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Micromanaging teens can increase problems
Parenting
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Q: Our 17-year-old daughter is an honor student who has been accepted to three colleges. She has not been a risk taker, except with boys. Her most recent boyfriend is a wonderful kid and very smart. Apparently, they both resent our rule that a parent must be home when either of them is visiting at the other one’s home, but they’ve gone along with it, however reluctantly. We just found out that they’ve been texting about sneaking out in cars to be alone. What should we do?
A: Your question, however brief, absolutely drips with evidence that the two of you are guilty of world-class micromanagement. Your daughter is a senior in high school, an honor student and a generally sensible person whose only “crime” is that of wanting to be alone with her boyfriend, who is equally guilty where she is concerned. Sounds normal to me. In fact, it sounds downright reasonable.
For purposes of the present discussion, micromanagement is the attempt to control someone who (1) cannot be controlled or (2) has demonstrated the ability to exercise reasonably good self-control.
For micromanagement to work, both of those conditions must be false. If either condition is true, however, then micromanagement will not work, and the anxiety-driven attempt to make it work will create a wagonload of problems.
There will be times in a child’s life when micromanagement is both feasible and necessary — during infancy and toddlerhood, for example. As a child matures, the need for micromanagement decreases.
It certainly can be argued that some teens, because they have demonstrated a serious inability to make good decisions, may need to be micromanaged. Regardless, the very teen who needs it is not going to submit to it. A teen who does not need it is not going to submit to it either. Therefore, micromanagement does not work with teens. Period.
Your daughter obviously has demonstrated the ability to exercise reasonably good self-control. Therefore, the attempt to control her is going to cause many problems and solve none. In fact, your attempt to micromanage your daughter is likely to result in the very problems you are trying to prevent. With the best of intentions, you have become your own, and her, worst enemies.
Invariably, micromanagement results in four problems: deceit, disloyalty, conflict and communication problems. You have discovered that your daughter is right on the edge of trying to deceive you. One down, three to go. You and she are having conflict concerning your rules. Two down, two to go. Deceit and conflict go hand-in-hand with communication problems. Three down, one to go. From here, it’s a short step to disloyalty — the increasingly likely possibility that your daughter will decide to reject your values — values you’ve worked for more than 17 years to instill in her. That’s all four down. Is the price worth it?
You still can retrieve this situation, but you’d better be ready to eat some crow. I strongly encourage you to sit down with her and say words to the following effect: “We hope you know we have only your best interests in mind, but we have to admit we’ve made a mistake. We’ve been acting like you can’t be trusted when in fact you’ve given us no reason to believe that’s the case. We’ve made our values and expectations perfectly clear to you. You’re a smart person. You know what the consequences might be of violating them. So, we trust you to do the right thing where this boy is concerned. From now on, we’re going to stop trying to control your relationship with him. We are convinced you are capable of controlling it yourself. We love you!”
Does this approach guarantee that no problems will develop? No. No one can make that guarantee. But believe me, these two young people are far more likely to do what you don’t want them to do if you keep doing what you currently are doing. So, the solution is quite simple: Stop!

A psychologist, Rosemond answers questions on his website at www.rosemond.com.

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From the book 'Outliers' comes proof that good health is more than just genetics
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Friends Jim Young, left, Mike Natale, Jeff Natale and Ryan Kiernan were on Greenwich High School football team together and Jim and Mike were captains. Jim, who was the youngest in Sherry Young's family, was welcome in the homes of the other three boys who still had siblings around and grandparents near. - photo by Sherry Young
As I look back on my life and the lives of others, both personally and in the reading I have done, I am convinced of the necessity of positive human contact in our lives. We are doubly blessed when we are able to make good friends or are a part of a family where we are accepted and loved.

Malcolm Gladwell in his book Outliers tells of a time in the 1950s when Dr. Stewart Wolf met a physician who practiced in the area of Roseto, Pennsylvania. Roseto was settled by a group of Italian families from Roseto, Italy, who re-created their life again in America.

This was in the 1950s before drugs and measures to prevent heart disease became important. In their conversation the physician said, You know, Ive been practicing for 17 years. I get patients from all over, and I rarely find anyone from Roseto under the age of 65 with heart disease.

Wolf was surprised by these words as, It was impossible to be a doctor, common sense said, and not see heart disease.

Wolf enlisted the aid of a sociologist and friend John Bruhn to help him. They found, There was no suicide, no alcoholism, no drug addiction, and very little crime. They didnt have anyone on welfare. Then we looked at peptic ulcers. They didnt have any of those either. These people were dying of old age. Thats it.

They checked into diet, genetics and possibilities of something in the foothills of eastern Pennsylvania but nothing made sense.

What they found was that Rosetans visited one another, stopping to chat in Italian on the street, say, or cooking for one another in their backyards. (Researchers) learned about the extended family clans that underlay the towns social structure. They saw how many homes had three generations living under one roof and how much respect grandparents commanded. They went to Mass at Our Lady of Mount Carmel and saw the unifying and calming effect of the church. They counted 22 separate civic organizations in a town of just under 2,000 people. They picked up on the particular egalitarian ethos of the community, which discouraged the wealthy from flaunting their success and helped the unsuccessful obscure their failures.

What they found eventually convinced the medical establishment to look beyond the individual and understand the culture people are part of their friends, families and town they came from. They determined that the people we surround ourselves with and the values of the world we inhabit have a profound effect on who we are.

Likely, this study could have been done with other ethnicities. However, my family's experiences with the Italian families in Connecticut ring true to the study. Our hungry and growing sons, especially our youngest son, Jim, who was left home alone with two beady-eyed parents, all had some memorable experiences being fed and loved in the Cos Cob multigenerational families. Proof of the African proverb, It takes a village to raise a child.

We live in an age when the contact we have with people often is on the internet, and many of us live among strangers. Unless we make the effort to reach out, we will become isolated, especially as we age. The Rosetan study is proof that reaching out and communicating may be good for our health.
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