Inside The Teenage Brain

"I would rather give birth to a baby elephant than raise a teenager again. It would be less painful," says Renee Cassis Hoering of New York City. "I cannot believe that my darling, sweet little girl has turned into a 16-year-old stranger who just wants money from me all the time."

After seeing his son through the teen years, Bob Mittelsdorf is in favor of the Mark Twain approach to child-rearing: "When a child turns 12, he should be kept in a barrel and fed through the bung hole, until he reaches 16…at which time you plug the bung hole."

The intensity. The sullenness. The drama - and it isn't only the rebellious kids who suddenly turn on us. When my friend's son -- a straight-A student and all-around sweetheart -- recently ended up in the hospital getting his stomach pumped because he went out drinking with friends for the first time and had no clue how much was too much, that's when I realized: There is just no predicting. Even for the most responsible kids, there is always that combustible combination of youth, opportunity, and one bad night.

As recently as 15 years ago, parents (and even scientists) threw up their hands and cried, "Hormones!" when asked why our children become so nutty around the time of adolescence. Certainly an unholy passion for Justin Bieber or Selena Gomez doesn't help, but it's hardly the whole story. For that you have to turn to science.

Vermonter, what you say is true. In earlier centuries, our differing diets meant that most girls did not acquire the body fat necessary to menstruate until they were in their mid- to late teens, which meant that they were amenable children until 15 or 16. Not long after that, it was right off to the altar or the army with them.

Kids in the past were also tranquilized with hard work—life simply demanded lots of hard work for survival, and believe me, teens are much less trouble when they’re exhausted. Close-knit communities and the control of an active church helped impose discipline from outside of the family.

I am a single mom with no family nearby, so it wasn’t always easy for me to stay in control. But I just did what my parents did: I found out what each child wanted and kept control of that thing. I told them, “I have the car keys and I have the checkbook, so if you want anything you’d better be sweet.” This worked well. My son knows well that if he is in the least insolent or unhelpful, he’ll lose his internet connection, his cell phone, and worst of all, his precious XBox (horrors!)

Keeping them busy working for what they want also helps; the only thing that kept my daughter from going off the rails in her teens was that she had to work extremely hard to pay for the riding lessons she craved, so she was too tired to get in trouble. There is no sweeter music to a parent’s ear than the sound of her beautiful 16-year-old daughter answering the phone at 9 p.m. on a Saturday night, mumbling, “No, I’m too tired to go partying, and I have to get up at 4 in the morning,” then falling into bed. Lovely!

Thank you, Dr James Dobson, for giving me the advice my late parents couldn’t.

Wow, you are a great, courageous mom. And in future years, your son will only grow in his respect, loyalty, and protection of you. I was raised in the 1950s and 1960s, and my mom did not hesitate to smack our mouth if we sassed her. Dad used the belt routinely (with restraint, of course); actually, the mere THREAT of the belt kept us in line. That era’s mantra was “Spare the rod, spoil the child” and “Children should be seen and not heard.” To this day, I monitor how I speak to my mom, and I’m pushin’ 60! I and my four siblings were saved from many a heartache by parental discipline.

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