Outskirts Press, INC.

My Teenager Needs Help... I Need Help!

Between mainstream teenagers and juvenile delinquents are those “oppositional teenagers” who simply cannot or will not follow the expectations parents, schools, and society have for them. They disrupt classes, skip school altogether, engage in power struggles and attention-seeking, or retreat into alternative worlds of technological amusement, isolation, and depression. Some become involved in more serious activities such as bullying, vandalism, drug abuse, and self-mutilation. Whether defiant or withdrawn, these oppositional teens confound parents who have no idea how to help them. The Oppositional Teenager provides the answers. Parents must take responsibility by initiating and sustaining a change process. First, they must develop greater awareness of their teenager’s psychological dynamics--and their own. Then, they must gain their teenager’s respect by role modeling a positive approach to life and investing goodwill in the relationship. Finally, in learning the options available (psychological, educational, legal, medical), parents can help lead their oppositional teenager toward a successful future.

This book makes a significant demand on you. It requires a shift in how you view your situation, from “My teenager has a problem” to “I have a problem.” Though the objective of this book is helping your oppositional teenager become as independent, happy, and successful as possible, the subject of the book is really you. You, as parent, must initiate and sustain a change process.
Parenting an oppositional teenager is an extraordinarily difficult task, and most parents struggle with it. They find themselves getting angry, threatening, attempting to punish (often unsuccessfully), avoiding and ignoring, and ultimately giving up. Some blame schools and the media, some drink or take drugs, some cry, some leave their family. Some pretend a problem doesn’t exist. Some make excuses for their teenager. Some take theirs to a therapist and say, “Please fix her (or him).” Some do not know what to do and as a result do nothing.
Most parents do not do enough to help their teenagers during this crucial period and end up paying for it later. Instead of the independent, happy, and successful young adult we all hope for, they have a 20-year-old living with them who is dependent, unhappy, and unsuccessful. In other words, right where they were in high school and no school system anymore to provide teenage daycare.
Most parents do not understand their teenagers. Most parents don’t understand themselves. They lack knowledge of the options and services available to them. They lack strategies for addressing their teenager’s needs. This book tackles these issues.