Readers Rally ‘Round Abused Mom
By Kathryn H. Kidd
When I looked in my email box on Thursday and saw only one
letter in it — and that letter was spam — I was disconsolate
over the fate of our Mormon Mama who wrote in for help
with her abusive son. But you Meridian readers hadn’t
let me down! Tucked into my 249-letter spam folder
were 43 (count ‘em!) gems of wisdom from loving readers
who wanted to help an unknown friend.
Today and for at least the next couple of weeks, we’re going
to print many of those letters and give hope to Mormon
Mama — and to the other parents out there who are in
similar situations. As you can see from our first anonymous
plea, Mormon Mama isn’t alone:
Please
print the follow-up article as to how to best deal with
this problem sooooooon.
Anonymous
Is today soon enough, Anon? And by the way, you weren’t the
only anonymous writer this week. Sometimes people like
to bask in the fame they get when their letters are
published in Circle of Sisters, and other times they’d
rather fly under the radar. There are lots of radar-flyers
for this particular topic! Here’s another one:
I can hardly wait to hear
the advice forthcoming about dealing with abusive children.
I have a 13 1/2-year old boy who fits the same description
as the mom who wrote about her son. In fact, it sounds
like I could have written the letter! Not only
is he verbally and sometimes physically abusive towards
his father and me, disobedient and a general stinker,
but he refuses to go to Church, is belligerent
whenever anything related to the Gospel comes up, and
mocks his younger brothers for their goodness.
Balance that with being a good-looking, clean-cut, straight
A student and athlete. I love my son, want
the best for him, have taken him to church every Sunday,
never missed a day praying morning and night as
a family nor skipped a single daily Family Scripture
Study, weekly FHE — all the things I thought would inoculate
him against the follies of the world. What happened???
I am a convert, my husband
a 7th generation member, descendant of Parley P.
Pratt and we have both served missions. This isn't
what we envisioned parenthood would be like! I
know there are lots of promises regarding his long-term
welfare, but getting through each day is quite
the marathon! "Endure to the End" of
the day sometimes seems beyond my strength.
Bring on the advice!!! By the boatload, truckload,
handcart-full, whatever!
Worried Mom in Michigan
(PLEASE withhold my real name!)
Your letter was a real eye-opener, Worried. When people are
hostile and abusive, it’s easy to categorize them as
bad eggs, but your son shows what a fallacy that is.
It sounds as though he excels in school. I don’t know
whether that compounds the pain for you or gives you
hope that if you can get over this crisis you’ll have
a great son on your hands, but whichever it is I hope
you can find some help here.
Here’s a note from another desperate mother:
When
I read that letter I thought "wow, that's me!"
My son is 16 years old and strong in the Church, but
when he loses his temper he will verbally and physically
abuse me even in front of his siblings. We've had to
call police on him, which made me feel like the worst
mom on the planet!
Now
we have our bishop involved as well as the Scout leaders.
We also have our son in therapy and my husband and I
are in counseling to deal with how this has affected
our marriage. One thing I learned is that I had to stop
feeling guilty. Sure, I've made mistakes as a parent,
but that does not give my son the right to abuse me.
He has the right to feel angry but not the right to
abuse.
Letting
go of the guilt opens your heart and mind to the Lord's
guidance on how to successfully parent. Stay close to
the Gospel to give you the strength and the inspiration.
Candice
Calgary, Alberta
Thanks for writing, Candice. Yours is the first letter to
mention that your son’s problems have affected your
marriage, but a situation like this can’t help but have
a domino effect. You can’t throw a rock at a window
without disturbing the whole piece of glass. Not only
do you have to deal with your relationship with the
problem child, but the parents also have to work through
the issue with each other and with each other child
in the family. This is a difficult situation, as you
can no doubt attest.
Here’s another family that needs help — one that brings a
medical condition into the mix.
Unfortunately,
I have a 17-year-old son that is abusive to me and my
husband. I am the one home with him most of the
time so I of course get the brunt of his anger.
My son is also abusive to things such as walls, furniture,
knick-knacks, etc. He throws, kicks, and hits
anything and everything. I want and need help,
as well. My son has been diagnosed as bi-polar
to make it worse. He is addicted to legal and
illegal drugs and going to drug counseling and seeing
a psychologist for his mental illness.
I
feel like a failure as a mother and my husband feels
like a failure as a father. This is our fourth
and last child so I don't have to worry about small
children being subject to his nasty temper. Any
help would be so appreciated.
Ann A.
Thanks for writing, Ann. You and Candice have both brought
up something that is a major issue here, and that issue
is guilt. Unfortunately, the people around us often
compound that sense of guilt by advice that is well-intentioned
but that doesn’t help the situation. We have received
several letters from well-meaning readers who told Mormon
Mama that if she had just (fill in the blanks), she
wouldn’t have the problem she is enduring today.
I sent those letters to a friend who has a large family.
About two-thirds of her children are the kind of people
that anyone would be proud to parent. The rest of them
have severe challenges. This is what she wrote back:
If
I had only had some of my children, I could say, “Well,
if you would do it just like me, then you, too, could
have success.” But the Lord was kind enough to
give me some real challenges, and I am without glib
and pat advice now. Parents can do many things to nurture
and encourage, but you are dealing with an eternal spirit.
And for some people nothing would ever work. They
have to be on their own rough journey.
I
said to my son when he was in the drug rehab, "Is
there anything we could have done to have spared you
this experience? Anything we have done wrong?
Could we have loved you more or differently? Taught
you differently? Anything?”
He
said, "I would have chosen this with any set of
parents. I just have to test the boundaries in
life. It's who I am.”
So
now I view parenthood differently. It is more like
being on a mission and being assigned companions.
Sometimes the strongest people get assigned the angry
and rebellious ones, because they will be able to hang
on and bless them. I really love my mean-spirited daughter
and my boundary-testing son, just as I love my angel
youngest child and my enormously creative and bright
daughter. I don't label them — that is just a way to
demonstrate how different, different they each are.
I
remember when I used to think that everybody could have
perfect grades if they just followed a few simple rules
like I did. I thought, fat people deserve to be fat.
Parents with angry children deserve it. Poor people
deserve it. I just can't stand that attitude.
Live a little longer, I think to myself now, and watch
the Lord break your heart — because he can't do a thing
with you when you are so smart. We live in the time
described by Paul when “their children shall oppress
them.” These kids grow up with a sense of entitlement
and often they just persecute their parents that they
aren't being given enough. Make my life easy in every
way, they demand.
These
are crazy times. If you have a challenge in life, it
may be that you were given that challenge because you’re
the one who is strong enough to endure it.
There you have it — advice from a mother who is still in the
trenches, and who has seen it all. But many more of
you have good things to say. Read on!
I am a mother of three
children. Our eldest, a girl, is almost 17. Our second
is a son, almost 13, and our youngest, girl, just turned
5 a few months ago. Our “problem” is with our son.
He is very disrespectful, defiant, disobedient, self/strong
willed, blames everyone else for all his wrong choices,
constantly negotiates everything in life, never accepts
no for an answer, and has anger issues. I am afraid
to think that he will be no different than the son of
the lady who wrote in to you.
We have tried putting his
name on the temple prayer roll, fasting/praying, talking,
lecturing, and everything else from “kind and gentle”
to “mean and rough.” We have constantly focused on
teaching gospel principles and have tried as best we
could to enforce the prophet’s Joseph’s idea of “teaching
correct principles” and then having the children “govern
themselves” as much as is appropriate for their ages.
To date, he continues to
lie, cheat, steal, be disrespectful and all those other
lovely things. Today, we just caught him stealing money
from his five-year-old sister, who worked hard to earn
money for a doll that she really wants. She went to
the store, priced it, and we wrote down the 20 “sticks”
on the white board (each representing a dollar), then
she happily has set off on doing 20 chores for $1 each
to earn the money she needs to buy the doll. So far
she has earned $10. He took $4 from her little wallet,
and claimed he had had it all along in his bank. What
do you do, as a parent (once you pick up the pieces
of your heart off the floor)?
Continually praying, and
following the promptings of the Spirit is all we can
do. Having attended Al-Anon (because of my brother)
we have learned quite a bit about boundaries. You cannot
force another person, not even your own son, to do something.
However, you can draw the boundaries that are
acceptable to you. (In fact, you must draw boundaries.)
Then you explain those boundaries to the child, and
let him know the blessings of abiding by those boundaries,
and the consequences of not abiding by them. When the
“consequences” time arrives, there is no need for anger
or fights or anything. It is a cut-and-dried case of
“you crossed the boundaries, and this will now be the
consequence” — then enforce the consequence ever so
calmly.
We have told our son that
we cannot force him to do anything. He is free to walk
away and leave the family, and break our hearts, and
make life miserable for himself if he wishes. That
is not what we wish. We want him to be happy, and have
great freedom in the world, and have many friends, and
have a good education, and be close to the Lord and
enjoy the blessings of belonging to a good family.
But he can only have all of that if he is willing to
sacrifice for it.
That sacrifice includes
getting along with others, keeping the commandments,
following the Lord by obeying Him, and doing his part
within the family that he helped choose before he came
to earth. He can be happy by doing what is right, or
miserable by doing whatever he wants. We are willing
to let him “crash-n-burn” if that is what he chooses.
My husband said it best:
“the price of having the prodigal return to you, is
that he will squander all of his inheritance.” That
is the price, and as parents, though it is heart-wrenching,
we must be willing to allow our “prodigal children”
to do that, if the time ever comes.
I pray that since our son
is young still, there is hope that he will not turn
into a “prodigal.” But if he does, we must be ready
to step aside and allow him to make his choices. Our
part is to keep faith, teach him the Gospel, and to
keep our own covenants. If we do this, we have a sacred
promise from the prophet Joseph that “the eye of the
Shepherd is upon him and sooner or later, he will return”
to us and his Heavenly Father. He will not be lost.
Teri Nine
Plano, Texas
Thanks for a thought-provoking
letter, Teri. You and your husband have real courage,
in allowing your son the freedom to succeed or to fail.
I’m so glad your courage is coupled with the faith that
he will not be lost.
Here is another letter
from a gentleman who has been in the trenches — but
this one is from the perspective of being on the far
side of the conflict.
Reading this article certainly brought back some painful memories.
Hopefully this letter will give you some hope and let
you know you are not alone.
To try and tell you what to do and how to respond would be
best left to the professionals, what I can do is convey
our experience and how it was resolved.
Our son was born profoundly deaf due to a virus and had other
physical issues as well. However, due to the hard work
of his mother he grew up with good communication skills
and physically fit.
He had always been somewhat physical in his emotional expression,
but things seem to come to a head during junior and
senior high school. More and more when he was angry
he would curse or swear at his mother and in extreme
cases would push or shove. This was not a result of
frustration in communication as some might think. The
whole family signed very well and were always there
when he needed to “talk.” My wife was very patient
and endured this abuse.
How we dealt with the foul language was to ignore it. I don’t
know if this was right or wrong, but our thought was,
“They are just words and can’t really hurt us.” Of
course we explained how inappropriate swearing was and
tried to downplay it and not give him the reaction he
was looking for. We felt he was using those words
for the shock value.
His sisters often were around during these exchanges, and
we explained to them how we felt and what our response
was going to be.
Towards the beginning of high school he also began doubting
his sexual orientation, and as you can imagine this
led to more discussions and further confrontations.
He had never been physical with me (I was a lot bigger
and stronger); however, his treatment of his mother
often left me on the verge of taking some kind of action.
I can vividly remember the night of our last clash. He was
furious and we ended up in a shoving match. Neither
of us was physically hurt but I ended up in tears, knowing
my response was not one the Savior would have used.
After that night I vowed I would love unconditionally and
felt reassured that it was the correct decision.
Well, it’s five years later the abuse has stopped, he has
matured, and he seems much more at peace.
Is the answer as easy as “unconditional love”? I doubt
it. What I do know is that patience, love, and
controlling your temper will definitely help in dealing
with this.
Mike
in Canada
I’m glad that unconditional
love is what it took in your family, Mike. The Christlike
qualities of “patience, love, and controlling your temper”
can never hurt! I’m also glad you’re wise enough to
understand that this may not be enough in other situations.
How fortunate we are to have the opportunity for spiritual
guidance to help us in problems that are different from
family to family!
I
can imagine the dilemma you are in! You
have my sympathy and my heart goes out to you.
I also had a child who was at the time 10 years old
and started to show rebellious traits and attitude towards
me. I prayed to the Lord and asked
for guidance and the answer that came clear to me was
'homeschooling'. I was very resistant to
the idea because how could I stand the idea of being
with a monster all day in my home when school provided
that temporary relief and shelter for me! But
I was willing to be obedient to the will of the Lord
and listen.
It
has now been almost 2 years of homeschooling my son,
who is now 12 years old. The changes
have been tremendous because he is not under the influence
of attitudes from teenagers and young people any more.
He is no longer being influenced by peer pressure or
being taught about moral relativism (meaning there is
no right or wrong in your decisions).
I
believe if you put your trust in the Lord and ask him
what is best for you and your son then you will be enlightened
and know what to do. I know my situation
was that I needed to pull my son out of the public schools
and homeschool him. I have seen the tremendous
attitude change and rebellious streak dissolve.
Believe
me, the road is not easy — but don't give in or give
up! There will be plenty of tears and trials but
ask for strength in the Lord to help you and your son.
I hope you will receive answers to what you need to
do for your son. Many well meaning
people can give their advice and opinions, but only
you can make the right decision through prayer and faith.
My
experience at the time was when I decided to homeschool
I had so many negative opinions from many friends and
family that felt I was making a big mistake and would
turn out a warped and socially backwards child.
If I had listened to their advice I would have certainly
missed my opportunity with helping my son, but thankfully
I resisted the opinions of others (respectfully) and
only trusted in God and his answer that I was given.
Remember Proverbs 3:5: “Trust in the Lord with all
thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.”
Celeste Tipiani
Roy Utah
Before we close today,
I have two letters that point to books that parents
may want to read to help them with rebellious children.
Here they are:
I
can't say my teen son has ever spoken to me the manner
you describe, but I have felt his dissatisfaction in
other ways. Terry Warner's book Bonds
That Make Us Free gave me hope and practical
ideas of things I could consider in dealing with my
son. It will give you a lot to consider in dealing any
relationship. That is why we have these trials; to prepare
us for future relationships that will test our Christianity.
Sandy in Utah
**
Helpful Books, in addition
to the scriptures:
