Survival Tips for Parents of Teen Boys
by Mitch DeArmon
Reality Check Series
from LeadershipWorks
Survival Tips for Parents of Teen Boys by Mitch DeArmon
Reality Check Series from LeadershipWorks
Published by LeadershipWorks at Smashwords
Copyright 2005 by Mitch and Vicki DeArmon
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Frustrated parents, The mountain lion, Cultural influences, Physical influences
Communication, Disrespect and telling the truth, Discipline and using the word no, The discussion about what's fair, Compromising, Talking too much, Interpretation, Telling him over and over again, Calling stupid stupid, Principled vocabulary, Lectures, One last seemingly small thing
Doing a good job, No special needs, From Emotional Reactors to Sensitive Initiators, Helping by not helping, Resource allocation, No credit, Independence, Encourage outlets for aggression, Mothers making the connection to men, Fathers reaching out to other men, A final word about helping
Handling divorce, Dealing with Trauma, Addiction, Dealing with anger, Siding with the law, Depression, School, Moving out
Over-involved mothers, The absence of fathers, What fathers do, Time and attention is love, Creating trust through consistency, Taking it personally, Parents as peers, Addictive parenting, Disagreements between parents, Changing parenting styles, Don't do it alone
Six Guidelines for Parents, Emotional versus Sensitive Chart, Initiator versus Reactor Chart, More help for the Single Mom
Survival Tips for Parents of Teen Boys
A Word from Mitch DeArmon
Parents of teen boys need an action plan and this book provides it.
This book represents the realizations I’ve had over the past 20 years in my work with thousands of adolescent boys. It is also the distillation of five years of workshops conducted for parents of teen boys. While the word survival in the title reflects the mode most parents of adolescent boys are operating with, this book actually goes much further than that. The survival tips certainly will make your day-to-day experience with a teen boy less consuming, harried, and frustrating, but they will also line you up with that long term parenting goal, producing better men.
I have tried to maintain the tone and informality of my workshops in this book. I’ve employed the same strategies that I advise you to have with your sons, remaining direct and honest, with an eye on the long-term results. I also venture into some uncharted territory regarding the role of mothers and fathers and the importance of men in the lives of boys.
In the interest of space and getting to the point, I’ve given short treatment to some subjects. If you are interested in learning more, I encourage you to visit the LeadershipWorks website at http://www.leadershipworks.org for information from both myself and other parents on raising teen boys.
Chapter 1
Survival Tips for Parents of Teen Boys
At the beginning of my workshops, I ask parents what troubles them about their sons. See if you recognize your son in some of their replies:
My son acts as if he has been replaced by someone from another galaxy.
He’s using drugs and alcohol.
He has no motivation, no follow-though.
He talks back and is defiant, hostile, and confrontational.
He’s disrespectful, rebellious.
He uses foul language.
He knows it all and won’t listen.
He won’t take no for an answer.
He wants everything given to him.
He’s hot-tempered and angry all the time.
He’s lazy and manipulative.
He doesn’t honor boundaries or follow rules.
He’s intelligent, but he’s failing in school.
He's self-absorbed.
He’s into violence.
He’s into video games.
He wants more freedom.
We don’t trust each other any more.
The underlying questions for all these parents are: How do boys think? What motivates them? and finally What can I as a parent do about it? If anything?
I’ve had parents drive up to the door of a mentoring program I was conducting; reach over and fling open the car door; and, as their teen son came tumbling out, holler, “I hope you can do something with him.” Then they’d drive off.
As parents we are a frustrated and tired bunch. And we’re getting a little desperate for solutions that actually work. We’d also like to know that we’re not the only ones struggling this way. I’m here to tell you, you’re not. Just as realization of the malaise of our teen boys has swept the nation and even captured the attention of the White House, the parents loving and raising those boys are having their own fallout. Parents are beginning to discover that parenting in isolation doesn’t work. Many are saddled with feelings of guilt about how their son may be behaving as if it were a reflection of their parenting skills. I tell parents all the time that perfectly good kids can screw up perfectly good parenting. And while we may sometimes share in the blame, it doesn’t mean we are any less for it nor should we ease up on our sons to compensate. I’m all for getting past blaming the parents and changing the focus to really help these knuckleheads our sons have become. Because as nearly every parent tells me when I begin working with his or her son, he’s a good kid really, deep down. And I know this is true. But he’s also an adolescent, so relying on this fact and the hope that it will emerge, doesn’t help him or us much. Here’s what does.
Don’t delude yourself about your son’s adolescent nature. It’s helpful to think of your son as, let’s say for example, a mountain lion. We can assess the nature of a wild beast and act accordingly. I’ve offended more than one mother by stating that teen boys are insatiable pigs. These animal assessments perform two miracles: They allow us some distance from the boy we love so much and they allow us to have a sense of humor (vital in this business of parenting). The point is what you really think your son should be is irrelevant. You may want him to be an antelope because antelopes are less messy and less dangerous. But holding this view is what catches parents off guard when the mountain lion roars out of the antelope.
Let’s be clear. Young men will never outgrow their aggression. The best that can be hoped for is that it is managed and focused. In his now-classic book The Wonder of Boys, Michael Gurian describes the biological effects of testosterone on a boy’s behavior as follows: searches for quick gratification, eats quickly, jumps from activity to activity, looks for quick sexual conquests, moves quickly to problem solving even in emotionally complex situations, and prefers activities that build tension and end in a quick release. Male independence starts at age 2. This is biology, and this is how humans have survived for thousands of years. It is natural for adolescents to move away from their families and into the world. Biology rules the boy.
Male aggression is on every level: mental, emotional, physical and spiritual and this aggression needs to be addressed and worked with in an aggressive manner. Pacifying this aggression only leads to unconscious aggravation, which is acted out in unconscious and unreasonable violence or addictions.
In defining aggression, I mean direct confrontation with the same energy the aggravation is occurring. This is what men provide our young men. When a confused adolescent is giving long explanations justifying his behavior, meeting that explanation with strong values of conduct is demanding more discipline from the young man. Don’t encourage him in his attempts to talk long enough to figure it out. Young men must be treated as if they know how to socialize, rather than our current method of emotionally indulging them. They want clear-cut directions, not to be abandoned to figure it out for themselves and do it alone.
Meeting that aggression with strong values of conduct demands more discipline from the young man. That's why fathers or mentors often up the ante in a situation where the young man has overstepped, whereas mothers often try to negotiate a lesser restriction or punishment for their sons, thus undoing the work the father is attempting, which is to channel that aggression.
Through the ages, the rage and confusion of adolescence has been talked about, but our society has chosen to quit dealing with the rage by developing intellectual explanations that make the person giving them feel better, but give the receiving person little to sustain himself. At the same time, we are more and more surprised by teen boy behavior. We are creating more and more laws to govern this behavior. We try to keep young men contained. We don’t provide places where they can express themselves.