Good Enough Mother:
Lowering The BIG Boom..
Why I’m Not Afraid To Punish My Teen
The other day something awful happened in my house.
It involved my son and I told him I was going to write about it. In order to protect him, I won’t go into detail about the infraction, only what happened afterward.
Buff and I had a long talk about it the following morning and decided to mete out a very harsh punishment that looked like this:
*No allowance
*No cell phone
*No friends over
*No driver’s license
Now I was ready to keep it that way until he was 18; lucky for Cole, one half of his parental team is rational.
Related: Good Enough Mother: How I Hit The Brink And Found My Way Back Again
Buff wanted to give Cole hope so we decided to allow him the opportunity to earn each of those things back again.
With compliance, Cole may:
*After 2 weeks, get allowance reinstated.
*After 6 weeks: cell phone is returned
*After 10 weeks: Cole may have friends over
*After 14 weeks: Cole has earned the right to apply for his driver’s license.
Harsh? Yes.
Necessary? Damn right.
Related: Better Not Bitter: Why I Won’t Track My Teen
During our discussion, I asked Cole how his friends were punished at home; according to him (and keep in mind this was a kid trying to get his folks to go easy on him), they were punished for maybe a week.
Yeah… not in this house and not once have I second-guessed myself or our decision to come down so harshly.
Parenting is tough; many times you’re feeling it out as you go along, praying you make the right decision and not hobble or harm your kid in the process. It hurts too, especially when you can see the potential that they cannot.
But here’s the bottom line: I am not in the business of being Cole’s friend and I really couldn’t care any less whether he likes me. I don’t give two sh*ts about being the cool mom either. What I do care about, the thing that keeps me up at night, is making sure I am raising a young man who understands that actions have consequences.
Guess who gets that?
Related: Live Love Blend: Is Your Man Guilty?
Our story ends like this:
Everyone signed a contract outlining the punishment and the path back.
Then I hugged him and told him I loved him.
You see that’s the other why. Buff and I came down hard because we know that if we don’t, the world will. Cole knows exactly what to expect from us and that we did it, not because we don’t love him but because we do.
Have you ever had to lower the boom on your teenager? How did you do it? Was the behavior corrected and how did you feel about doing it?
