
ETA When they are a teen, you aren’t trying to correct behavior now imho, you are laying the groundwork for a better relationship and life choices for them to make later. YMMV

[jz78817]

@Dangerosa

When they turn eighteen you can tough love them - my son’s behavior got a lot better when he turned eighteen and knew we could throw him out. Until then, at fourteen, they know they hold the cards

so you’re saying parents are essentially powerless once their kids are teenagers?

Really?

You’re responsible for keeping them safe, legally responsible for whatever they do, yet you can’t do anything but let them do whatever they feel like doing?

man, am I glad I don’t have kids.

[Tom_Tildrum]

Getting back to the OP, it seems to me that major changes so late in a child’s adolescence would have the best chance of success if they took place in the context of overall family therapy. That way the child can see the changes that the parent is having to make as well.

[MandaJo]

@jz78817

Uh, the “incentive” is that if you break your grounding, the leash gets tighter and tighter.

and if they get up and go out anyway, they come back to find the doors locked and they can’t get in.

That works with some kids. It doesn’t work when you have a kid you know damn well is perfectly willing and able to find a drug den to crash at before she gives you an iota of control over her, or who has almost successfully killed themselves at least once already, or who might well get angry and start smashing windows and if you call the cops it’s not implausible that they will shoot him. Or they have friends with rich but neglectful parents who will basically let them crash at their place and stay fucked up for a couple years.

There are kids that are very, very hard to parent well, and whose parents spend a decade or more having to make very difficult calls about when to restrict and when to indulge–and who often mess up, because this shit isn’t easy. They really don’t need armchair quarterbacks suggesting it’s simple. Sometimes it is. But sometimes it isn’t–and it’s better to count your blessings than to smugly assume it’s because they were too lazy or stupid to be a good parent like you.

[jz78817]

@MandaJo

That works with some kids. It doesn’t work when you have a kid you know damn well is perfectly willing and able to find a drug den to crash at before she gives you an iota of control over her, or who has almost successfully killed themselves at least once already, or who might well get angry and start smashing windows and if you call the cops it’s not implausible that they will shoot him. Or they have friends with rich but neglectful parents who will basically let them crash at their place and stay fucked up for a couple years.

at what point do you just cut your losses and give up?

[MandaJo]

@jz78817

so you’re saying parents are essentially powerless once their kids are teenagers?

Really?

You’re responsible for keeping them safe, legally responsible for whatever they do, yet you can’t do anything but let them do whatever they feel like doing?

man, am I glad I don’t have kids.

Sorry for double post. I just thought of response to this.

It’s not that you’re legally responsible for whatever they do. It’s that you still love them more than life itself and the one thing you want in the whole universe is for them to stay alive and with a reasonable chance of future happiness.

They, on the other hand, don’t give the slightest damn if they live to see their next birthday. They either don’t think about it, don’t really care, or actually kinda expect to die.

In cases like that, they hold all the cards. They are holding themselves hostage and they aren’t even that interested in negotiating. It can be beyond excruciating.

[MandaJo]

@jz78817

at what point do you just cut your losses and give up?

Most of the time, you make it through. They grow up. If they are mentally ill, they respond to medication or learn how to manage it. They find a goal. The hormones stabilize. Most of the time, there’s a reasonably happy ending. It might be they don’t become President like you kinda expected in pre-K, but they find their way.

Other times, they die. Parents worry about screwing up and killing their kid because it happens. It’s not an irrational worry.

And other times, you decide you can’t help, nothing you do will matter, and you draw your boundaries where you can stand them–and this can be “cut off all contact” and it can be “turn myself into The Giving Tree because if I can’t save them I can at least make their collapse as comfortable as possible”.

[Dangerosa]

@jz78817

so you’re saying parents are essentially powerless once their kids are teenagers?

Really?

You’re responsible for keeping them safe, legally responsible for whatever they do, yet you can’t do anything but let them do whatever they feel like doing?

man, am I glad I don’t have kids.

Not if they are defiant. What are you going to do? You can’t hit them. If you ground them, they call and older friend and someone picks them up. Restrict their TV - they don’t care - they watch it at a friends (where someone picks them up). Physically restrain them? That won’t work. Limit their food, nothing but bread and water - that friend who picks them up has parents who let them eat anything. And if the rules or punishment are what they think are too restrictive, they just leave.

If you’ve given them good discipline and the ability to make good decisions to that time, they might obey you more often than not out of respect. But even then, the part of the teenage brain that knows everything - including that their parents know nothing - is in full force at that age. As well as the brain short circuit that negates common sense.

Teenagers often suck. Its a good thing they were cute as babies.

[jz78817]

@Dangerosa

Not if they are defiant. What are you going to do? You can’t hit them. If you ground them, they call and older friend and someone picks them up. Restrict their TV - they don’t care - they watch it at a friends (where someone picks them up). Physically restrain them? That won’t work. Limit their food, nothing but bread and water - that friend who picks them up has parents who let them eat anything. And if the rules or punishment are what they think are too restrictive, they just leave.

If you’ve given them good discipline and the ability to make good decisions to that time, they might obey you more often than not out of respect. But even then, the part of the teenage brain that knows everything - including that their parents know nothing - is in full force at that age. As well as the brain short circuit that negates common sense.

Teenagers often suck. Its a good thing they were cute as babies.

then let them leave. And don’t let them back in, or else all your approach (throw up your hands and say “what can I do?”) does is teach them that no matter how shitty their actions are, they need suffer no consequences for them. hell, I’d probably toss him out myself with a “thanks for making me waste 15 years of my life on you” to go with it.