Help Review

Posted by fxckfeelings on May 2, 2013

From Mama Rose to your average scary hockey dad, pushy parents who steamroll their kids into living out their own dreams are seen as monsters who seldom inspire real motivation. Pushing a relatively unmotivated kid into therapy instead of the spotlight might not make you feel like Dina Lohan, but the fact is, an enthusiasm gap between parent and child never bodes well. It doesn’t necessarily mean that your kid is an unmotivated, treatment-rejecting slacker, but it does mean that the intensely emotional intervention of a caring parent, whether offering treatment, discipline, or both, can make a child too reactive to others’ motivations to discover his or her own center and strength. When you want to help a difficult child, you must also learn to sell your child on the values of patience and self-restraint through example, waiting for your child to meet you halfway. Pushing a child to be mentally healthy is more valid than pushing her to be a superstar or pro-athlete, but if she don’t want it as much as you do, all you’re doing is pushing her away.
–Dr. Lastname

My daughter’s therapist is extremely expensive (hundreds of dollars, and he doesn’t take our insurance), but my daughter said the sessions helped her with her depression when it seemed like no one and nothing else could, so my husband and I took out a loan and paid for weekly treatments, which started when she was in high school and continue over the phone now that she’s in college. At the end of last semester, however, she’d flunked out of a course and now says she needs more money for personal expenses, and my husband and I have reason to think she’s drinking and partying way too much. We’re furious and my husband doesn’t want to keep “throwing money away,” especially since it’s money we have to borrow, but I’m afraid that if we confront her or reduce support for her treatment she’ll get even worse, drop out of school, and never get her degree or her mental health in order. My goal is to figure my way out of an impossible dilemma.

Ironically, endlessly searching for ways to keep your daughter safe is, in itself, a fairly dangerous proposition; if you make yourself too responsible for her treatment, she won’t develop her own values and reasons for using it and accepting its limitations. You can lead the kid to therapy, but you can’t make her think.

Until she builds her own foundation for managing her illness and its treatment, your recovery plan remains shaky. It gets shakier the more it depends on your efforts and the availability of therapists who may or may not be there when you need them, no matter what their cost.

There’s no way you won’t feel exhausted, broke, and enraged if your sacrifice doesn’t prevent relapse; unfortunately, given the recurrent nature of depression and various avoidant behaviors, relapse is always likely, which means you’re setting yourself up for a lot of fury. Adjust your goal, then, to the fact that more is less, and the key to helping your daughter is awakening and nurturing her motivation for recovery, not substituting yours.

Once your anger is out of the bag, as you note above, there’s the double danger of hurting her recovery while increasing your already overburdened sense of responsibility, which will only serve to make everyone crazy. Instead of trying to save her—spoiler alert, you can’t—use your resources to provide her with choices while treating her as the only one with authority to make them. Don’t guarantee that treatment will always work, depression won’t come back, or avoidant behavior will remain controlled. Assure her, however, that if she keeps trying to find good therapists and treatments and good reasons for managing her behavior, she will grow stronger and you will be proud of her, regardless of relapses.

If you match your contribution to her commitment, you will conserve what you have for the long haul and protect it from waste and abuse. If she’s not ready to invest in treatment, hold back, not to punish her, but to respect the fact that treatment won’t work otherwise. Once she’s ready, ask her to select the best treatment available from what’s available on a limited budget. Don’t skimp because you’re discouraged or cheap, but because the limits to your resources are real and she will make best use of treatment when she accepts that fact and works with it.

There’s nothing wrong with your feeling totally devoted to your daughter’s treatment. Remember, however, that your first task is to show her you value the strength it takes to manage a mental illness and not let it manage you. In doing so, you, not cash, can take your rightful place as the most important treatment resource she has.

STATEMENT:
“I’m afraid getting anything but the best treatment for my daughter will endanger her progress and trigger relapse, but I know that treatment won’t work until she has developed her own reasons for pursuing it and reining herself in, knowing that treatment often provides no relief or happiness in the short run. Regardless of my fears for her future, I will teach her respect for good self-care, reward any and every step she makes in that direction, and express confidence in where it will take her.”

I know my fifteen-year-old son had a hard time when he was living with my crazy, drug-abusing ex, but he’s been living with me and his very stable stepmother for the last six months and should be appreciating the effort I’ve made to rescue him and provide him with security. Instead, he swears at his stepmother, threatens to kill himself, and refuses to obey rules about curfew, homework, drugs, being respectful to his half-sister, whatever, and no amount of discipline can get him into line. I’ve also gotten him therapy and sent him for residential treatment, but after two months in Utah he came back with the same nasty mouth and stubborn attitude. I gave those doctors a piece of my mind, but it didn’t make a difference. I’m thinking of sending him back to live with his mother because her abusiveness seems to be what he deserves. I’ve given him every opportunity and he clearly doesn’t want to get better, so I’m wondering if he needs to be reminded where he came from and sent back there if he isn’t going to appreciate what I’ve done for him and show respect where it’s due. I’m out of ideas, so my goal is to find the doctor out there with the skills to remove my son’s head from his ass.

You’re right, of course, to worry about your son’s bad behavior and make every effort to limit it, but, like the parent in the case above, you’ve learned that your control is limited. Some parents try to control a problem with therapy and others with discipline, but neither works when you put primary responsibility for change on yourself or your hired hand, the doctor (even a rectal surgeon). Your efforts and those of professionals can work, but only if you can persuade your son that recovery is worthwhile.

Your opposition to his bad behavior lets him know where you stand and tells him you care, but he can’t necessarily control his bad behavior himself, and your anger, when he defies you, may well prompt him to do worse. Like the parent above, your escalating efforts will paint you into a corner from which you can’t escape without feeling like a failure and spreading the feeling to include your son and anyone you’ve recruited to help him. At this point, you’re literally helping until it hurts—not just the both of you, but his chances for positive change.

So instead of making yourself responsible for his behavior, give yourself a more reasonable assignment— tout the advantages of self-control and provide an environment that rewards it while keeping your cool. Hide anything he might want to steal (the good silver, car keys, the bad silver), offer rewards for keeping to a schedule and doing schoolwork and chores, and, in the process, protect everyone from anger and blame by keeping expectations low. Let your son know you think he’ll do better if he can get with your program, but, given his past experiences, you don’t know when that will happen.

If he runs away, welcome him back, but if he puts himself in danger, accept that he may need residential treatment. Either way, don’t change your tune; as soon as he starts to acquire self-control, he’s going to start growing and you’ll be happy to offer rewards instead of fines, disincentives, and exile.

In accepting your own helplessness, remove the shame of his control problem while making it easier to talk about. Don’t get soft on your limits, just don’t enforce them with anger and blame; you believe he will like himself better when he can control his temper and act like a decent person. You don’t expect it to be easy, but, as long as you can avoid heated confrontations and enforce rules in a friendly manner, you’re confident you can keep on trying.

Like the parent above, you know that your efforts won’t work until the time is right, so conserve your strength and bide your time. When he can use the rules you’re providing, you’ll have more to contribute. Until then, know that you’re being a good parent, and that doing that, along with being patient, will get him (and his head) onto a better path.

STATEMENT:
“I feel overwhelmed by the persistence of my son’s defiant behavior, but I know it’s not easy for anyone to stop, even if he spends months in a 24 hour residential treatment center surrounded by therapists working around the clock in 8 hour shifts. I believe I can help him control his behavior when he’s strong enough to make use of my help. Meanwhile, I have faith that patience will eventually pay off and that I’m doing the best a father can.”