Another parenting lesson or new skill I am having to learn, this week (since Wednesday) I am concentrating on “un-plugging”. The past few days as you may or may not have read from my blog posts I have been ranting. Sometimes I rant so that I can get to the other side, but ranting cannot persist. I also notice I talk to myself more when I am going through stressful phases. The past couple of days I have been working on un-plugging and it seems to help me stay centered.
I know all to well my ranting is not going to get my son / sons to change their ways. Especially with the new “18 year old”; I have decided to un-plug from his world specifically. It has become my mantra, when I feel myself beginning to get tense or upset about a situation, I repeat to myself “un-plug, un-plug, un-plug, un-plug” as many times as it may take. So far it seems to be helping and it brings me a certain calm, this may have to be an attitude change for me.
This does not mean I do not care about what he does or where he goes, but it helps me stay on track or have an even keel. I thought 18 would be easier and that I would be able to let go more, but now I can see this is a whole new phase in the parent and teen journey and trying to stay connected. I am grateful when I am able to stay focused on what I have control over.
Try it out and let me know if it works for you. You might have another trick to share, I can never have to many.
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Thank you for the very wise comments, and definitely one of MY problems is the fight to be right ! I do have to work on that, and just back off (un-plug towards husband as well as towards son !!!).
What my husband is doing is constantly questioning and criticizing the decisions of the staff and the therapists at the home where our son is now, and he did the same with the staff at wilderness. My husband is a lawyer so he’s good at confrontation, and the staff are getting rather exasperated with his comments. He has even brandished the UN charter of the rights of children, to say that it’s inhumane treatment that our son can’t communicate freely with us and with friends, and can’t make decisions himself. And yet my husband knows very well that our son has made a whole series of very poor choices and decisions, otherwise he wouldn’t be there !!!
I’ve discussed with my husband several times about how he is sabotaging our son’s treatment by his constant criticism of the therapeutic methods used at the home, but he feels so strongly that therapy is worthless and isn’t going to work, that he can’t help himself from needling them all the time, and this has been going on since the first phone call with the therapist in wilderness.
During one early call, my husband launched into a lawyerly tirade against therapy, talking about the past, working on emotions, etc. etc. etc. And the therapist, after a pause, said (brilliantly), “Are you talking about your son or about yourself ?”
This is so hard and I was moved to respond. When it comes to our children, I don’t think there’s a choice. If you were to choose your husband over your son, your relationship would be in trouble since no marriage could withstand such a vast divide. If you were to choose your son, your marriage would not survive. It seems that the issues were there prior to the problems as these are reflective of value differences that are deeply ingrained both culturally and psychologically. In these things there is a choice and that choice is to learn how to live in the ambiguity without alienating your husband’s belief system, letting go of the “fight” to be right. There are many ways to accept another’s perspective without making them wrong as this is distancing. It wasn’t clear from your writing what specifically he was doing to “resist”. It’s important to remember, even though a person doesn’t trust something, it doesn’t mean they can’t change if it’s not forced on them but you let it in slowly. Ask your son if that didn’t happen to him.
There are a lot of ways that I tell parents to un-plug just in different words. Mostly though is remembering that your worry as a parent does nothing for the situation, if nothing else it adds to an already volatile conflict. If you need to simply say I would like to talk about this later, or I understand and then say nothing more. It shows support but that you are allowing them to handle the situation whatever it may be.
Anne, are you talking about posting a question on the forum? If so you have to sign into the forum to post a question, your subject about spouses not agreeing a good topic. My husband did not believe in treatment before my son went, but later gave in when he became so out of control. That is a tough one when they are in treatment, because it does not support the process for your son.
I am going to try and get the forum going so that people can post new topics. Thanks for commenting.
I can’t figure out how to post a new subject on this site, so I’m just adding this as a comment to your comment above. And on that subject, I must admit that I have had to take a clear step backward from my son’s problems and his life (he’s in a residential program and has done two stays in wilderness), because the emotional stress and worry was destrying me. If I plunge, I can’t help him either, so I am definitely trying to un-plug a bit !!!
On a completely different subject, I was wondering if anyone else has a problem with a spouse who does NOT believe in therapy or residential treatment, and who is resisting the whole idea, which makes it difficult for the staff at our son’s residential program. I trust them, my husband does not, it’s as simple as that.
If anyone has any advice, I’m rather desperate !!! I feel as if I’m being asked to choose between successful treatment for our son, or survival of our marriage. I want both !!!
All comments are most welcome.