Do you feel used by your teenager?

[CostaRicanBananas]

Yesterday was DS' 16th birthday. He was supposed to be having a party this weekend but his mock results arrived and they were disastrous - after all the nagging and the promises / claims that he was revising SO hard! Party called off, we were supposed take him out for dinner last night. First we went to the sixth form open evening at his school, and seeing that we could agree on one of his A level preferences, I took it as an opportunity for us (him in particular) to get a better feel for it. Without even reading or considering what he was being told, he came out with a "Yep, I definitely want to do it.". We were on the way to the restaurant and trying to discuss it, but he was up in arms and being incredibly rude to the boot. So when he said "we might as well not bother with the meal", I put my foot down that we weren't treating him. He was already being rude when we arrived at the school and it just got worse as we moved on to the A level subject.

Up to that point, he had had presents, treat breakfast, lifts everywhere etc but I will not tolerate being spoken to in the way that he did. I don't get it. As a single parent, I've moved mountains for him, including moving counties in order for him to attend his current school. It's a huge opportunity but he's throwing it all away as he simply cannot be bothered to do any work. And that applies to everything: his room, his clothes, his appearance etc. He's nice as pie if he wants something but otherwise, he's makes it sound as though he's doing us a favour - such as last night. It wasn't about us being nice to him and him being treated when actually, he's not exactly deserving of treats at the moment - far from it! No, it was like he was doing us a favour?!

It's breaking my heart. I always saw us as a close unit and I always envisaged that I would be there to support and guide him. Instead, he doesn't do what is expected of him and he treats me with contempt!

[TeenAndTween]

I've got an alternate view to offer on this. It may be way off.

Your DS worked for his mocks. At least he thinks so. He spent hours in his room with his books open anyway. You nagged him about revision, but didn't get involved, e.g. discuss his schedule, test him on things. He thought he was learning stuff, but when he got into the exams he realised he didn't know so much.

So now he is embarrassed and angry with himself for doing poorly. Instead of being supportive, you cancelled his party. He is now scared he won't get the grades he needs for his A levels so is burying his head in the sand and trying not to think or talk about it. But you keep going on about it, and then you cancelled his birthday meal too.

None of this may be real. But is it at all possible he sees it in this way?

[LittleBairn]

You cancelled his birthday party last minute because his results weren't good enough for you. I can understand why he's angry at you it must have been humiliating explaining that to his friends.

[PurpleWithRed]

I always saw us as a close unit and I always envisaged that I would be there to support and guide him. Instead, he doesn't do what is expected of him and he treats me with contempt!

He's a teenager, not a toddler or an employee. He also sounds like a perfectly normal teenager to me: stroppy and difficult on the outside but fragile and inept on the inside. He will grow out of it, eventually, probably.

[dexter73]

I think what TeenAndTween writes makes a lot of sense.

[PeaStalks]

You cancelled his birthday party because he didn't get the grades you expected . And THEN you cancelled his birthday meal?
He will remember this for the rest of his life.
I am speechless at how you can expect the boy to treat you with respect when you are stamping your feet like a toddler.

[CostaRicanBananas]

I see it as irresponsible to reward someone for nothing. So I am expected to go out of my way, spend money on a party, deal with the aftermath when he's not delivering the basics? Why on earth would I do that? To me, that would just teach him that he can carry on coasting and there will be no consequences. These are their last years before adulthood and they will go into adult life thinking that they are simply entitled to it all, without having to actually earn it. If he had done ok on his mocks, there would have been no question of cancelling the party. But the results were simply disastrous. My son does not find academic subjects difficult, but he finds it hard to grasp the concept of putting some work into things in order to reap the rewards.

I don't expect DS to be top of the class but he is expected to meet the basics. He chose not to revise and he did the bare minimum during the exams hoping that he'd get away with it. Every single one of his teachers said so. In fact, one of his language teachers sent me an email yesterday explaining that DS is an A* on the subject but that he needs to stop being lazy and distracting other during lessons - her words, not mine. So DS does no work, refuses to pull his weight at home and is rude but I should still reward him with a party and a meal?

With the meal, we were on our way to the restaurant and by then he had already spent most of the evening being rude to me. And I should have rewarded him for it with a meal, even after he snapped? Really? How would I have justified it?? Sorry but I entirely disagree with the comments posted here, but thank you all the same for your feedback.

[smileyforest]

Sounds like a normal teen to me....why get so involved? He is trying to detach from you....I've had to learn...their choice isn't it...if they don't work...they don't get results...Quite harsh to cancel party....

[Timeforabiscuit]

Was the restaurant chosen/suggested by you or your son?

[usualsuspect333]

I don't think his birthday celebrations should have been cancelled. Birthday treats should not have conditions attached imo. No wonder he is pissed off with you.

[Snog]

Agree with the usual suspect. I think you are putting far too much emphasis on his exams and not respecting him commensurate with his years. I think the person who most needs to apologise is you. Cancelling birthday celebrations was really inappropriate and not very nice.

[CostaRicanBananas]

The restaurant was originally my suggestions, I wanted to take him out for a meal and we've always done that. I get his favourite breakfast on the table in the morning, presents and balloons, drove him around after school for the stuff that he wanted to do and then the dreaded episode following the sixth form open evening.

I am not trying to make a decision for him but I want to make sure that he's making an informed choice.

And make no mistake, this is incredibly hard for me. We are already going working through how on earth he's going to attend the school sports trip abroad, which is going to cost £3,000 when he hasn't done any of the things that he was supposed to do. He was given very specific goals and deadlines - all very basic stuff, and none of those involved getting straight As and having a spotless room. It's breaking my heart as I so wanted him to have the opportunity, in fact I was the first parent to hand in the deposit. But would you reward your child with something like this when they are not pulling their weight?

[Orangeanddemons]

As a teacher, I often think the purpose of mocks is to fail them...

It's about learning what the real exams will be like, more than actually passing them. Most of my y11's often cock up their mocks. They all do fine on the real thing though..I would have let him have his party. Ds failed all his mocks just before his16th birthday. He still had a big party. He's at university now.....

[CostaRicanBananas]

Are you really saying that you'd have gritted your teeth and pretending that your child wasn't being completely obnoxious to you?

[Orangeanddemons]

I'd have just ignored, or left him to it. Aren't teenagers meant to be obnoxious? I thought it was in the job description.

[PeaStalks]

gritted your teeth and pretending that your child wasn't being completely obnoxious to you
Yes on his birthday. Not the next day or any other but birthdays matter to children and 16th birthdays are a milestone. Bad enough that he failed his exams, make no mistake he will be looking at others who did well and regretting it, but to have to tell his friends that you cancelled his party......

[CostaRicanBananas]

Maybe that's where I've gone wrong...I've overlooked the job description. If I got this all totally wrong then I will be the first one to apologise and try to put it right. I've been in turmoil all day over this but right now, I still can't see why or how I should have gritted my teeth and let him speak to me the way he was doing whilst treating him to a nice meal out. I can clearly see him resisting, and I can accept that this is his way of claiming his independence but we are talking about basic good manners and courtesy. As for the party, sorry but I don't see it... In principle, his birthday and mock results shouldn't be linked together but I saw it as sending out the complete wrong message by telling him that it was ok to coast and do nothing (in general) as you'll still get what you want in the end. So why should he bother then?

[Lottiedoubtie]

I agree with everyone else I'm afraid.

A birthday party isn't a reward for doing well in your exams. It's a treat that you get by virtue of your actual birthday.

I'd have gritted my teeth, got through the birthday stuff and then sat down with him and talked about how he is going to ensure success in the summer.

[Lottiedoubtie]

Was he being rude to you before the meal because you'd told him the party was off? Or because he was embarrassed by what had happened at school? What did he actually say and why?

[YesIDidMeanToBeSoRudeActually]

When you planned the party, did you say "this is dependent on you getting so and so grades in your mocks and will be cancelled if you dont?"

It was a 16th birthday party, a birthday, not celebrating exam results party. I too think you were wrong to cancel it. How humiliating having to tell his mates his party has been cancelled by his mum.

The meal perhaps might have been reasonable to cancel given his attitude, but not his party. They're important to teenagers, particularly at this age.

I think you need to apologise, or you run the risk of permanently alienating him at a very tricky age. By all means, tell him you are upset he didn't work hard, don't make it about the grades. The effort, not the result.

[Kleinzeit]

You are not “rewarding” him – you are celebrating his birthday. That’s two completely different things. You can only really turn a birthday thing into a reward if it’s something “extra” on top of what you were going to do for him anyway, and you need to agree with him in advance what the reward is going to be and exactly what he needs to do to earn it. For example you could have decided that the meal was the celebration and he could have a party too as a reward for doing well in his mocks. But you shouldn’t be taking birthday things away afterwards because you’re disappointed in him. Also you shouldn’t spoil his birthday meal by going on about his educational choices on the way there! A birthday meal should be a happy time, a time to put failures or worries about the future to one side.

He's nice as pie if he wants something

But that’s great! Just make sure there’s always something he wants that he can earn by being nice as pie. Or by doing his revision. Or whatever else you want. Don’t just hand out the treats (apart from birthdays and Christmas) – get him to earn them first. You’ll both feel better.

And when you make deals with him,make sure they are practical. Like the 3K school trip - there's no point making any kind of deal about whether he goes or not if you've already paid a lot of money upfront, because you wont want to waste the deposit. It always has to be, first he does what you want, then he gets the reward. Never the other way round.

[YesIDidMeanToBeSoRudeActually]

Another way of looking at reading your reply where you disagree with what pretty much everyone is saying....Did you refuse to give him his birthday cake or his birthday presents as his exam results weren't good enough? How does that sound? Surely that would seem unfair? Well, the party is the same. Except to a 16 year old, even more important!

God knows, teens spent enough time stropping about "it's not faaaaaair". Don't give them any more ammo! Can you reinstate the party?

[CostaRicanBananas]

No, because nothing seems to matter. It's like the sports tour. At this stage, he's no longer going. I did explain before hand what he had to do and again when I didn't see anything happening - time and time again, over 12 months ago. In the end, I had no choice but to contact the relevant teacher to say that he may not be going after all. He saw the risk, he's seen his friends getting all excited about it. Was that enough to prompt him to actually work for it? No. Nothing seems to motivate him at the moment and he doesn't seem to have any sense of shame. So no, I don't actually think that he cares / regrets it that his friends did better than him. He couldn't be bothered to answer the questions and he still can't be bothered to work for anything, as long as he can get away with doing nothing then life is pretty good.

[Dontwanttobeyourmonkeywench]

I can see where you're coming from, my approach would have been very similar. DS (17) sat his GCSEs last year and was forever coasting through classes and doing the bare minimum because he could. His teachers kept on telling me that he was capable of achieving great grades if he would put a bit more effort in but he didn't see the point when he was getting good grades without a lot of work. His mocks were a complete disaster and he had to resit an exam that he should have been able to do with his eyes closed. It was the kick up the bum that he needed but I also had to learn to take a step back and let him get on with it. The saving grace was that he knew what he wanted to study in Uni so we agreed that so long as he got the grades for the exams that he needed I wouldn't nag about the rest.

He got what he needed but managed to just about scrape LLW (how???? it's a non-subject!!). He's now doing an applied science course and has had a great shock with regards to the amount of coursework that needs to be done and having to organise his deadlines by himself. Last term was a bit of a learning curve for him in terms of time management but he's finally getting the hang of it. The hardest thing that I have had to do was to stop trying to support him directly (as in going on about revision etc) and letting him learn that he would fail if he didn't put the effort in, although I would be there for him.

We are close and I want so much for him to fulfill his potential, but I have also learned that the hardest thing is to let them fail occasionally. It's mocks, in the scale of things it's not a big deal. (It has taken me a year to be able to see this)

[TheXxed]

My 16th birthday party is one of my fondest memories. My mum took me out shopping I bought my first pair of heels and wore them to my party later that day.

Birthdays and Christmas shouldn't be conditional.

[indecisiveithink]

I agree with all that's been said op.

I've really struggled over the years to forgive my DM for never forgiving me for being a teenager. He's 16.