Teen-Proofing Fostering Responsible Decision Making in Your Teenager
Parents can protect toddlers--with their maximum mobility and minimum  logic--by pasting plastic on electrical outlets and putting poisons out of  reach. But protecting teenagers is not so simple, says family psychologist and  author ofRaising a Nonviolent ChildJohn Rosemond. "Short of solitary  confinement, you can't guarantee that a teen won't use drugs, shoplift, drink or  crash the car. In the final analysis, teens must protect themselves." Rosemond'sTeen-Proofingprovides parents with tough-love strategies for managing  teens so they make self-protective, rather than self-destructive, decisions.Many parents will recognize the error of their ways in Rosemond's portraits of  parents as "micro-managers" who try to control their children and "wimps" who  let their children control them. He offers a compelling alternative by urging  parents to be "mentors, who realize they can control the parent-child  relationship, but not the child." The author explores critical parent-teen  issues including curfews, cash, cars, and cohorts--detailing an approach that  gives teenagers a "long rope" to make their own mistakes and also offers  "creative consequences" to encourage responsible decision making.The author offers smart and seasoned advice--from coping with middle school  "tweenagers" to understanding why teens are vulnerable and how the culture  diminishes a parent's influence. Yet he undermines his clarity with snide asides  about mental health professionals and one too many smug and self-congratulatory  examples of his own parenting of a son and daughter. These distractions are  unnecessary; the book's unconventional and provocative suggestions will speak  volumes to parents of teens.--Barbara Mackoff