Rude Teenage DS

My 15 year old is going through this and all I can say is back up what you tell him you will do and make it obvious you love him as hard as it can seem sometimes.  Taking away things is effective and do not let him sulk in his room or sulk about it at all.  No pity parties.

Oh ya gotta love the teen years!  NOT!!   I've been pretty lucky so far but my older one did go through a period of thinking he was all grown up and should be able to say and do whatever he wanted.  He was rude and disrespectful to both myself and my DH on a daily basis.  We tried just dealing with it firmly for a while but things didn't improve and so one day I'd had enough and I blew up at him, turns out his dad did too on the same day and I didn't know it! 

Anyway the gist of what I told him was that I simply will NOT be spoken to that way!  And that he had a choice, continue this crappy behavior or decide to act like a decent human but that if the behavior continued there would be none of the following:  no driving privledges, no four wheeler privledges, no cell phone, no computer/internet access, all things that we, his parent's pay for and are therefore considered privledges.  Acting like a snot does NOT earn privledges!

I think I surprised him because I was really loud and I was in his face and yes he's a few inches taller then me!  I had HAD it!!  He got the same from his dad and yes, it did take more then once but he did decide that life is a whole more enjoyable when you act like a decent human in our house and we've moved on.  With him I didn't have to resort to restricting privledges, he improved his behavior on the threat alone, but I was well prepared to do so.  The idea of his mom driving him to school every day and dropping him right in front for all to see was not a happy one!

Good luck!  It's not fun and they don't always make the right choice so be prepared to make good on your conditions just in case he decides to test you.

  We got through puberty and the teen age years with our son relatively unscathed, but our daughter was another story.  My 'tag along with Dad' kid became a royal pain in the butt.  She would not smart mouth me (swearing was/is not allowed in our home), but she would lay her attitude upon my wife, and I would intervene.  It caused a serious rift between my daughter and me that has now been repaired, but we lost several years - that I am sad about.  I still believe that if the house rules don't suit you, "Get out and be responsible for yourself."  This does pass, but it is no fun while ongoing.  I would use your approach.  Whether or not it is the right one, I don't know, but we do what we gotta do.  Good luck. You are not alone. 

I work with problem teens...
The main thing they need to know is consistency, they need to know what WILL happen when they do something aganist your rules.
Mean what you say and say what you mean,  EVERYTIME... no letting them get away with it one day..then nail them for it next week...
If he doesn't get up when he's  supposed to...what will the consequences for that be? Etc... you need to figure it out and thensit him down and tell him what exactly will happen if he breaks such and such house rule...
I have a no tolerance policy for back talk and disrespect in my house...i nail them hard, they rarely do it twice....

Red's going to come live with me in 2 years. Thank you for volunteering Red. :-)

I may not have kids but I tell you, any small woman can get a larger person (or horse for that matter) to pay attention if you put emphasis behind your words. I used to deal with horses that were used to being manhandled (which is stupid, they are too big for that) and I quickly trained them that once I raise my voice, I am serious and you better pay attention. This has also helped me with some guys standing in the road trying to be intimidating.

Sorry to hear your having troubles.  I never had any problems with my DD in the teen years. Just lucky I guess. But I can say I would not tolerate the house rules being broken. And I dont bluff.

My sisters and I were 3 female teens that were a year and a half apart. And we were horrible teens. We back-talked. We fought. We argued. We disobeyed. We didn't care.
Half the reason we got away with it was because my parents were not consistent. They would makes threats to take away privileges but they never stuck to it.
Thank God, eventually, we did smarten up and realize we were being disrespectful little brats who needed to clean up our $hit and be the responsible young ladies that our parents wanted us to be.
So, yes, you MUST be consistent and don't EVER take back a threat. They will hold onto that and use it to their advantage. They will test you over and over and over.... But always stick to your guns. They can tell when you don't mean what you say.

FYI a small screw driver is all you need to remove a bedroom door (unscrew the hinges)

It does get better, especially if their GF is around, cause a rude guy is the last thing they want to show a girl.


<~~Mom of 3 boys who have survived to see 18  (and I have the gray hairs to prove it)