Today my teenager was upset because.....

Loving the rose tinted glasses on this either from PP’s perfect teen years or perfect teens. I call BS.

Remember having toddlers? Remember being told to ‘pick your battles’? This, but with toddlers the size of you. Everyone finds the line that can’t be crossed (for me being told to F off by DS) and everything is a learning curve for teens and their parents!

Everyone's family circumstances and dynamics are different (and unless name-calling is constant and other abusive behaviour going on), it's a bit sheltered and smug to comment as you have

@Undertheoldlindentree

Several people made the same comment before and after me.
Why I have you singled only my comment and namechecked me for being 'smug' and not others? 🤔🙄

'Bitch' is a horrible word but just the sort of thing some worked up teens might reach for to shock. Yes, any parent would sanction heavily after that....but doesn't mean that later they can't privately see a funny side to the teen overreacting and being so self-centered.

Everyone's family circumstances and dynamics are different (and unless name-calling is constant and other abusive behaviour going on), it's a bit sheltered and smug to comment as you have.

My DD has 'the face' as DH ad I call it this morning as she has to go to school but her younger brothers don't ( they have an inset day). She has also been huffing because DH has agreed to take to school this morning but won't take her so she arrives just before the bell as he has to get to work.

But essentially it would never even get to the point where your 16 year old would ever call you a bitch.

So I don’t have a solution to what an appropriate response would be. Because for me, for my parents and for many others too - it’s simply not something that that is a realistic scenario

Building a good relationship when they're little works wonders for riding out the teenage years.
Mine had their moments as teenagers and even early twenties, but I'm a firm believer that decency and respect work both ways. I probably had my own moments as a parent too, but we're the grown ups and need to model good communication and respect as best we can.
If a child of mine had called me a bitch we'd have done a lot of talking (and by that I mean listening too)
I believe we have to look at bringing up future adults so we work through the stroppy moments of the teenage years, rather than using punishment and threats of abandonment.
@Snoopsnoggysnog

MrsFezziwig
the main reason 60s teens wouldn't have said those things is because of the fear of being on the wrong end of ANOTHER violent assault by one parent or the other.

@LaetitiaASD what nonsense.
Yes, what absolute tosh. I was a teen in the sixties and had loving, caring parents. Never a finger lifted in anger, and I’m offended by that nasty post

Then weren’t you bloody lucky, I would have been walloped and shut in my room for days - my parents definitely weren’t ‘loving, caring’!
You were very lucky, many of us weren’t 😡

How best to deal with that then? I don’t have teens yet but I am genuinely curious as to what you do when your 16 yo calls you a bitch. Kick them out? Stop their funds?

Some of these aren’t just teen moodiness / hormones

It’s abuse. Towards you, their parent.

And they will do the same when they have their own families.

Some of you are raising the men that are splattered all over the Relationships board with posters pleading the OP to leave and go to a refuge with their children

He will be calling his wife a bitch. And worse

Been told that he is now a vegetarian.

Made him vegetarian pasta and everyone else chicken pasta

We are all evil and disowned firstly because he can apparently still have chicken despite being veggie and I should of known and that the whole family are evil for not supporting him a d eating chicken

Sixth Form open evening tonight. I enjoyed watching the teens cringing with embarrassment at having to walk around with their parents/carers when all of their mates were about.

Its not about the word.

Its about the utter disrespect.

How fucking DARE he treat the person who is housing and feeding him in such a way?!

I will not accept that, even if you choose to.....good luck with that by the way.

If your Mum doesn’t mind being called a bitch, fair enough, but I doubt most parents would be OK with it.

Omg please get over the DS calling his mum a bitch, ok it wasn't nice but its been said! It must mean worse in some parts of the country, as its not the end of the world saying it where I live. Personally I think f........ and c... are worse and they're used all the time on MN.

@EmotionalSupportBear another parent of an autistic teen here. It’s bloody hard. She was diagnosed 3 years at 11.5 and to this day she is in denial about the diagnosis. At first I thought it didn’t sound too bad, she’s high functioning, at mainstream school, has friends etc. But the combo of autism plus teenage girl has been incredibly stressful and this summer reached an all time low which has broken me. Terrible terrible meltdowns which took all my patience to talk her down. We’ve learnt a lot of her triggers so try and act accordingly.

I just had the audacity to offer my soon to be 13 year old DD a Hallowe'en party, inviting any of her friends around. Apparently I have no idea what it's like to be her age.

I now play only pre approved Spotify playlists if the teens are in the car. Otherwise I get comments like "ugh I'll have to stop liking x now if you like them" if I inadvertently play something they think they've discovered. at the Fleetwood Mac incident mentioned earlier!
All strops are met with 'Fank you Mrs Patterson' in the style of Kevin and Perry.

Can I just make it clear that I ask that question on hearing some of their friends names! Not seeing them. That would rather insensitive of me!

Teensplaining..... this is definitely a thing. I look back fondly on the ages of 15-17 and wish I knew as much now as I did then.

The current thing with my teens is the LGBTQ+

I can't even say "is that friend a girl or a boy" without one of them ticking me off for not including non binary in that statement.