While defiance isn’t pleasant, I will choose it over deception any day of the week. When a kid is in your face, at least you know where he is. You know exactly what he feels and where he stands.
Sometimes parents become intimidated by a defiant teen who yells or threatens. Before you give in to him, however, try this exercise: Imagine a three-year-old who is enraged because you won’t let him have a cookie. See how his face swells up, and hear how he screams and stomps. Now paste your teen’s face on that child. Now you have a picture of what you are dealing with. Does that help?
Defining the Problem
While they can appear similar, defiance and argumentativeness are not the same, and it’s important for you to discern the difference. As we saw in chapter 23, an argumentative teen still accepts, at some level, your role as parent, while desperately attempting to make you change your mind. A defiant teen, however, questions or completely rejects your authority as a parent.
Sometimes argumentativeness escalates into defiance. This defiance, which flares up quickly and is emotional in nature, can lead a teen to impulsively say rash words. For example, “You are so unfair! I’m going to wear that dress whatever you say!”
While your teen sounds defiant, she may not be. The teen brain can’t edit well yet, and your adolescent may not mean what she says. You probably remember saying similar things you didn’t really mean and wished you could take back. So don’t hold your teen to every word she says. Just say, “Well, I know you feel strongly about this, so let’s wait till things are calmer and talk about it.” This gives her some space and freedom, and it also keeps her from engaging in a power struggle with you. You want to prevent your teen from feeling the need to prove that she really meant what she said simply because she doesn’t want to lose face with you. Saber rattling doesn’t work well with adolescents.
True defiance, however, is not impulsive in nature. Defiant teens want to be their own boss, right here and right now, and prematurely fire their parents as their guardians and managers. Their battle cry is, “You can’t tell me what to do!”
This thinking has some problems, of course. First, teenagers aren’t yet ready to be their own boss. Without parents to guide and protect them, adolescents may be hurt or hurt themselves in some way because they lack maturity and do not have enough life experience to make good judgments. The second, and deeper, problem is this: by design, we will never be totally and fully in charge of our own lives. We were not created to be our own final authority. As adults, we all have to defer and submit, at some point, to other authorities in our lives. From God on down to bosses and supervisors and spouses, we need to respect someone.
So the adolescent’s ultimate desire — to be in charge of her own life — needs to be shaped and matured into something more helpful so that one day she can become a functioning adult, with all the freedoms and all the restrictions of adulthood.
Handling the Problem
If you are like many parents, you’ll find it difficult to deal with defiance. Defiance attacks your role as protector and can be emotionally draining. But if your teen is truly defiant, you must act, for the sake of your kid. Here are some guidelines for what to do.
Stand firm against defiance. Be reasonable and loving, but keep to your limit and be strong, as demonstrated in the following dialogue.
Defiant teen: | “I’m going out the door and you can’t stop me.” | |
Parent: | “You are right. I won’t stop you. But please listen to me first. I want to work this out with you. Will you please reconsider?” | |
Defiant teen: | “No. You are so unfair. I’m out of here.” | |
Parent: | “I have to let you know that this is your choice, and I’m not stopping you. But there will be a consequence, and it will be serious.” | |
If your teen continues out the door, be sure you follow up. Don’t let fear or fatigue or guilt stop you. Your teen needs to know that someone loves him enough to be stronger than he is, who can withstand his defiance, and who will give him external controls when he has insufficient internal controls.
When you stand firm against defiance, you are providing from the outside that which your adolescent does not possess on the inside: structure, self-control, respect for authority, delay of gratification, impulse control, and a host of other good skills. Your teen can then safely internalize these attributes from you so that they become hers.
Stay connected. Even though your teen’s anger and rebellion against you can make connection challenging, as much as possible, stay in relationship with her. Take initiative to keep talking with your teen. Let her know that you are for her, even when she is defiant. Listen to her and validate her emotions. Keep in mind that in adolescence kids are trying to learn to integrate the darker and more aggressive parts of themselves. This is how they mature and become able to deal with failure, anger, and hurt in healthy and appropriate ways. If you can’t be in relationship with your teen in her defiance, she won’t learn to do this.
This doesn’t mean you should subject yourself to abuse or injury. Always preserve yourself, but at the same time let your teen know that you want to connect.
Give as much freedom as your teen earns. If you have a defiant child, he will insist on total and complete freedom. Resist the temptation to remove all privileges and freedoms until he admits you are the boss. This plan often backfires, because the teen feels forced to take greater and greater power moves and to increase resistance. Instead, let your teen have whatever he earns. For example, ground him or take away his media. But don’t do both if you don’t have to.
Expect escalation. Expect your defiant teen to initially get worse rather than better after you set limits. This is the nature of defiance. Your teen is attempting to see how far she can go, and though she does not see it this way, she needs a parent who will stay firm and loving in the face of her increased defiance. Be stronger than your kid is. That is what a parent is and does.
Encourage adaptation and mourning. If this goes well, your teen will adapt to reality. He will give up the fight and accept that he cannot control everything and that he does have to answer to someone. However, he will feel some sadness that he can’t have his way and that he must give up and surrender some fights and freedoms that he doesn’t want to. Mad transforms into sad, which creates a functioning adult.
Seek professional help. If your kid’s defiance gets out of control, get help. Sometimes a teen needs boundaries and structures that a parent can’t provide. Counselors, youth pastors, school staff, residential treatment centers, and other intensive adolescent centers can support your values and the work you are doing. They can take your teen through the extreme times and help you become a better parent so that you can handle things when your teen returns.
You Can Do It!
Hold two pictures of your teen in your mind. One as a three-year-old without the cookie, and the other as an adult who can adapt to the authorities — from bosses and supervisors to God himself.