When working with an adolescent, you have to ascertain the adolescent’s behavior, by gathering data from the adolescent as well as the parents. It is critical to tell the parents how their own behavior impacts that of their children; how they live life, how they relate to God, how they relate to each other, and how they solve problems. In order to guide, sometimes direct the behavior of your child, you must change how you relate to the child. You must change how you live life, relate to God and each other as well as how to solve problems. As you change to become patient and kind, protective and trustworthy, you will be demonstrating how you want them to behave. God can affect change within these kids, by the changes that you allow God to make within you. You will learn how to model Christ-likeness, hold them accountable, live out Agape love, by having consistent rules and discipline. Ephesians 6:4 says, “Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.” The passage is basically saying that you will make your kids crazy, if you don't give them spiritual safety. 

Their spiritual security comes from seeing parents live an authentic, realistic Christian faith. So, rather than yelling, screaming and terrorizing these kids, they need to hear you say, “I could be wrong or forgive me, or I need to think and pray.” After giving all of the kids a questionnaire, I showed the results to the parents, and explained the basic things about each one. Mike has no process for solving problems or discussing issues. He's impatient and comes across boastful, and can seem to be proud. When he is easily angered, he manipulates and lies, takes money and doesn't tell you, hides his grade card or changes it. Doing all of these things, he provokes you, and he's not trustworthy. He doesn’t know how to work with you or God, so he doesn’t face problems or admit he's wrong. He just does what he has learned to do to survive. He knows he is not doing well, and feels like a failure. Mike has tried to tell you what you want to hear; and every time you yell and scream. He can rightly say, “Here they go again. They're picking on me.” You buy into this false guilt, and then he's in charge, by manipulating you. 

Joe has the same types of things as Mike: impatience, unkindness, pride, easily angered, not trustworthy, and negative. He doesn't have a process for problem solving or dealing with life issues. He assumes the worst and runs on fear, showing more emotion than Mike. Joe has higher scores on hopes, perseveres and never fails. His concept of God is somewhat better than Mike’s. Aaron had a bit more trouble with patience and kindness. It looks like he has had a process of thought, prayer, and submission to God in the past. He has trouble with pride, which is basically hatred against God's authority, so he will also provoke you. He is easily angered, and upset with himself. He also has a negative attitude which looks for the worst, and has trouble trusting God. He also feels like a failure. 

These three adolescents have a tendency to avoid reality and be manipulative. With both parents being strong-willed, and both with active personalities, they go quickly from perception to anxiously reacting, when they get into a conflict. These three adolescents have discernment. That comes from being cunning and objective, in order to plot and scheme, to manipulate people and make them feel false guilt. These three look for ways to exploit the extremism of their parents. Through manipulation, the kids are getting away with murder. The parents are giving them the ability to do that, because the parents don't know how to stop, think and pray. Every time the parents go off, the kids capitalize on it, and find ways to do more junk. Add the in-laws, the ex-spouse coming to make more demands, infuriates the wife, and it all becomes chaos and pandemonium. 

The treatment plan says to have an initial session with the guardian or parents. Get the family history, and give the questionnaires to the kids and parents. Use the specific questionnaires for the kids about how they treat their parents. Give the parents ones that show how they treat their kids, and also the marital questionnaire. Score and analyze all of them to learn all of the personalities involved in the family. While his three boys were passive, her son from her first marriage was active-sincere. 

Using all of this information, I explained to the parents that this was about two things: the parenting process and spiritual understanding. I set up individual sessions with each child separately, and then with the parents together. Once that was complete, the entire family came together to talk about the problems, listening to each other and getting to the heart of the matter. You teach them a new way to communicate using the process of patience. Once you get the chaos calmed through the discipline program, you can address both marital and parental issues. None of that is easy or smooth and it takes time. But the treatment is correct. 

Here's what happened. The parents were willing to work with me. They had had so much damage that for probably three-four months, it was touch and go. They would still fight. They would scream and yell. They would come to counseling fighting. But their initial commitment to God was sincere. The woman had never read the Bible. They just didn't know what it meant to be a Christian. I took them through the process of patience, and we established an agreement. Whenever they had conflict, they would use the process. They had a standing joke when they first tried to do this, and tried to say, “It appears that you're doing this, or that,” the woman would say instead, “It appears that you're being stupid.” It took a lot of refinement time, but I kept reminding them of the concepts each time I'd see them. We reviewed the concepts of rudeness, pride, selfishness, God's grace. We practiced the process of patience through role plays: state your facts, state your feelings. What are your perceptions?

Through that practice they began to change, became less violent, and found more answers. They calmed down more. At the same time during those sessions, I explained how to use the discipline program.  It is important for the children to clearly know what is expected and how they can choose to respond. The discipline program basically is establishing simple rules, such as “speak in a calm voice, respect the person you are speaking to, make your bed, respect your parents.” Find that discipline sheet to see how it works. You'll notice that it says, make up the rules on the top of it. In a session with parents, I use my computer to type them up on the spot. Sometimes, they need help finding rules. We talk about the things your children do that you don't like and other times the unspoken rules in your house. That helps get them started.  Make each rule a direct statement that is positive such as: “You will pick up your clothes every night.” “Speak kindly to each other.” Make a list for each child by name such as, “Rules for Mike.” 

           The very first step is the parents make the rules based on First Corinthians 13, verse four through eight. Parents have the final world word on what the rules are. Step two is how you administer them. It's a very basic process. Let's say that Mike is told, “You've broken the rule by hitting your brother.” You state that you broke the rule. Then the second step is you say, “Now this is a warning.” This was very difficult for these parents. They were so used to going from a perception of an infraction to a discipline reaction like a smack in the head, scream or curse, that they said to me, “This is no good. This kid is getting away with murder.” I explained that the purpose of the warning is to empower them to think and then to choose to change their behavior. The parents had to trust God to help them learn how to do this. God deals with us this way, by giving us choice. After this is a warning and identifying the rule that was broken, the third step is to say nothing else, and walk away. If the child chooses to break the rule, then they pay a consequence. Previously, the parents had tried consequences, but they were too severe like grounded for a week, and lost your bicycle for a month.

           Consequences have to be short, repeated, while increasing in duration or intensity. Only if it is age appropriate or as a last resort, the consequence culminated with a spanking. The three levels of consequences are 1) age-appropriate time in isolation from others, toys, and media, 2) additional time in isolation or a second type of consequence like doing an unpleasant task, and 3) a spanking if appropriate or a fine (added chore or money) for older kids. If additional infractions occur in the process of doing the consequence for the first rule infraction, another warning and consequence are established. For example, on his way to isolation, he kicks the wall. You point out that he chose to break another rule, and have an additional consequence. Usually, the child picks up that they're not allowed to manipulate. 

As these consequences pile up, the child will realize that they are only hurting themselves and start to make better choices. If the child is extremely stubborn and continues to act out, put their present privileges “on hold” and walk away.  A parent can say, “Since you continue to throw your food on the floor, you are losing your choice to play freely outside, look at the tablet, etc. during or after you eat, until you clean up the floor and apologize.”  Eventually, they will discipline themselves after your simple warning, once you start this cycle.  You start to reach their minds, which is what you're after in the first place.

You don't want your kids living in confusion from inconsistent discipline and your emotional, reactionary behavior. You want them to think. For example, the child is in isolation. After the amount of time, the parent goes to the child and says, “Why are you here?” You want to be sure the child knows why. “Because I chose to break the rules.” That is your opening to ask him, “Do you want to talk about this?”  “Do you want to pray about this?” They have to choose. If he says no, then you say, “Look, what you did was wrong, but your worth and value come from God. I am not mad at you. But when your actions, by your choice, break the basic principles of Jesus which is what we live by, then I'll confront you, and you'll have consequences. I won't do this out of anger, but I won't relent, and it's going to be consistent.” By doing this, you're separating the crucial actions from worth, because conditional love says, “What you do, determines your worth.” As a parent, you need to make good choices and discipline out of love and not emotions. If you display emotional parenting, you are open to being manipulated into false guilt by the child for your behavior. That moves the attention away from the child, and puts the parent on the defensive. This is what happened in this family.