To tell DS I won't take him for his driving test later (vile behaviour related!)

[boyohboys]

Massive argument with DS 17 this morning started over him ignoring a very simple request I'd made. I came downstairs saw he'd ignored me so asked again. He continued to refuse, I insisted, he got sweary & vile and I shouted very loud and stomped off muttering what an ungrateful & selfish shit he was and how I would remember this next time he wanted a favour.

So, he has his driving test after school tonight, it's out of area & needs me to get him there - it's a 3 hour round trip so not insignificant favour either! I'm thinking I should message him to say given this morning's debacle I won't be taking you to your test this evening so either cancel or get yourself there (not really an option unless he can find a mate to take him!)

Next available test isn't until February & not taking him will escalate an already frosty relationship even further. Added to which this sort of thing stand-off has happened before & I've followed through on threats or imposed sanctions but nothing changes and he continues to think it's everyone else at fault (me, his dad, school, etc ) and be generally unpleasant.

YANBU: don't take him: he doesn't deserve the favour. End of conversation.
YABU: take him: don't escalate it further and it won't change anything long term but do impose other sanctions/punishment instead (?)

Not sure why or even when things went wrong but he's a very angry young man and I do worry about not only our relationship but his future relationships as he really has very little respect for women or authority.

Yes, I missed this bit. What he said to you was really off.

I really worry for young men tbh and the culture of toxic masculinity. It's a real problem. It feels different and more insidious than everyday sexism, say.

I wonder how he would respond if you said that he is dangerously close to incel language?

This hatred of women in plain site and actually so dismissive is not good.

I'm afraid I bore my teens to tears with my feminist rants, but actually most of it sinks in. Unfortunately, DD is now understanding what I have been ranting on about as she experiences the hatred first hand (just for walking down the street in her school uniform for eg).

I think you could call him out on his language, every single time. Maybe somewhere in the back of his mind he will remember he is accountable and something might sink in.

I would absolutely not take him, and if I treated my dad like that/spoke to him in a certain way/didn't do as he'd asked, he absolutely wouldn't have taken me & it would have been a lesson that it was my own fault, and I had to deal with the consequences! Not to mention learn from it.
There's such thing as public transport and I'd have been expected to get that!
It amazes me the amount of teenagers that get run around everywhere, my dad worked until at least 6pm, shift work in the winter and mum didn't drive so I had to make my own way if I wanted to get somewhere! It teaches you independence!

the more I punish the angrier he gets. I agree now he does just get away with me telling him it's hurtful/unpleasant and maybe refusing a lift or similar but honestly, constant battles are exhausting and horrible for his siblings and seem to get us nowhere

I know this sounds weird but have you thought about just ignoring the bad behaviour and rewarding the good

Your ds is 17. He has been like this for 2 years. He is a teenager. His hormones are all over the place. He is under stress because of the driving test.

I have been through this twice. Ds aged 18/19 was the worse. He is very early 20s now.
At the weekend we talked and laughed through the night till it was light outside chatting about all sorts of things, what the future plans looked like, funny anecdotes. He even admitted that he had been horrible stubborn and wished he could have taken the advice I had given him.

I think at this age you need to take a step back from the anger and general horribleness of teenagers and let it bounce off you. It isn’t personal (even when it feels that way)

Your job is to make sure they are safe. Give them information and help when they need it and if you haven’t started started yet, start to let them make small and medium size decisions so it makes them know they are being heard

At some point they do comeback to you Unless you act like my mother who couldn’t let any mistake go and you had to be perfect at all times. By the time I was 17 I had moved out and was married just to get away from the shouting

Exactly, one is going through and emotional growth spurt and is riddled with new hormones plus is still young and emotionally fragile... the other is the adult who taught him the appropriate ways to handle their temper.

Then once again demonstrated it to them by acting out and is now after the fact planning on acting out again instead of dealing with it like an adult.

I think anyone can see where the problem has stemmed.

If it’s any consolation OP i had a challenging teen, way worse than yours sounds and was in despair for years. However when he reached his twenties there seemed to be a miraculous growing up and his horrid attitude changed to the point that at 25 he sat us down and thanked us for sticking with him through the horrid times apologised for being so unspeakably awful and from then on has turned into such a delightful young man that we are so proud of, and believe me he put us through hell!

He has loads of friends is very sociable, but is generally pretty foul to everybody outside his friendship group (charming to friend's parents apparently!) and can be lovely but on his terms. He will generally hold it in at school, unless he is directly challenged, and then he will in his words "stand up for himself" which usually results in a detention for disrespect,

Relationship with DH (his dad) is similar to mine sadly but DH has increasingly started just not bothering to ask anything of him so they really just exchange pleasantries & not much more. This causes tension between us however as I see it as checking-out on the Parenting but in truth don't blame him. We actually get on really well otherwise and this is our only real source of tension.

Someone gave an example of how their husband would leave the their son outside for the night if they spoke to their mum like that - honestly if I read my posts a few years ago, I'd probably be saying the same but the reality is you're not going kick them out at 15 or 16 or even 17 and he knows it.

Take him to the test. He was probably stressed this morning and you stomping off won't have helped that.
Yabu talk about other behaviour later, this is a life skill to drive not a night out

What are the friends he's hanging around with like, and the peer culture at school?
Is it possible he's had his head turned by porn/incel/Andrew Tate influences (lots of schools are wringing their hands with the fallout from these, but less eager to draw attention to the issues (to avoid tarnishing school reputation, stating its a challenge for ALL schools currently) so often wider parent body doesn't appreciate the magnitude - but only those of adolescents+teens where s**t has hit the fan.

To be honest, I'd take him but leave him there. He can find his own way back. That way you're not stopping him from taking his test.

It is quite possible that is he doesn't pass he will blame you

I shouted very loud and stomped off muttering what an ungrateful & selfish shit he was

You both sound really hot headed and like neither of you have learnt how to calmly communicate when frustrated.

Take him to the test, you both need to work on your communication skills.

Be the bigger person. You’re the adult. To not take him would teach him that pettiness is the way to live life

Sorry OP, I didn't mean to come across as blaming you. Its a bit of a boiling frog. You let them get away with a 'one off', you dont pull them up on every little thing because you dont want to be on at them all the time. You make allowances for age, hormones, exams, even the MN classic of 'undeveloped brains'! Then suddenly you run out of road and you can no longer tolerate it. I get it.
My point was there's no immediate cure for a long standing issue, so there isn't a sanction that's going to 'suddenly work'. It's going to have to be a process whereby he learns where your boundaries are and what happens when he crosses them. Different sanctions work depending on what's important to the individual. For mine, it was financial. So I would 'fine' them by making a reduction from their allowance every time they crossed the line for example.

I wouldn't mention the insurance unless he mentions it first. Then I'd just say no, that the driver has to pay for that. There's no way I'd pay for his insurance when he was treating me like that. I'd warn the grandparents not to pay for it, either.

I feel your pain . My DD2 was the same. If there were 2 boxes, one that lead to certain death and two was to apologise she would have taken certain death everytime.
She is now a very sensible adult but needed to leave home at 18 to become one.

Have you tried not responding at all if he shouts or swears at you?

My mum used to tell us that she couldn’t hear shouting and would just repeat ‘I’m not talking to you until you’re calm’ until we had settled down. It annoyed the hell out of me as a teenager but it was effective! There’s no point having a one sided argument (and it must have worked long term because I don’t shout at all as an adult 🤷‍♀️).

I think this will only work if you’re not a shouty person either though. And you’d have to tell him in advance that you’re not going to engage with him when he’s angry, and what the consequences will be (no lifts to social events/no access to Wi-Fi… etc).

Or it teaches him that arrogance and abuse has no consequences.

Take him to his test
Driving lessons are expensive and the sooner he passes, the sooner he can get out of your hair
There is a huge backlog of test spaces, so he may not get another chance for months
He could've been on edge this month so I'd cut him some slack today

What a bunch of push of pushovers on the first page. He won’t ever be a decent man if he doesn’t even know how to respect his mum. Don’t take him. Make yourself a nice bath and a glass of wine and enjoy.

He’s 17. He’s got a lot of learning to do; hopefully from his mother

Iwould take him, but if he passed he wouldn’t be going on my insurance until he behaved better

I'd also say whatever you choose as a sanction make sure it's always available and imposing it doesn't inconvenience anyone else. Refusing a lift or a party will only work if there's one required. Grounding can be just as unpleasant for the rest of the family stuck in with him, so it's tempting to renage for the greater good. That's why I find reduction of money useful. It was always an option and only affected them.

Not if you have a calm conversation about expected behaviour later on and a sanction that doesn't also punish the parent. Not taking him to the test means more months of taxi services and more expense and stress. There are more appropriate punishments.

he really has very little respect for women or authority

I can see that and that is why I disagree with most of the posters on here.

Consequences for abuse is not “petty” it’s a necessary repercussion.

Like hell would he be getting lift such a long way from me after that outburst.

All it teaches him is no consequences and will merely increase his contempt for you.

Re driving tests, I used the Driving Test Now app and it was very effective. It autobooks for you. It will depend on your location though. I'm in the East Midlands which is less competitive than London. In fact, we have people coming to our test centre from as far away as Liverpool because there are more slots here.