Have you ever been frustrated over how to discipline your teenager? Wondered how in the heck you’re supposed to get them to do anything they’re supposed to do, without an argument?

How about this - have you ever had a knock-down-drag-out with them over a consequence you’ve attempted to impose?

My guess is, if you said yes, the fight was over a cell phone, laptop, or gaming system. Am I right?

When it comes to electronics, our teens don’t play…as one mom in the U.S. recently learned when her teenage daughter called the police when she took her cell phone away as punishment.

The daughter complained to the authorities that her mother was emotionally abusing her. That’s right.

It reminds me of the one time I decided (under peer pressure) to try to get my then 3-year-old son to behave by swatting him on the bottom with my hand. He screamed that he was calling 911 and that was the end of corporal punishment in the Coleman home.

Stay with me, I’m talking about the mistakes parents make when attempting to discipline their teens and tweens.

This is Speaking of Teens, the podcast that teaches you the science of parenting adolescents so you can be less stressed and more excited about having a teenager. I’m Ann Coleman, I’m an attorney turned parent educator and I’ve spent years studying the science of teen behavior and I want to help you learn how to parent your teens for the best possible outcome.

Maybe your kids have never called the police to report you for trying to discipline them but I’m guessing that at some point along the way, there may have been some choice words said or a few meltdowns over your attempts. And that’s really easy to understand when you step back and look at the way most of us have been taught to discipline our kids.

In most Western countries we come from a long line of folks who did more harm than good in the discipline department.

And we’re still fighting the emotional dysregulation and the uninformed parenting practices that have been perpetuated generation to generation.

And you can see it on full display in this recent story posted on Reddit from a mom who was trying her best to discipline her teenage daughter. Let me tell you about it and  then I’ll tell you what should have happened instead.

Now, if you’re going to have an argument with your teen, the cell phone is a pretty easy target. It’s basically become an extra appendage for teens and lots of adults – the surgeon general of the U.S. is even calling for black box warnings on social media apps. Very few parents (and likely even few teens) would dispute the fact that teens are far worse off with smart phones than they were before they came along.

Because our teen’s cell phone and other electronic devices cause such a problem in the home, with teens being practically addicted, many parents reach for these devices first when searching for a way to discipline. Taking a device away has a huge impact on a teenager, right? So, if you want to make an impact…

And that’s exactly what this one mom did. She said in the post that she asked her 15-year-old daughter to clean her room at 9 am and by 4 pm when she saw that she hadn’t yet done it, she walked straight into her daughters room, took her laptop from her, and asked her to hand over her phone.

Can you guess what happened?

Well, the daughter refused to give up her phone and tried to escape with it but mom wasn’t having that, so she followed in hot pursuit.

Mom chased her daughter all around the house and physically wrestled the phone from her daughter’s hands. That’s right.

The daughter then left the house, called the police from a nearby store, and reported that her mother was emotionally abusing her. The police refused to get involved, of course, since there was no physical abuse reported and the daughter told them what happened.

But wait, there’s more. Daughter comes back home and when she tried using her older sister’s phone, mom kicked the bedroom door in to take the phone from her, whereupon (that’s my legalese word – like it?) whereupon the daughter fled the bedroom via her window, went back to the same store and called the police again, who reiterated what they’d said earlier – no abuse.

Mom posted on Reddit that she’d already tried therapy for the daughter (we don’t know why – does she have a diagnosed disorder, has she been acting out…) and the daughter refused to participate.

So, mom’s question on Reddit was, “where did I go wrong and what should I do next?”

Well, as usual there were plenty of parents giving “tough love” advice like “turn off or block internet signals so you don’t have to wrestle the phone away” or “just have the plan turned off altogether until she can ‘restore your trust’”. And she got advice like “install cameras in the house”, “it’s okay that she hates you right now”.

So, what do you think? Did mom do the right thing? Did she handle it the right way? If not, where’d she go wrong?

If you’re an OG listener, and you’ve heard me for a while, you may be able to guess where I’ll start.

First, what started this entire fiasco was her daughter not cleaning her bedroom as mom asked her to do. But, if it’s not dangerous, unhealthy, unethical, illegal, or likely to close some door better left open…it is not worth having a rule about, arguing about, or rescuing them from. Anything not squarely landing in one of these categories should be left up to the teen to handle themselves.

Of course there are nuances. Let’s talk about it. So, does a messy bedroom fall into any of those 5 categories? Could a bunch of clothes on the floor, empty soda cans, papers all over the place be dangerous? A good attorney could make the argument but let’s be reasonable. Could it be unhealthy? Well, if we’re talking nasty to the level of bugs or mice, then yeah, it could be. Is it unethical, illegal, or likely to close some door better left open (and by that we mean, is a dirty bedroom going to prevent her from getting a job in the future or from finishing high school, etc.?) No, no, and nope.

So, if you go by this standard (which is generally the accepted standard from parenting experts) then it really should be left up to them if the want to live in the mess.

And the fact that a messy bedroom triggers your emotions, makes you angry, drives you nuts, should really be of no consequence. Think of the number of arguments you could avoid if you just let it go.

Having a messy bedroom really poses no threat to anyone. And guess what, they won’t grow up to be total slobs. Did you keep your bedroom pristine when you were a teenager? 99% of teenagers are messy but certainly not 99% of adults are. They do grow up and learn how to clean up after themselves.

Now, I know how hard it is to ignore a horribly messy bedroom for some people - so you do have options that may still avoid conflict.

First, let me make clear that it’s not your job to police your teens, to punish them for their transgressions or mistakes, or make them afraid to mess up. It’s your job to make sure they grow into mentally healthy, stable, responsible young adults. And the only way to do that is to teach them the skills they lack as adolescents.

What skills to they lack? Well, generally, the ability to use their executive functions because their prefrontal cortex is still programming and not fully capable of making good decisions, focusing, planning ahead, organizing, or using self-control.

And you know what will never, ever teach them those skills? Punishment. Can you teach a blind kid to see by punishing them? So, you can’t teach a kid who’s making bad decisions, make better decisions by punishing them. It simply makes no sense.

Never will punishing a kid teach them a single thing other than to fear you, hate you and rebel against you.

Parenting and discipline is about teaching. How can you teach without punishment? Well, first of all, you can allow natural consequences to occur (if there are any). Are there natural consequences to a messy bedroom? Of course, there are. If all of your teen’s clothes are dirty and, in the floor, and no one picks them up to put them in the washer, dryer, fold them and put them away, what will your kid wear?

Exactly. That’s called natural consequences because you don’t have to do anything to enforce them. Natural consequences simply occur as a result of your teen’s action or inaction. It’s a beautiful thing if you allow it to happen.

What else might happen because of a messy room? They might have a hard time finding things, might misplace homework, might not want to have company over, and it might start to really feel gross.

There is no better teaching experience than a kid deciding they’re uncomfortable enough that they need to do something (or stop doing something). I can still remember the first time I felt I should take a real bath rather than wetting the soap and towels and pretending. No lie. Kids do learn.

Now, if for some reason your anxiety or OCD or engrained parenting beliefs simply will not allow you to wait for your kid to learn naturally, you can do something else – you can negotiate. Negotiating is not a sign of weakness or giving in or allowing them to win – this is not a game – this is the relationship with your teen, their mental and emotional health and their future we’re talking about.

Negotiating is about showing them you’re listening, you empathize, you can be reasonable, and they can trust you even more in the future. If you’re reasonable they feel they can tell you things without getting mad, freaking out or punishing them.

So, if there’s something that doesn’t fit into any of those categories I mentioned, and you know you should really back off but it’s just impossible for you to do so, you can discuss it with your teen and try to reach some middle ground that’s acceptable to you both. And remember it’s not a negotiation is one side is happy and one side unhappy – from my experience with negotiating, both sides are less than thrilled (but happy they’ve agreed on something).

For me and my son, we agreed that every Saturday he would empty the garbage can in his room (after gathering up all the garbage) and pick up all of his clothes and put them in the hamper.

Did I have to remind him? Yes. And often I would volunteer to help him just to get it done. But the arguing and bickering over his bedroom stopped.

Even if this mom had been upset over an issue that did fall into one of those categories I mentioned, the conflict should have never escalated to the point of chasing her daughter around the house and wrestling something from her hands.

I talk all the time about how parents have to work on their own emotional intelligence to be able to parent without all the conflict and disconnection. That couldn’t be more relevant in this scenario. Parents are not supposed to act like children. Parents should have more emotional restraint, understand their own emotion - why they get so upset about certain things - and then work hard to regulate themselves, maintain their composure. You can’t teach when you’re so emotionally dysregulated yourself.

But you know what? I get it. I didn’t understand this a few years ago. I had unreasonable expectations; I was sarcastic and controlling and made a mess out of the relationship with my son. No one had taught me any better.

But you don’t have that excuse. I’m telling you right now, everyone can do better than this. There is never any reason to escalate a situation in this way. As a matter of fact, when emotions get high, and you realize you’re going to have a difficult time maintaining control, it’s time to remove yourself from the situation. Say you need to take a breath before you say something you shouldn’t and leave the room.

So many of us seem to think that everything is an emergency – things need to be addressed right this minute or somehow, we’ve been taken advantage of or let them get away with something.

But that’s backwards thinking. Rarely is anything an emergency. Usually, the behavior has passed when you find out about it. There’s time to calm down, think about it, make a rational decision, decide how to handle it and what to say -instead of reacting in the moment when everyone is on high alert. A messy bedroom is not an emergency. Most things can wait – even a day or two if that’s what it takes.

This mom was mad – I understand that. She was triggered by the mess. She was triggered when she saw her daughter sitting on her ass all day after asking her to clean her room. She was likely cleaning house herself and thought, “how dare she?” “I’m sweating and working over here and she’s just sitting there like a princess.”

Yeah – I get it – I’ve had those thoughts many times. And it’s those thoughts that can really send our emotions and behaviors into orbit. Our rational mind shuts down and our emotions take over. This is not discipline – this is tit for tat.

This mom’s only thought after her initial indignation was, “I’ll teach her to mess with me – I’ll take the one thing that hurts her the most.”

That’s the very definition of punishment. And again, punishment doesn’t work.

If this had been a situation where logical consequences were warranted – let’s say, mother and daughter had agreed to a simple cleaning routine and daughter had not complied last week, so mom and daughter discussed it again and negotiated a less stringent routine, yet daughter, again this week, has not complied. So, let’s say they agreed in advance that there would need to be logical consequences enforced if she did not comply a second time (but they didn’t agree on what those would be).

Is taking a cell phone away for not cleaning a bedroom, a “logical” consequence under any circumstances?

Logical meaning, it makes good sense? It’s logically related to the thing the teen doesn’t understand how to do. It somehow helps the teen learn how to do the thing they need to learn. It’s not overly broad in scope or too long or too much or taking away something the teen can never get back, or piling on top of a previously issued consequence.

How does taking a cell phone away make sense as a logical consequence here? It doesn’t.

I know it’s tempting and that some people will tell you that the consequence has to hurt. But you know what? Again, that’s not a logical consequence, it’s a punishment.

And the quickest way to cause conflict, disconnection and rebellion is to punish your teen. Just try it and see.

And the thing is, if consequences aren’t done properly, that’s all it is – a punishment. So, you can consequence yourself right into a corner with your teenager. You can take away everything, even take their bedroom door off the hinges and they will do everything in their power to show you that you can’t break them.

They will do the opposite of what you want.

Why? Because teens crave autonomy. They need to be treated like a fellow human, like you would treat any other adult – with dignity and respect. You don’t chase your spouse around the house to take something from them because they didn’t do what you asked. Would you kick in the bedroom door?

Punishment doesn’t work. Scare tactics and retribution for past acts doesn’t work. Look at the jails. If these things worked, our jails wouldn’t be near as overcrowded, would they?

Teaching people from an early age, the skills they need to succeed in the world, with love and kindness and empathy and firmness – that’s what works. Teaching teens how to do what they need to do, works – they’re very open to that.

Something else that works – having such a good relationship with your teen that they actually want to do what you want them to do.

Being so connected that they will tell you about their struggles, tell you about what’s bothering them, tell you about the decisions they’re trying to make, tell you why they’re upset or angry or vaping weed.

And if you threaten their autonomy with punishment, you’ll never have that level of connection because there will be so much animosity between you. They will be so angry and hurt that you treat them with such disrespect and like they know nothing – like they’re still a kid…that they’ll never talk to you – they’ll feel distant and disconnected from you.

This mom didn’t understand any of this. The parents advising her on Reddit didn’t understand any of this. And that makes me sad because at one point, I didn’t understand any of this.

We have to open up our minds to the fact that we can no longer parent the way our parents and grandparents did. Our teens deserve better. They deserve our empathy, our respect, our patience and kindness, just as they deserve our firmness and our unflinching dedication to insure, they learn what they need to while they still live with us and we still influence them. That influence lies in your connection with them.

You will not influence them through punishment, tough love, authoritarian (my way or the highway) parenting. You build a wall between you and almost certainly guarantee that poor behavior and lots of conflict continues.

If you want to learn how to do better, how to back up and start over, how to parent your teen in such a way that brings you closer and keeps them safe and changes their behavior for the better, that’s what you learn in Parent Camp.

You can keep wondering why things aren’t working out the way you want, or you can join today and start meeting with me and other parents every week, learn everything you need to know about parenting teens, change your family’s story.

I’ve made everything so easy for you in Parent Camp. So, if you want to work with me, and join other parents taking the same path, check out the link in the bottom of the episode description for Parent Camp.

And if you’d like to continue the conversation, come join us in the Facebook group – that link is also in the description.

Thank you for being here for another episode of Speaking of Teens. I hope you’ll consider sharing the podcast with a friend or a group of friends. My goal is to help as many parents as possible turn things around in their home, so I hope you’ll join me in that mission.

Alright, until next time my friend, remember, a little change goes a long way.