If your daughter displays unacceptable behaviors, it may not be a discipline problem at all. She can be an emotional wreck.
As a parent, you can probably relate to your daughter more than you realize. Think about it for a minute, we go on with our lives living, thinking and feeling like adults because that’s who we are now. However, we were all teenagers once.
Are you always looking for ways to remedy behavior problems?
I think we all do this and yes there are some great tips and ideas out there and I’m by no means saying we shouldn’t try at least some of them. Along with what I will share with you from my own personal experiences, there needs to be some sort of routine and guidelines in place for everything to work together. Behavior problems are only part of the symptoms of what is really going on emotionally inside your daughter. So yes, we need to treat the symptoms as well, but that is only part of the problem and they will only be temporary solutions.
Are you constantly trying to find the next best discipline tactic?
Again, of course, they need discipline in their lives, we already know this. Discipline is very important in the lives of your daughters, not only to teach them right and wrong and to have consequences for their actions, but also to make them want it. Believe it or not, she will feel more loved knowing that you care enough about her and her well-being to not allow certain behaviors, however, I can’t say enough that this is only part of the problem in the first place.
Are you ready to get to the root of the problem?
Teenagers have a lot of stress on them, more than we knew as kids. Her daughter has a lot to deal with in her daily life and added pressure from her peers and other kids at school. The difference is that they are not armed with the tools and maturity that we adults have. We as parents must get to the root of the problem with our teenagers to get any results. Now you can take them to counseling or you can take the bull by the horns and do it yourself. First understand that your daughter will probably scream and yell and maybe even slam the door early in the process. Okay, we’re ready for it. I know my daughter appreciated it all in the end, so there is light at the end of the tunnel.
Get a piece of paper and a pen and give it to your daughter. Tell her that she should write down everything she likes and dislikes about herself and be real about it. Next, have her write down everything she wants to change about herself, including how she feels when certain situations come up. It is very important for her to be real, so she may need to point out certain things that may seem difficult for her to start on her path.
Take these “lists” and go through them one at a time, now it doesn’t matter how long it takes you to finish these lists. So you take the first item on the list and talk about it. Together you will need to figure out how to change it, this can take time depending on the size of your list. My daughter had a four page list, so she can seem overwhelming, but don’t let it seem that way because her purpose is to remove that overwhelming feeling of emotion that runs through her. It took us 6 months to complete the list, checking off all these things as we went, it became a challenge for her that she enjoyed it. We’d sit down every night and she’d pull out the newspaper (we both had access to it in a common place) and be like “Ok mom number 13.” You already got the idea.
This will help you organize your feelings and gain more confidence. A lot of times our teens don’t even know what’s wrong or what the problem is because they’re so nervous and overwhelmed with all these different emotions and they don’t know where to start anymore, so the natural reaction is to just give up and walk away. with a big chip on his shoulder and pent up anger to release. Which in turn results in releasing him in all the wrong ways and at all the wrong times.