Too harsh?

[goldface]

DS (14) is a lovely boy, no serious trouble ever but man he can push my buttons, wind everyone up, never know when to stop with a joke, be hard to motivate and be super selfish.
He's been hard going this week and last night after the usual: asking him repeatedly to stop doing something, asking him to do his chores - Eg feed the rabbits, put his uniform away, nothing massive - I lost my temper and told him just to go to his room as I didn't want to be around him.
It all got a bit shouty and he said something about not wanting to live here cos I am always nagging him and I said well tbh you are difficult to live with at times and no one else in the house strops and sulks and doesn't pull their weight so maybe we don't want to live with you!
It all calmed down later and we agreed on some compromises and even managed a board game! But....now I feel super shitty that I may have made him feel like we don't want him?? Too harsh or reasonable reality check?

Sorry OP, I think that was way too harsh, I can understand the rest of the comment but would have left of the 'maybe we don't want to live with you'. However I don't think the comment was undeserved but just that sometimes us mums have to bite out tongue

I think it wasn't ideal but I wouldn't beat yourself up about it. It's not like you said you hate him or wish he hadn't been born or something. It will perhaps make him view his behavior from the perspectives of everyone else in the house.

When I was a teen I remember saying something dead stroppy to my nan about how I was older and I didn't need to listen to her anymore and I felt very smug til she reminded me that she didn't need to listen to me either. Works both ways, as did your example.

Not an unreasonable thing to say in the moment, but I think it’s the kind of comment which needs to be discussed alongside an apology afterwards. Let him know that of course you didn’t mean you don’t want to live with him, but that in a household everybody needs to pull their weight and it’s not fair on everybody if he’s not doing so. If he feels like he’s being nagged maybe sit together and write a list of chores he needs to do each day for him to tick off - have a time each chore needs to be done by and promise you won’t nag or remind him so long as the chores are done by the agreed time (so if uniform needs to be put away before 8pm you won’t remind him unless it gets past that time). This will give him a reminder of what needs to do that he can take responsibility for.

That's really good advice thank you, we did have a chat and a hug and I'm confident he knows it was. My way of trying to articulate that it's not a one way street?
I will def take your advice re saying a time when jobs need to be done by so that he feels a bit more in control

Hell no, what you've said is normal. Don't beat yourself up about reacting to bad behaviour with a valid emotional reaction. You have feelings too. Telling him that his behaviour means he's hard to live with but later showing him you love him but won't accept his behaviour is fine. People need boundaries and the younger they learn that the better. We get told as mums we should always be nice and caring but they forget about the advice about not being a doormat. Your DS knows you love him, but he's also learning a boundary that he'll take forward as a life lesson and hopefully start to realise that if he's not being very nice that people won't want to be around him. Better he learns that now. Take care, you're a great mum xxx