I have notes on this somewhere…Oh, and I also have a 14-y-o boy.
At various unpredictable times throughout adolescence, the kid’s prefrontal cortex “goes dark.” This results in things like them not being able to plan ahead or see consequences, not being able to correctly interpret other people’s social cues, and various other things. Overly emotional, prone to all-or-nothing declarations, etc.
You can’t really tell them to grow up. At that age most of them are growing up as fast as they can.
He sounds like a very normal fourteen year old to me! I suspect he’s been goofing off and knows that he’s been caught at it too. Let him have his mood, but PLEASE do not apologize. You have nothing to apologize for. Let him feel the consequences of messing up.
I’d point out not only that he’s responsible for his own moods, but to consider exactly how far that goes. For instance, if having his failings remarked upon can ruin his day, he should try to have fewer of them. I’d probably say “I’m sorry your day went badly, but that wasn’t my fault, it was yours. After all, there’s no need for me to remind you of missing assignments if there aren’t any.”
I absolutely believe that a teacher may occasionally lose a paper. I find it much harder to believe that she *consistently *loses *his *papers.
You might really enjoy Dr. Kevin Leman’s book “Have a New Kid by Friday: How to Change Your Child’s Attitude, Behavior & Character in 5 Days”. My twins are only 6, but we argue far too much so I’ve found a lot of value in Dr. Leman’s advice.
I think Dr. Leman would say that you are only responsible for pointing out what needs to be done and outlining the negative consequences if he fails (and sometimes you have to manufacture consequences, like loss of privileges). The rest is up to your son.
I can relate to your dilemma, I want to be involved in my kids’ lives and I’m very empathetic. But what winds up happening is I become a stand-in for “The World” and bear the brunt of all my kids’ frustrations and disappointment in life. Which is exhausting and futile, really, and it distracts me from the joyful parts of parenting.
And so often my adult logic (variations on “this is the way life works”), which seems like it OUGHT to get us past the negative aspects of life more quickly, has little or no value to them. Instead we fight about THAT now, instead of whatever issue is actually at hand.
Dr. Leman has some advice on forming positive connections with our kids, too. It’s not about power plays or “winning” either; it’s about putting responsibility (for emotions, for outcomes, for anger and frustration) where it belongs.
My quote would be, “OK sure kid I’ll apologize to you for ruining your day. But first you apologize for neglecting your responsibilities, lying to me, trying to blame me for your problems and trying to make me feel bad for doing my job as a parent… Well, I’m waiting.”
You shouldn’t have to spend your morning nagging him about his school work. His day was already up the creek by not having done it. He needs to apologize for being a slacker.
I can’t get past this “rules” thing. I am not by any means a strict disciplinarian, and neither were my parents, but even still, below you will find my complete list of “rules” for my parents when I was a kid (including as a teenager):
Please don’t set me on fire.
If you do set me on fire, please extinguish me promptly.
Look, sven, I get where you’re coming from, to an extent, but absolutely no 14-year-old boy should learn the lesson that he gets to dictate terms and conditions to his parents. That turns a typical 14-year-old boy into a completely irresponsible and self-absorbed 22-year-old man, who expects everything just so and can’t handle the world when it, unlike mommy, refuses to bend to his whim. Look, I’m not a morning person. I also need an hour or two of warm-up time before I’m ready to deal with discussion about serious stuff. And if I showed up at my job and expected anyone, let alone my employers, to care or tailor their days around that, I’d be laughed out of the building. So I get up extra early, take a walk, surf the Internet, play a video game, whatever, before I even head into work. That’s how grown-ups adapt to the world around them, and teaching a 14-year-old that the world adapts to you instead is a bad, bad idea.
I get where sven is coming from, too. And I think it’s foolish to consider never apologizing to a 14 YO. If you genuinely do them wrong, if you, for example, accuse them of something and later you find out they didn’t do it after all, and you didn’t believe them even over their protests, you should apologize. You are, after all, teaching them to be an adult and you should lead by example.
But in this one you either don’t apologize at all, or use this one:
“OK sure kid I’ll apologize to you for ruining your day. But first you apologize for neglecting your responsibilities, lying to me, trying to blame me for your problems and trying to make me feel bad for doing my job as a parent… Well, I’m waiting.”
I don’t see a problem with saying “I’m sorry I ruined your day”, and in the car on the way to school does not seem an optimal time to remind him of missing homework. The night before, sure, when he has a chance to work on it if necessary.
OK, so he’s surly and self-important. He’s fourteen, that’s what they do. This is about the age where they start to develop into adults instead of children, and part of that is the adults in his life modeling respect for his feelings. Of course, another, bigger part is taking responsibility for yourself, and for your own feelings, so if this is an attempt to manipulate you out of doing his homework, then you don’t have to apologize for that part of it.
My kids are well beyond that age, but my wife did get that kind of stuff occasionally. “Mother, you’re ruining my life!” more often than not got “Dear, I’m your mother and I live you - that’s my job.”
I’m still trying to figure out how asking him to check on some daggone assignments is a recipe for a bad day.
Telling him he’s going to flunk out of school if he doesn’t straighten up? Yeah, I could see how that can wreck things. Criticising his clothes? That too.
Politely asking him to follow up with his teachers on something that is kinda sorta important? This is what a parent is supposed to do. I don’t care if it’s in the middle of the night.
I would say, “Well, now, with this, I could point out that you’re ruining mine, so I guess we’d be even, huh?” Then point out that the difference is that you choose not to let such little things ruin your day, because you are mature enough to take responsibility for your own mood instead of trying to put it off onto someone else. Tell him, as he goes through life, he will indeed encounter people who want to say someone else’s actions or reactions ‘made’ them react/act one way or another. Tell him not to be deceived, no one ‘makes’ you do or say or react. Actions and reactions are personal choices, and that the ability to own them, whether or not we are proud of them, is one of the hallmarks of maturity.
Then I would point out the stretch marks on my ass and sit on his head.
Then he’d realize he was acting like an asshole and we’d have a nice productive chat. At least, that’s how things have worked out for me so far. If we’d made an agreement not to talk about certain things at certain times, I’d even apologize.
I refrain what has been stated in different ways. You have nothing to apologize for.
Your kid is switching focus to something you might listen to, so they can avoid admitting they didn’t do what they needed to do. My three year old niece already tries to do this.
Your son is a 14 year old boy, and other than asking for an apology - sounds like MY 14 year old son. Missing assignments, no clear answer, surly when questioned - yup - that is my boy.
**Shodan **has a point - nailing them on the drive to school is not the best time to do it. These are conversations that should occur in the early evening the night before, not when you don’t have time to get through the conversation and finish processing. We fail at this regularly, but we try to have these difficult conversations at times when everyone is rested, and there is time to keep on talking.
So - you don’t owe an apology, but this is a good time to talk to your son about responsibilities, assignment tracking, honest answers, and dealing with authority. Add in a little bit of “life ain’t fair” and you get a good step in the raising of kids.