Why can teens be such hard work?

[AsAProfessionalFekko]

Why is everything a three ring circus?

Why the smallest request is turned into a debate the likes of which won't get seen much outside the Courts of Human Rights?

Every nit picked?

Every rule, tradition or convention disected?

Every preference sneered at/eye rolled?

God it's exhausting...

To remind you not to have a late baby when you have a teenager.

Seriously it is completely normal and to do with brain development and the beginning of the next stage of separation. It's hard work though...

Have you read this ?

www.amazon.co.uk/Get-Out-Life-bestselling-teenagers/dp/1846680875?tag=mumsnetforum-21

I have a teenager we mostly get on great now (16). 12 to 14.5 was hard.

13/14 is exhausting. Everything is a drama.

I do feel sorry for them though in terms of everything being on social media. When I was that age we knocked on people's doors/ called the house phone.

They have access to each other's lives 24/7 now.

I'm exhausted - I just don't remember dramas when I was a teenager!

I have a lot of siblings and my parents said that I just bimbled along in my own little world when I was growing up and 'just got on with it'.

DS is nothing like me! Are boys worse than girls?

They have to break it all down and rebuild it - it's how they figure out who they are - it's how they form their own identity - to part from their parent's view on life - it's not fun but it looks like it's something your ds needs to do.

DS1 is nearly 19. Things have calmed down considerably (he's at Uni which helps lol) He is becoming a proper grown up.

DS2 (16) is on the whole ok but every now and again behaves like a massive toddler where everything is a battle.

It's to make sure you don't break down and cry and beg them not to go when they finally leave home!

Seriously though, I remember being an utter witch as a teenager. I hated everyone and everything and really thought the entire world was really unfair.

It's that age where you are no longer a child but not quite an adult. They want to be treated as a grown up but don't have the capacity to act like one. They want more freedom but lack the ability to be trusted with it.

It does get easier and no, I don't think boys are worse. We have four girls between us, one now in her 20's (who was a fucking nightmare!), one about to hit 20 (also a fucking nightmare), one nearly 15 (definitely pushing limits) and one just about to turn 13 (she has autism too so I suspect the next few years will be truly testing).

The oldest two are now independent adults, one living in London with her boyfriend, one at uni. Both drive, hold down jobs, sort out their own lives and really don't need us in a practical sense but still come and see us a lot. Just because they want to rather than need to.

Trust me, boys aren't worse than girls...

Sex isn't the key thing; either can be horrible (for varying duration) or surprisingly nice. Or fall into bad ways, or not.

DS age 20 was a dream, still easy now at uni.

DD - nearly 18 - is killing me. I am sat on my bed sobbing my heart out, not wanting to live any more. Everything is my fault. Last night I was accused of being an evil bitch every day for ensuring she keeps on top of college work. I am controlling apparently, rather than caring that she doesn't fail her BTEC (which is a real possibility and will mean she has wasted the last 2 years).

Today I have been accused of forcing her to learn to drive, yet she couldn't wait to have her first lesson last June and has just passed. Apparently she only learnt as otherwise how would she ever get to a job when we refuse to drive her around for next 30 years. What the actual fuck? we do have buses and trains where we live!!

I also forced her to get a job. She worked for a supermarket before xmas and has just started back with them. Last nights row was about her not taking too many extra shifts on whilst still at college.

She is not going to uni (not capable with the grades that she's getting). She is however having a gap year to decide what she wants to do next (and hopefully grow up somewhat). She thus needs to have some way of earning money when her course finishes at the end of June, hence she started looking for work again at Easter. I refuse to fund a gap year and as she will have to run a car and wants to travel, she needs some money. But apparantly I made her get a job. She's not lazy, enjoys working and earning money, but apparently its all my fault.

Not sure if she expected us to fund her gap year and the years after that, as well as driving her everywhere.

I am not sure where her sense of entitlement has come from, her brother has had same upbringing and has none of it.

DH just agrees with her, he'd agree that the sun was blue if she declared it. I can't live like this, but I can't see a way out apart from suicide.

And yes I know I have a DH problem. But where DD is concerned he's blinkered.

Are boys worse than girls?

Well I feel like my two were in some sort of teen relay.... DD (16yr) was horrendous from about 12 to 14 and then she transformed into the heavenly daughter I now have. DS (just 19yr) was quite a dream until about 16 yr when he became even more childish and bone idle. So when DD settled down, DS became a pain and the baton was handed over as it were

Just this afternoon I have come home from work to find DS has done bugger all to help around the house so I gave him a stern talking to and got DH on side when he came home as I was sick of it.

I think it's mostly about independence Fekko, that and the fact that something weird goes on in the teenagers brain (a science fact) which obviously then effects their behaviour. They have to find their own way and for some of them it means arguing that black is white all the time. Others manage to agree that black is black mind you and still mature!

My 15 year old is being so difficult at the moment - it's soul destroying 😣.

She speaks to me as if I am dirt on the bottom of her shoe, if I try to ask her to do anything. If I make a comment, she will speak slowly to me (as if I'm stupid) in a pouty way and tell me how hilarious I am, I should be a comedian and what an awful Mum I am and how much she hates me 😞

She is a bright girl - a high achiever musically and academically. She seems to have started another relationship with a boy and is being sneaky, secretive and difficult again now.

Every day is a battle and I can't say anything without an argument ensuing. 😖

I don't know but I never anticipated that parenting a teen would be so hard and so wearying. To be fair, my teen is fine a lot of the time, but oh the dramas when stuff goes wrong!

Also, I think handling the quick change of emotional states can be quite exhausting. Mine can be dancing around the room, blissfully happy, listening to loud music and doing silly (and blindingly accurate ) impressions of people one minute, and literally 30 seconds later can be an alk-consuming, eye-rolling strop owing to some very minor perceived slight or inconvenience (usually "caused" by us her parents!). It's very hard to keep up!