See this book on parenting to regain control at home
NEW YORK (AP) There’s a difference in parenting between a little backtalk and kids actually bullying their grown-ups.
Yes, you heard that right. Parent and family therapist Sean Grover writes in a new book, “When Kids Call the Shots,” that a generation or two ago, it would have been unthinkable for children to bully their parents without consequences, yet today everyone knows a parent who is bullied.
By that he means the terrible twos that turn into the terrible tweens that turn into the terrible teens that become the terrible college years.
Turning that around, he said in a recent interview, means coming up with new strategies but also unpacking your own baggage in the esteem, resentment, shame, fear and anxiety compartments of your past. It ain’t pretty but letting go of old tactics - surrendering, punishing, negotiating - is a positive step.
Grover’s book offers studies from his 20 years working with families and personal stories of his own trials as the father of two girls, now 12 and 15.
While parent bullying can occur at younger ages, he focuses on adolescents. His tips cover both parents and their kids, including better vigilance of possible auditory processing disorders, dyslexia and other undiagnosed issues that may affect learning and behavior, and may up anxiety, frustration and anger all around.