Parent in Control by Gregory Bodenhamer

Author:Gregory Bodenhamer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: A Fireside Book
Published: 1995-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

7

HOW TO REGAIN CONTROL OF OUT-OF-CONTROL CHILDREN

If parents don’t consistently discipline their out-of-control children, who will?

If parents don’t consistently supervise their out-of-control children, who will?

If parents don’t consistently reach out to their out-of-control children with love, who else can?

The First Steps in Gaining Control

Children who have learned that violence is an effective means of getting their way will use violence until they are stopped. Chronic runaways who learn that they don’t have to obey any household rules if they aren’t at home will continue to run away until they are stopped. Children who are emotionally attached to powerful peer cliques and subcultures like street gangs, skinheads, punks, heavy metalers, alternative kids, and graffiti taggers draw enormous amounts of antiparent, antiauthority support from their peers. Until they are prevented from having any contact with these people, children will fight every parental attempt at regaining control. Of all of the things that parents must do to regain control, it is most important and most difficult to stop the violence, prevent the running away, and end the peer-group influence.

If your teenage children are violent, aggressive, and quick to lose their temper, if they hit or physically manhandle you to get their way, if they are chronic runaways, or if they are deeply involved in gangs or delinquent and incorrigible subcultures, please consider sending them to a well-structured, well-supervised wilderness program or residential treatment center, or participating in a Back in Control Parenting Workshop as a first step in regaining control.

Some types of misbehavior are obviously worse than others. If your children are involved in drugs, alcohol abuse, running away, crime, or gang activity, or if they are associating with destructive people, work on those problems before attempting to get them to clean their rooms, take out the trash, do their homework, or perform any other tasks or chores. If a sixteen-year-old girl’s primary problem is cutting school to hang out with her drug-using friends, don’t try to get her to clean her room or do her homework at this time. That will come later. Instead, work on keeping her in class, removing her from her negative peers, and providing day-to-day supervision based on her level of trust. In two or three weeks, after you have initially regained control, you may begin to work on household tasks and homework.

Also, before you work on anything, reread Chapter 5, “Provocation and Manipulation,” and practice handling your children’s attempts to overcome, dismantle, or avoid your discipline and supervision.

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