Parenting Teens with Love And Logic - Foster Cline MD

[JoannaK]

Parenting Teens with Love And Logic Author: Foster Cline, MD and Jim Fay Publisher: NavPress Publishing (April 19, 2006) Paperback: 320 pages ISBN-10: 1576839303 ISBN-13: 978-1576839300

Book Description
Navigating the parent-teen relationship is difficult. Teens need their parents to teach and guide them to make responsible decisions. Mood swings, arguments, and the pressures of school and peers can strain relationships even further. Parenting Teens with Love and Logic covers a broad scope of real-life issues including divorce, ADD, addictions, sex, peer pressure, school and street violence, and breaking the law. In facing these tough subjects, the book offers parents distinct ideas to help them set limits, teach important skills, and foster maturity in their teenagers.

Chapters:

1. Teenagers 101: Welcome to Parenting Graduate School
2. Love and Logic Parenting: Will It Work with Teenagers?
3. Back to the Basics, Part One: Training Teens to Act Responsibly
4. Back to the Basics, Part Two: Treating Teenagers as Responsible Adults
5. Fasten Your Seat Belt and Enjoy the Ride
6. Understanding Teens from the Inside Out: Internal Changes in Adolescence
7. Understanding Teens from the Outside In: External Changes in Adolescence
8. Ready, Set—Off into the Real World
9. How to Use Love and Logic Pearls

About the Authors
Foster Cline, M.D. is an world renowned psychiatrist, consultant to mental health organizations, parents groups, and schools across North America. Dr. Cline graduated cum laude from the University of Colorado and earned his MD degree from the University of Colorado Medical School in Denver. He spent his medical internship in the Gorgas Hospital, a federal hospital in the Panama Canal Zone. He completed his adult and child psychiatric residencies at the University of Washington in Seattle.  Cline also is a grandparent, as well as the father of three biological children, one adopted child, and several foster children.

Jim Fay brings with him over thirty years of experience as an educator, school principal, and father of three grown children. Recognized as one of America's top educational consultants, he has won many awards in the educational field.

[united for now]

I personally like the "Love and Logic" stuff. Multiple books targeting various age ranges and specific situations, seminars all over the country, different authors, a cute "story teller" way of delivering their message, and it relies a lot on consequences and promotes responsibility while helping the parent understand how their trying to be nice backfires on them.

They have many books, CD's and videos, giving parents a wide choice... .

I have a few of their books, tapes, and I have seen 2 of their seminars for teachers  )

www.loveandlogic.com/

[phew]

My mom did not parent with logic.  Her discipline was scary, full of rage.  

I want my daughter to be loved by a logical parent.  There is also a version for parenting a teen.  It is like having a mentor that can guide you through.

We can raise healthy, well adjusted children.  I know that we can or we would not even be asking each other to dialog on this topic.

[Erika]

My therapist recommended this (she has a son with adhd and it really helped her).

Erika

[Sodonealready]

I'm a bhr spec ed teacher as well as a mum (7,4,1) and thus seen just about every parenting resource out there and I LOVE is Love and Logic.

You might have seen it on PBS?  

Anyhow, the whole approach is based on the idea that mistakes are cheapest to make when kids are young and encourages parents to allow kids to make mistakes and let natural consequences teach the lessons.  Respect and empathy are maintained as life, not a mad mummy or daddy teach the lessons.  

My favorite line "We're all born with a certain number of temper tantrums in us -- let's hope our kids get most of them out of their system before they're out of our house."  That so  made me think about my mother who tantrums in her 60s more than most preschoolers.  

I have done a bit of PR for this approach in our local papers... .

Sodone

[motwgk]

Love and Logic parenting: best books I've ever read.

[twojaybirds]

Parenting with Love and Logic.

It is an awesome system for typical kids used in schools, including me working with  kids with behavioral disorders.

And once my dd was diagnosed and I started reading about responsibility, validation etc I saw how Love and Logic would be effect for her as well.

[qcarolr]

The Parenting Teens With Love And Logic: Preparing Adolescents for Responsible Adulthood, Updated and Expanded Editio book was revised in 2006 and includes actual references to "disordered" or "difficult" children and neuroscience based research impacts. It also has a great definition of 'adolescent' that includes my DD26 in her emotional age vs. her chronical age. It talks about disordered parents and the limits of this method - ie. get professional help when love and logic don't work. It addresses many of the more dangerous issues in our world today.  I think I got the most out of this book of the three.

The chapter "What Love and Logic Is Not" goes over their experiences with misuse of their program, and the impacts of unhealthy home situations (ie. BPD parent in the picture)

So this would work with siblings and stepkids that do not have BPD, but have   . That is how it is working with my gd.

I think it has also given me more perseverance in the boundaries I need to take care of myself with DD too. It does put parent self-care as a priority - we have to model taking good care of ourselves for our kids. And I am able to put gd's needs first, and limit my enabling actions with DD without the discomfort I have experienced in the past. She is a grown up and I am treating her like it -- she gets to make her own choices and I am not going to rescue her or be her victim. AHHHHH - this feels so good.

qcr

[Free One]

The best resource, hands down, that I've come across (and I've read a lot; including Parenting a Child With Intense Emotions) is the Love and Logic series of books.

They are quick, easy to read and give you immediate advice to put into place. This helped me calm down, which helped my son calm down. It gave me skills to teach him how to handle his emotions.

I even follow Love & Logic on Facebook and Twitter - they often put out helpful reminders.

[mamachelle]

When you go to Amazon.com and search for “Parenting with Love and Logic” the page is full with over two dozen different books/cds/lesson plans in the series.

Be sure you are looking at the newest versions, published 2006 to 2010. They have been updated giving weight to the complexities and increased risks in today's world. They also acknowledge those situations where the ‘attitude of love and logic’ and strategies to apply these can be abused or misused. This is especially relevant for us here at bpdfamily.com, living with family suffering mental illness, especially PD’s.

Some ideas I discovered are very much supported by other tools, skills and attitudes I have learned here at bpdfamily.com. The most important:

• Parental self-control: essential so we can model what we desire from our kids. Self-care leads me to self-control to ease my resentments, anger, and fears.

• Support network imperative: surround myself with responsible people with strong self-concepts to give the strength to endure.

• The younger we start building this path to responsibility in our kids, the better they will learn the tools for their lives as teens and young adults. And it is never too late to learn.

[qcarolr]

I am discovering myself using love and logic ideas in my daily life with my gd8 and dd27 in spite of my resistance to change. They work better for the 8 year old with ADHD. She is our gd that we have custody of since infancy. Maybe she has less negative experience interference and a more flexible mind/heart. I do see DD responding to my modeling of these strategies with gd at times.

"Parenting Teens With Love And Logic: Preparing Adolescents for Responsible Adulthood" is set up in 3 parts:

• Love and Logic Principles

• Developmental stage

• Specific strategies and examples called “Pearls”.

I'll comment on the first part – Love and Logic Principles. These are basically the same in all the Love and Logic books.

The Principles:

• Set enforceable limits

• Give people choices

• Allow consequences with empathy

The following assumptions are listed as needed for success in applying Love and Logic:

• Build in the flexibility needed for individuality of each person and the variety of family structures we live in now.

• Principles will not be abused; parents will always intervene in life-threatening situation; parents are caring and loving. Parents who are abusive may not recognize or acknowledge this in themselves.

• Presume stability in genetics and social/family structure.

IMHO the last two assumptions can make the Love and Logic principles hard to apply in many of the family situations brought to bpdfamily.com or it may limit the effectiveness or require adaptations when sharing parenting with BPD partners/ex's and by grandparents raising grandkids. We may be struggling with a neglectful or abusive parent and the genetics and social/family structures are indeed often unstable.

There is a lengthy discussion of the types of parents and how love and logic proposes a “consultant parent” model. The others are helicopter, drill sergeant, and laissez-faire (or abdication of parenting). I have been a mix of all these at times with both DD27 and gd8. Reading this section really brought this to my attention, and I am motivated to work at being more consistent in my style, even if not totally ‘consultant’.

Becoming a consultant parent involves a shift from telling our kids what to do, how to do it, when to do it with ‘limits’ towards asking questions to guide them to solutions. And we have to give their problems back to them first before we can offer this guidance to get their needs met. This is also a hard task for me – a rescuer mom so often getting in the way of my girls lessons!

[qcarolr]

So from the books I have gotten some strength and perseverance in coping with gd's behaviors - it is really a tough love approach. The love (empathy) piece comes at the end, uses very neutral parent emotion, and puts consequences near the beginning. So very backwards from what has worked best with DD26 (SET, Validation, Values based boundaries, Acceptance). Yet, it works with gd7. With DD this would push her anger into a long rage - and would have as a child too. With gd she yells, starts to throw something -- and I seem better able to stop her with warning of consequence and she is able to rethink it, calm herself, and make a better choice, followed by hugs and tickles and moving on. She is more relaxed in general and more affectionate with me.

The Grandparenting With Love and Logic: Practical Solutions to Today's Grandparenting Challenges book has some good advice for various 3 generation situations. It supported many of our decisions with DD and gd. The examples are a little outdated - published in 1994. Basic content seems accurate - ie. get legal advice if needed to protect your rights to seeing you grandkids, how to manage difficult r/s with SIL or DIL, etc. Supports the importance of the r/s with granchild and has some good suggestions.

Some comments I extracted in reading “Grandparents With Love and Logic” that apply to my situation and many others balancing grown kids and our grandkids living in chaos:

I love you, and I hope your life goes well.

You are able to learn from your mistakes. You are bright enough to learn and strong enough to handle the pain that comes from unwise choices you’ve made.

There is a lot of good, basic parenting knowledge to be gained here.

Choose the book(s) that apply to your situation then adapt them to your child or grandchild’s individual situation, especially if your child or their other parent is suffering from a PD.

One other books in this collection that I read is:

The original “Parenting with Love and Logic” is focused on the younger child to school age children. Their developmental stage requires more concrete language and goals.  The original book I had was first published in the early 1990’s, and I really resisted what the authors had to say as I raised a very difficult little girl who is now BPDDD27. The strategies seemed too harsh. They felt like a set up to my child to get into trouble, hoping a lesson would be learned. I believed they would not work at all with my DD27 when she was a child. Perhaps this is because I was not ready to take in the information provided – I had a lot of growing up to do too. And I had never heard of BPD.

I realize now that I did not understand, or have my own self strength, to get the LOVE part. It is the empathy, sharing of sorrow, validation skills that support all the logic strategies.

The newer versions reflect this emphasis more clearly.

[ScarletOlive]

Here are 50 free pdfs on Love and Logic
www.loveandlogic.com/t-Free-Articles-and-Handouts-for-Parents.aspx

Examples:
Have a Plan for Dealing With Peer Pressure    
Keep Teenagers Safe Behind the Wheel    
Prom: A Night of Many Decisions for Teens   
Teenagers and Spring Fever   
You Can Save Your Child's Life   
What's More Important: GPA or Character?    
When It's Time for Them to Get a Life   

[lbjnltx]

After all is said and done... . after all the "special skills" I learned to parent a child w/emerging BPD... . there really are none outside of the scope of good parenting.  The skills need to be used more intensely and consistently than most children need... . yet they are the same skills.  Keeping the big picture in mind while managing each crisis is difficult for even the best of people/parents.  Love and logic can be difficult to hold in the forefront of our minds when our children are so often in crisis.  Yet we must for their benefit in the long run.

Having a road map to follow can help keep us focused when we are confused, afraid or feeling like giving up. 

Take advantage of any resource that helps.

[Skip]

Date: Mar 2013Minutes: 5:56
Sample Clip - Love and Logic Keys to Helping Kids Cope with Divorce

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