Rebellious teen

[Nobodytoldyouthis]

First time user so I could do with your advice as I feel I have no where to turn my fifteen year old son started playing up six months ago misbehaving at school , vaping and now he’s staying out Til late on a school night saying he now doesn’t need to be told when to be in he is hanging about with people I don’t know and I’ve caught him with weed I just feel so ashamed and so alone I spend all night worrying where he is if I confront him he says he will leave and never come back my husband works nights so isn’t there to share in the worrying where he is the one thing he does do is text me back so for that I’m grateful any advice would be appreciated from this very tired mum

Can you take him out for lunch and have a real chat? Appeal to his better nature as one who is growing up... you appreciate he needs more independence but explain how you worry about the consequences of his actions etc? Can you set some more flexible rules that he can follow so you can reward him and it improves the communication? If you can have a good, respectful relationship that will help?

I have a DD13 who has been making our life hell for the past 6 months with her behaviour, thankfully the school are stepping in as her behaviour there is bad aswell and have arranged counselling for her in order to address the issues, we've had to compromise with her on some areas in order to keep the peace at home my other Dd15 is in her GCSE year and she can't have so much disruption in her life, DD13 is constantly pushing the boundaries and I've been worried just like you, speak to your sons school and maybe they can help.

@Nobodytoldyouthis, I don’t have a lot of answers, but just wanted you to know you are not alone. My son is very like this. He is always our smoking weed and worse. It’s becoming harder to reason with him and he’s totally disengaged with school. I have reached out to Targeted youth support; I don’t know if this will help. You can access through your county council.

Hi everyone thanks for the advice I tried talking to the school who basically said they have no counselling his behaviour is self destructive and I’m wondering if it’s to do with his grandma who he lost in July his first bereavement and although they were not really close he seems to have pulled away from his other grandparents I told the school when he lost her that he was struggling to no avail this week at school has been terrible involved in a altercation at school with another pupil my ds then sent a threatening message in retaliation to this other guy pinning him against a wall the messages go back and forth with my ds offering to forget it but the other guy wants to fight the school got involved and blamed ds as the first message was his we explained if you read them he tries to find a way out but the school says he is stil to blame waiting to see the consequences , I’ve also booked in to see our gp to see about counselling for him hope this helps

I'm sorry to hear that OP, I know how terrible the worry is, I've become so anxious lately too, I'm trying everything but it just became too much for us to try and help her on our own so I'm praying the counselling works, it all started with a fall out with her best friend and it escalated from there, I'm at my wits end so know you're not alone, hopefully GP can get some counselling for your DS, it's such a terrible time for everyone when there's so much disruption due to one family members behaviour, don't forget to look after yourself too

Thank you for the message it means so much that I’m not alone I just feel such a terrible mum and as if everyone will judge me if he gets expelled I’ve joined him to a gym now so he has somewhere to go at night and he seems to like it so fingers crossed at least when he is there I know where he is I’m so anxious when he is out I feel physically sick thinking is today the day he doesn’t make it back we try our hardest as mums and I think at some point I will realise that but I’m not there yet I don’t think it’s helping that my eighteen year old moves to uni next week and she’s always been a pillar of strength for me so to think it’s just going to be me sitting there waiting every night for him to come home is making it worse thanks again

You're welcome OP, there's a huge thread in the Teenagers section called "Holding on to the end of the rope...." which you might find useful, parents going through all sorts of problems with their teens, it really made me feel I wasn't alone and we're all doing our best!

Well today I decided I had had enough made an appointment at the gp to discuss ds after listening they agreed to help and sent a letter to the school expressing concern over ds mental health and anger management as the school had previously dismissed this I’m really hoping this will help I even sat ds down explaining what we had done and the reasons why we even discussed bereavement counselling for ds and even though he didn’t say yes he didn’t say absolutely not so maybe a breakthrough fingers crossed