Article: Studies have shown that yelling at your teenager, no matter how much you may believe they deserve it, actually makes behavior worse. It might feel good in the short term, but parenting is about improving your child's behavior, not making yourself feel good. No matter how hard it is, don't let yourself yell back, even if your child is yelling at you at the top of their lungs. Even if you keep your cool, it doesn't feel good to get yelled at. Furthermore, you need to break your child of the habit of raising their voice to you before they begin to think that it's acceptable behavior. If it's a relatively new behavior, be understanding with them and explain why yelling doesn't help: "I understand that you're upset, but yelling doesn't do anything but get both of us riled up. The more worked up we get, the less likely we'll be to reach a happy ending here." If it's repeated behavior, be firmer: "I do my very best to never raise my voice to you, no matter how upset I get. I expect the same courtesy from you." If your teenager has made a habit out of being smart with you, set firm, strict boundaries in a confident tone: "I don't know what you think you're going to accomplish by being sarcastic with me. At the end of the day, I'm still your parent, and you need to watch your tone and lower your voice before I double your punishment." Everyone can think back to a time when they snapped at someone without thinking first about what they were saying usually, you regret it immediately. Take a few seconds to work through your immediate reaction of frustration or anger before responding to your child. Your teenager is coming from an uncontrollably emotional place, but it's on you as an adult and parent to speak from a place of reason. Don't worry about voicing your personal frustration; instead, focus on what you can say that will actually elicit the desired behavior from your child. It may be helpful to breathe deeply for a few moments to get your breathing and heart rate under control. By consciously reducing the physical symptoms of agitation, you can put yourself in a calmer mindset. Counting to ten is a useful tool, though it may take longer to get yourself under control. If your reaction is so strong that deep breathing and counting to ten don't work, you need to take a break from the conversation, and ask your teenager to do the same. While decompressing, do something that relieves your stress: read a book, knit, cook, lay down and close your eyes whatever you need to do to feel better. "I'm too upset right now to speak calmly, and so are you. I'm worried that we're going to say hurtful things to each other, so other, so we should take a break." "I love you very much, but I think we need to be apart for fifteen minutes before we can continue this discussion." "Let's both go into our rooms and calm down. When I feel ready to talk, I'll wait for you in the living room, and you do the same if you calm down before me." Don't restart the conversation until you've both plateaued emotionally. Use the first person (I) instead of the second person (you) point of view when speaking. When emotions are high, hearing the word "you" over and over again will make anyone feel attacked, and that's not what you want. Instead of attacking the teenager about their bad attitude, try to make them understand how their words and actions make life harder for the people around them, including you. For example, try saying: "I feel bad when you speak to me this way" instead of "you have a bad attitude." "I get exhausted between working and cleaning up after everyone at home" instead of "you never clean up your messes." "Your father/mother is going through a rough patch right now" instead of "you need to be nicer to your mother/father." Pay attention to the situations that seem to elicit the worst behavior from your teenager. It may be that your child is most irritable immediately after school, but that they calm down after they've had a snack or nap. It may be that they act out more when they have a lot of work for school, or when they're fighting with a friend or significant other. By being alert to the situations that trigger your teen's worst behavior, you have a choice to either give them more leeway or to proactively lessen their stress. Be proactive by making their lives easier: have snacks waiting in the kitchen after school; help them with their homework; etc. While it's very difficult to watch your child go from a sweet, loving child to a combative teen, you have to remember that to a certain degree, their backtalk has nothing to do with you. Beginning with early adolescence (age 12-14), a healthy child will begin to develop a new and, to them, groundbreaking awareness that adults, including their parents, are not infallible. As they're struggling to reconcile what they've always thought about you with this new realization that you are a flawed human being, it's perfectly normal for them to lash out from time to time before they learn how to relate to you as one adult to another. Remember that it's not just your child. Talk to your friends with similarly-aged children, and you'll find that all teenagers act out to some degree. Bad behavior in a child is infuriating, and it's very difficult to get beyond the frustration you rightly feel. However, it'll be much easier for you to keep your cool if you try to consider the experience from their perspective. Think back to your own adolescence odds are high that you said your own share of hurtful things to your parents. Some things to remember about life from your teenager's point of view include: Egocentrism, or the belief that their interpretation of the situation is the only possible correct interpretation is a normal part of cognitive development. Your child's brain is developing the capability to grow beyond egocentrism, but it's not finished yet. For example, when they were three, they might stand in front of the TV and not understand that just because they could see the TV didn't mean that others in the room could see through their body. As teenagers, they've developed beyond that but there's still a ways to go. Your teenager's brain is developing in a way that allows them to grasp abstraction in a new way, and for the first time. Injustices seem to be everywhere but without the wisdom that comes with life experience, and without the cognitive ability to flesh out the logical repercussions of their abstract thinking. Because of this, they get incredibly worked up about things that seem insignificant from an adult's perspective. But remember that their brains are still developing important cognitive functions that will allow them to see the way you, as an adult, do with time.
What is a summary of what this article is about?
Don't raise your voice. Try to keep your teenager calm. Think before you speak. Breathe. Remove yourself from the situation. Don't be accusatory. Anticipate problem periods. Don't take their comments personally. Change your perspective on the behavior.