Parenting Teens: What to do with a 13 year older who demands the rights of her 17 year old sibling?
Does your 13 year old daughter demand and expect the privligies of her 17 old sibling? How do you tell her, “You’re only 13 years old and Emma, the older sister, is 17” when she feels that she is also already “a teenager”?
I was recently asked this question and, in the words of the mother, the situation is, “Whenever I tell that the older one didn’t have those privileges when she was your age (like watching TV or going on-line for hours and hours) she says, “That’s what you’re saying Ma, you don’t know!” It’s almost like they have a ready made answer.”
There are two basic things that you must do to end these senseless and frustrating arguments. Firstly, make sure that she doesn’t get her way and that you don’t give in. If you eventually give in to her wishes then she will continue with her “ready made answers”. Why should she change tactics? She is achieving what she wants. Therefore, no matter how hard it is for you, don’t budge.
You are probably saying to yourself, “He (meaning me) just doesn’t understand. Her constant repeating herself simply grinds on my nerves until I feel it is just easier to give in to what she wants than to have these endless arguments.”
Therefore you have to something else: you have to break the pattern.
How do you do this? It’s really not too hard. After she says her regular, “That’s what you’re saying Ma, you don’t know!”, instead of saying, “Oh yes I do” say something different like, “Jane, you say that she did these things and I say that she didn’t. What do we do now?”
If she continues to repeat what she is conditioned to say, “Mom, you don’t know!” then you say back, “I know that is how you feel. But I feel differently. What do we do now?” Do this and you will be amazed at how effective it is to stop those arguments.
The reason why this works so well is that you changed the argument from, “Did Emma (the older sister) do it or not” to “What do we do now that we have two opposing views?”. This question is new to Jane and she can’t pull out of her bag her familiar response. She has to say something new and once the old pattern is broken you have a chance of winning.
This is the deal: Whenever there is an unacceptable pattern that repeats itself, break that cycle to regain acceptable behavior.
Try it and you will be amazed how effective it is.
If you are finding that parenting teens isn’t always easy click here to view some practical videos on how to “Fix Up Your Family”
To your success on building the family that you want and deserve
Shevach
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