Husband attacked teenage son

[Throwawaynameforthis]

On Saturday night my husband pinned DS to the floor.

We were playing a family game and DS (14) was being annoying, escalating to rudeness. He accused me of “smacking him” which I absolutely did not do.

I took myself out of the room for a minute and the next thing I hear is H yelling, DD15 shouting at H to stop and DD9 sobbing.

As I walk into room DS is legging it out the house looking terrified, quickly followed by DD. From what I can work out H picked DS up by then lapels and got him on floor and was telling him he’d “show him what a smack is”.

I found DS quickly and then DD and went home. H apologised to the DC but I’m so angry. I don’t know what to do. This has been escalating for months.

Is this it? Is there any recovering from this? For me or the DC?

At the same time, the ds needs to learn to stop constantly pushing buttons and be obnoxious. That’s not a good trait either and the fact his dad reacted in less than suitable way doesn’t mean the teen shouldn’t address his behaviour too.

@Meuniere Yes, except DH is an adult who has responsibility over children and should have learned productive methods to manage rage a long time ago. I agree that DS did not behave well originally, but he's 14 and teens will usually have some kind of pushback around parent figures which needs to be addressed appropriately.

Your ds doesn't need to be put in his place, he needs to have appropriate behaviour taught by example.

I disagree. We are talking about a 14yo, not a 4 yo. The time when you couod hope to teach only by example are long gone.
Of course, how you behave will have an impact. But that will nowhere near be the ONLY thing that will influence a teenage behaviour. Otherwise, why on earth would parents still try to punish, remove privilege etc... for tother issues such as refusing to help in the house, tidy their room etc... when they have an excellent example in front of them from their parents doing it everyday?.

@Throwawaynameforthis

All of you saying it’s an assault are absolutely right. If he’d done it to someone else then he’d rightly be spending some time with the police.

DS doesn’t want to do family counselling. Doesn’t think there is an issue.

I told H that he needed to speak to someone and fair play he organised it and went yesterday. I haven’t discussed it with him.

both your husband and your son have problems dealing with anger. Your husband has been one of your sons key role models so little wonder he is the way he is. If your husband is serious about changing then there is plenty of hope and he can start modelling the changes to your son and encouraging him to open up and discuss things differently

@RiaOverTheRainbow

So nothing is changing? You're happy for your children to learn that when men are angry they become violent and that's fine??

Your ds doesn't need to be put in his place, he needs to have appropriate behaviour taught by example. Your daughters need to learn zero tolerance for violent adult men. Their father isn't going to teach them this, so YOU have to step up.

For someone who has apparently 'lost control' simply pinning the boy to the ground is pretty reserved behaviour. He could easily have been preventing the situation from escalating by restraining the boy.

I'd suggest that OPs husband has remarkable reserve if the boy is by OPs own admission really hard work and deliberately pushes adults.

I think some posters on here need to take a step back and think about what 'violence' actually is.

@trashaccount, agree.
Whcih is why I think the fact the ds says he doesn’t need Counselling and is refusing it isn’t an acceptable answer.

All 3 of them need to learn to be assertive in appropriate ways. And none of them know to do that.

To slightly go against the grain, in my experience dads and teen sons often clash. Of my male friends and family almost every one had some sort of physical tussle with their dads. All from otherwise loving and nice families. 15 years on all on very good terms with their dads.

Both of them behaved badly. Clearly your DH as they adult should have controlled himself better. He apologised. From what I can gather no one was actually hurt?
I’d chalk it up to hormones and pressing buttons. Seek support if needed but I don’t think this is the end of the world.

@thelmber
I'd suggest that OPs husband has remarkable reserve if the boy is by OPs own admission really hard work and deliberately pushes adults.

Physically pushing your child to the ground and threatening to smack them is not "remarkable reserve". Not even close.

@fassbendermistress what tripe. You are diagnosing the OPs husband as being a poor role model to their son and the cause of his anger issues based off this one incident?

Do you think the OPs habit of dealing with her sons bad behaviour and attitude by just 'walking away' won't have possibly had a bigger impact?

I agree that the teenage son also needs to learn to regulate his behaviour. Absolutely.

However, that is a separate issue and should be dealt with as such. It shouldn't be allowed to detract from the fact that the father assaulted his son, and no amount of victim-blaming can make that justifiable.

FWIW, if the ds is demonstrating abusive behaviour towards his mother, then it isn't hard to see where he has learned that from.

Yes I frequently prevent backchat from escalating (to what, yelling??) by introducing physical aggression

To echo other posters, would it be ok if he'd done this to the dd?

[quote trashaccount]@thelmber
I'd suggest that OPs husband has remarkable reserve if the boy is by OPs own admission really hard work and deliberately pushes adults.

Physically pushing your child to the ground and threatening to smack them is not "remarkable reserve". Not even close.[/quote]
But he didn't smack him, or even hurt him.

Have you ever had to physically restrain someone in your life to prevent a much bigger incident? How do you know that's not what happened?

My Dad once beat my DB up, he wasn’t a violent man and very very patient, his own dad was violent, he never wanted to be like that, but had been pushed to the limit by my DB. There was lots and lots leading up to it. My DB was about 17 at the time. My DB has never blamed Dad in fact he has said on many occasions he can’t believe Dad didn’t do it sooner as he (DB) was a shit and needed a wake up call. My Dad DB were very close after and I could not even describe the respect my DB had for my Dad.

Similar story with my BiL and his son. Not beaten up but he did pin him to the wall and give him a smack, I think he was a bit older, maybe 16/17 and was being a shit. Obviously it can go lots of ways but BiL wasn't in general violent or shouty but his DS was being out of order to his mother and BiL defended her.

They all have a great relationship and after leaving home in his early twenties, he ended up back living with them when he needed an operation and couldn't work. That lasted about 6 years and he's only recently moved out again, round the corner.

As I say, not condoning it but I can see how it happens and it's not always the end of the world. Might stop the DS from pushing someone in a bar too far and getting a bottle in the face for his trouble.

DS doesn’t want to do family counselling. Doesn’t think there is an issue.

Well of course your DS doesn't want to do family counselling! He's a teenage boy! Honestly, do you let him rule you in everything?

My personal experience was my father shoving my sister as a teenager because she was goading him and goading him. I watched the whole thing play out and I can honestly say I took my fathers side as she was a massive pain in the arse (and still is). He’s dead now but to this day I’m thought he was very restrained.

@thelmber

This behaviour wouldn't be accepted for a 14 year old DD, nor would it be accepted in any other environment socially. If DS had held down someone in his class and threatened to hurt them, there would be expulsions and probably police warnings.

Unless DS was physically threatening DH or DD, for example throwing punches (which has in no way been mentioned) there was no need for restraint.

I suspect this thread is too close to the bone for a lot of readers. I suspect a lot of people defending this bully have partners who are also aggressive to their children.

My brother was an obnoxious teen but my dad never did anything like this no matter how he pushed it. Instead what happened is my 15 year old smartarsed brother mouthed off at the wrong person in the street one night and got 7 shades of crap beaten out of him. After that, he learnt to mind his mouth. Honestly it would have been a lot better for him if my dad had pinned him to the floor.

FWIW, if the ds is demonstrating abusive behaviour towards his mother, then it isn't hard to see where he has learned that from.

more armchair diagnosis. Now OP's dh has a long histiry of demostrating violent behaviour to the dc?
As I said up thread, we had a difficult ds.
My dh is the most non violent and gentle man.
At times they had some massive arguments (verbal). Not a hint of violent behaviour.

The same teen was massivley swimming in testosterone. He smashed things in his room, threw things a few times, and came very very close to hitting me more than once.
He did, several times hit/push his siblings. (for which there was obviously appropriate response from us)

Where did he learn that? Not from me or dh, neither of us are ever violent or use violence or endorse violence.

Teenage boys are awash with testosterone, and believe me it is powerful stuff.

But in this case, the dh shoudl not have acted the way he did, because despite all I have jsut said, as parents we have to remain the adult in the room,a nd sometimes that is unbelievably hard to do.

I have zero tolerance to child abuse. So for me it would be over. My husband isn’t the sort to do this, and never has, but he’d not even need me to tell him to leave, he’d know. It would be game over for me.

What I find interesting is, you spend more time on this thread telling everyone your sons faults and very little about your child abusing husbands, read them back.

Because what he did is child abuse. And the fact your kids accept it is just so terribly sad for them.

It’s up to you what you do, but I have a horrible feeling this will be forgive and forget in the end, snd the kids know it, so will just accept it.

Till one day they are old enough to go snd not come back.

@thelmber Do you think the OPs habit of dealing with her sons bad behaviour and attitude by just 'walking away' won't have possibly had a bigger impact?

I’ve been on MN long enough to know that I’d be told I was failing to protect my DC and to LTB but I wasn’t expecting to be blamed for walking away

I’d love to know what the more appropriate response would have been

@toxtethOgradyUSA

I suspect this thread is too close to the bone for a lot of readers. I suspect a lot of people defending this bully have partners who are also aggressive to their children.

Ha ha ha. Nope!

I am saying that this is a workable situation. Not screaming "LEAVE HIM!! LEAVE HIM NOW!!" because a Dad has shown force when his son threatened his mother.

@BertieBloopsMum He never threatened his mother?

Many, many (probably about 50 ) years ago my teenage brother was being an absolute shit. Pushing and pushing boundaries. It all came to a head one Sunday afternoon after he was totally obnoxious and disrespectful to his Nan, Dad's mother. Dad, who I had barely heard raise his voice before, absolutely lost it. Grabbed my brother by the scruff of his neck, pushed him out the door and locked it. I'm not sure who was more shaken, Dad or brother. When brother was eventually let back in he apologised and after that things became so much better in our house. Sometimes people just have to learn the hard way that you can only push other people so far before there are consequences.

@trashaccount if an adult put another adult onto an isolation spot and refused to let them leave until they admitted they had done something wrong we would also call the police, but we are happy for parents to do that with children, we just call it a 'timeout' and its fine.

The point I'm making is that comparing the actions parents are allowed to take to discipline or control children to actions that unrelated people can or can't to do to one another is misleading and simply wrong.

OPs husband is the parent, her DS is the child. DS was warned and warned, then disciplined in a manner where he has suffered no harm, and has now probably learnt a valuable lesson in not pushing people too far.

As another poster on here said, DS may just avoid having a bottle pushed into his face in a bar one day if he remembers this incident.

Have you ever had to physically restrain someone in your life to prevent a much bigger incident? How do you know that's not what happened?

Because that's not what the OP described.

There was no suggestion in the OP of the ds being aggressive or abusive. He was being "annoying, escalating to rudeness". He accused his mother of hitting him, and then his dad grabbed him, got him to the floor and threatened to show him what a smack really looked like. The boy then fled the house looking terrified. I'm not sure where you get the idea from that account that he needed to be restrained?

OP, one thing which we haven't asked is why ds was claiming that you had smacked him in the first place. How did it all start?