TEEN ACTS BORED WHEN TALKED TO
PARENT: My teenager won’t talk to me without being rude. He
yawns, uses body language that says he wants to leave and sighs a lot. It
is very annoying, so I end up yelling at him. I want to communicate with
him. How do I do it?
SANDY: Choose to talk to him on his time --when he wants to
go meet his friends or watch a TV program. When he starts acting bored,
use boredom to get him to be more civil; “I have three things I want to
talk to you about, David. I
will start with the first item; should you choose to act bored or be rude
in any way, I will start what I said over again. When I get to item number
three, if you choose to act annoyed or bored, I will start everything I
have said so far over again.”
You can’t make a child behave by yelling at him--you can
invite him to behave by boring the snott out of him. Because he wants to leave, he may check to see if you mean
what you say, and he will give up --as long as you do exactly what you
said you would do.
Copyright (C) Sandy Spurgeon McDaniel, 2000