Reluctant Teenagers
By Dr. Roger Pierangelo and Dr. George Giuliani
Introduction
One of the most difficult functions facing court officials (e.g., law guardians, court appointed therapists, and judges) is to determine the true motive behind the reluctance of a teenager to maintain visitation with a parent during separation and divorce cases. In order to fully understand the dynamics behind reluctance and the many possible motives, one must first explore the developmental characteristics and variables that influence teenagers in dealing with the stressors of separation and divorce.
The presenting problem first encountered by court officials is usually a rigid, not negotiable stance by the teenager that involves realistic reasons for the reluctance of participating in visitation. If this presenting problem is taken at face value, which all too often occurs by untrained personnel, then the teenager may actually be placed in a compromising position that will aggravate his/her already stressful situation. Instead of immediately accepting the rationale of the teenager as fact, court officials need to be aware of the variety of underlying motives that all present in the same fashion, namely reluctance.
The first step in understanding the true motive behind the reluctant teenager is to understand the difference between symptoms and problems.
How Problems Generate Into Symptoms
Dynamic or internal problems (e.g., conflicts, fears, insecurities), create tension. The more serious the problem the greater the level of tension experienced by a teenager. When tension is present, behavior is used to relieve the tension. The more serious the problem/s the greater the tension and the behavior required to relieve this tension becomes more immediate. As a result, the behavior may be inappropriate and impulsive rather than well thought out. Therefore, in some cases, reluctance may be a symptom of a deeper problem and not the actual problem itself.
When tension is very high it may require a variety of behaviors to relive the dynamic stress. These behaviors then become symptoms of the seriousness of the problem. That is why the frequency and intensity of the symptomatic behavior reflect the seriousness of the underlying problem/s.
As the teenager becomes more confident or learns to work out his problems through therapy, the underlying problems become smaller. As a result, heshe generates less tension and consequently less inappropriate, impulsive or self-destructive behavior patterns.
If a teenager does not recognize or does not have the label for the problem then the tension is usually released through some form of behavior and in case of the tension of separation and divorce, reluctance becomes the tension reducing behavior.. We call these outlets of tension behavioral symptoms. These behavioral symptoms are sometimes misidentified as problems and therefore treated as such. When this occurs the problem only gets worse. If one sees a fever as the problem, then treating that alone will exacerbate the problem. These behavioral symptoms become the first signal noticed by teachers, parents and professionals. Therefore, it is very important for court officials who are making decisions with serious implications to fully understand the difference between symptoms and problems. If this is not fully understood, a great deal of frustration will occur in trying to extinguish the symptom.
The identification of symptoms as an indication of something more serious is another first step in helping teenagers work out their reluctance.
Examples of typical symptomatic behaviors that may be indicative of more serious concerns may include the following:
-impulsivity
-reluctance
-fearful of adults
-constantly blames others for problems
-panics easily
-distractible
-short attention span
-over-reactive
-physical with others
-intrusive
-unable to focus on task
-procrastinates
-inflexibility
-irresponsibility
-poor judgment
-denial
-daydreaming
-social withdrawal
-constant use of self criticism
-lies constantly
-gives many excuses for inappropriate behavior
-fearful of new situations
-verbally hesitant
-hypoactive
-hyperactive
-fears criticism
-rarely takes chances
-moody
-defies authority
-anxious
-tires easily
-controlling
-overly critical
-forgetfulness
-painfully shy
-argumentative
-destroys property
-bullies other children
-lazy
-needs constant reassurance
-inconsistency -argumentative
While many of these behaviors may indicate the presence of a problem, several guidelines can be used to determine the seriousness of the problem/s:
1) Frequency of Symptoms--Consider how often the symptoms occur. The more serious the problem the greater amount of tension generated. The greater amount of tension the more frequent will be the need to release this tension. Therefore, the greater the frequency of the symptom, the greater chance that the problem/s are serious.
2) Duration of Symptoms--Consider how long the symptoms last. The more serious the problem the greater the degree of tension generated. The greater the degree the longer it will take to release the tension. Therefore, the longer the duration of the symptoms the more serious the problem.
3) Intensity of Symptoms--Consider how serious the reactions are at the time of occurrence. The more serious the problem the more intense the level of tension coming off the problem will be. This level of tension will require a more intense release. The more intense the symptom, the more serious the problem.
Anger as an Insulating Emotion
Another factor in understanding the true motives of the reluctant teenager is to view anger as a lead emotion and perhaps not the real emotion. Panic, anxiety, vulnerability, fear, guilt, emotional pain or hurt are all emotions that use anger as the lead emotion. That is why there are such high levels of rage and anger between individuals who go through separation and divorce. Most of these emotions are experienced during this process and become insulated by anger. To view someone as angry may actually be missing the real emotion which lies behind it. Therefore, in the case of the reluctant teenager, it is very important to find the emotions that lie behind the anger and determine why they developed in the first place. That eventually allows for repair since the opposite of love is not anger but apathy. Anger assumes hope, and court officials need to see the fact that the teenager may not be able to sort of or label what it is he/she feels or what he/she lacks in the relationship with the specific parent he /she is resistant to seeing.
Six Factors that Need to be Addressed by Court Officials in the cases involving the Reluctant Teenagers and Visitation
Before any decision on the reluctance of teenagers and visitation can be made, it is imperative that court officials ascertain certain answers that may affect the outcome of the decision.
1-Determine the motive, personality, and expectations of the parent, and the prior history of the parent/child relationship: Court officials will need to determine the parent s motive for restoring the alienated relationship. It is very crucial to determine how genuine this motive is and make sure that the underlying reasons are not connected to revenge, anger, control or a desire to reverse child support.
Along with the parent s motive will be the need to determine how the parent s personality style and ego strength may impact on the teenager and his/her reactions during treatment. The parent will have to be coached on the difficulty that he/she may have in restoring the relationship. The parent will need to understand the true resistance behind the teenager s behavior and work with court officials on a successful outcome. Over-reactive, controlling, or parents with low self esteem may have to be worked with individually to help them understand and tolerate the process.
Court officials need to look at the parent s history of intimacy and involvement with the child prior to the onset of reluctance. A relationship between a parent and a child that has a positive history prior to the divorce has a better prognosis and will be easier to repair. Building a relationship that never was will involve much more work. As a result, the parent s expectations on progress will need to be realistic so that frustration and rejection do not occur.
2-Determine the etiology (real cause) of the teenager s reluctance: Court officials will need to determine the etiology (real cause) of the teenager's reluctance. This is a crucial factor since the surface reason is rarely the real motive in these cases. If a decision is made without fully knowing the real motive behind the reluctance, serious permanent damage may occur in the teenager s psychological and emotional development. There are 12 possible reasons for teenager reluctance in separation and divorce cases.
These include:
A-Divorce related depression and anxiety: Reluctance towards visitation with a parent may stem from the mental status of the child as a result of the trauma resulting from the damaging experiences of separation and divorce and not the relationship with that specific parent. If this factor can be determined as the motive behind the reluctance then it will need to be addressed and the reluctance should not be considered as unwillingness to be with the other parent, only an avoidance of the total divorce process. Teenagers who are motivated by divorce related depression and anxiety lack the energy for any involvement and may feel that any interaction will intensify an already hostile environment which the child feels totally unable to cope. warning signs of divorce- related depression or anxiety may include:
Loss of spontaneity: Normally playful children may become moody
Low self-esteem: Feelings of worthlessness, comments about being stupid or unimportant
Poor self-care: Poor grooming, excessive disorder in a formerly neat child s room
Excessive sadness or moodiness: Prolonged withdrawal from people or moodiness, disinterest in favorite activities
Irrational fears or clinginess: Fear or avoidance of normally safe people, places and things; intense crying and separation anxiety when leaving family members or friends
Sleep problems: Unwillingness to go to bed, difficulty falling asleep, waking up in the middle of the night, nightmares, reoccurring bedwetting, refusal to wake up or go to school
Poor concentration: Chronic forgetfulness, missed homework assignments, or decline in grades for an extended period
Inappropriate anger: Excessive frustration, frequent angry outbursts, fights with schoolmates or siblings, yelling at parents
Drug or alcohol abuse: Experimenting with tobacco, medications, household substances, drugs, or alcohol
Sexual promiscuity: Engaging in sexual activity that ultimately threatens to damage your child s emotional or physical health
Self-injury, cutting: Finding relief from emotional pain by inflicting physical pain, or taking excessive physical risks that result in injury
Suicide: Talk of killing oneself, making plans to end one s life, suicide attempts. Immediately contact a suicide prevention organization or a mental health organization in your area.
B-Not knowing how to bridge the relationship: Reluctance on the part of teenagers towards visitation may be nothing more than just not knowing how to bridge the relationship, especially after months or years of non-involvement with the parent. In this case, the teenager is not unwilling to have a relationship but lacks the skills or ego strength to initiate or deign the road back to a healthy relationship. While the symptom again is the same, namely rigid resistance, the motive is very different and the repair is very positive if the court officials have determined this to be the underlying motive behind the reluctance. The degree of desire is sometimes measured by the level of anger towards the other parent since anger assumes hope. The teenager maintains the anger towards the parent to maintain some connection and in some manner send the parent messages, sometimes cryptic, about what needs to be done to win the child back.
C-Fears of betrayal to the other parent: There are times when the teenager s reluctance in seeing a parent may result from the teenager s belief that the other parent feel betrayed by the child s relationship with the other parent. While this may not necessarily be communicated or felt by the parent, these feelings of guilt are generated by the teenager s experiences with the intense anger and hatred exhibited by the parents towards each other. As a result, the teenager feels that any relationship with one parent will be seen as a betrayal of loyalty by the other. This factor increases dramatically if the intense hatred is verbalized or acted out by one parent towards the other.
D-Discomfort and confusion over the parent s involvement with another person: There are times when a teenager s reluctance with visitation may center around a new relationship in the life of his/her parent. This new relationship can trigger off a series of emotional reactions from issues of replacement for a daughter if the father is involved with someone else, need for protection of the mother by the son if the father is involved with someone else, anger over replacing the father for a daughter if the mother is involved with someone else, or fears of betrayal against a parent which may occur in having a relationship with this other person. Many times a spouse will have a very serious reaction resulting from the reality of finality, replacement, etc. when the ex spouse has someone else enter their lives. The teenager may be very sensitive to this reaction forcing a hesitation in visitation with the involved parent.
E-Resistance as a result of an older sibling s reluctance in having a relationship with the parent: Sometimes a teenager s reluctance to visitation can result from an older sibling s resistance to seeing the parent. The indirect influence or overt influence of this older sibling can make it almost impossible for the teenager to visit without repercussions. This fear can become even greater if the teenager is the only sibling in the family to want a relationship with the other parent. In this case, the teenager faces the possibility of alienation of his/her family over his/her decision to have a relationship with the other parent.
F-Parent alienation: Parent alienation, which is not parent alienation syndrome, occurs as a result of realistic and valid reasons involving prior or ongoing emotional, physical or sexual abuse, prior neglect or some other tangible pattern of behavior that has caused the teenager reluctance because of safety issues. This issue is a very crucial one to determine since some parents are very convincing to the court that the reluctance on the part of the teenager is from the influence of the other parent.
G-Hostile Parent Behavior: Sometimes a teenager s reluctance towards visitation with apparent results from the hostile behavior of a parent. In our opinion, there are three states of hostile behavior that greatly affects the psychological well-being of children and molds their opinions and feelings for one of their parents. In order of severity, these are: (1) Subtle Passive State; (2) Hostile Indirect State; and (3) Hostile Direct State.
Subtle Passive State
In the first case, the parent provides subtle messages to the children, such as looking angry or becoming quiet to the children when they are leaving to see the other parent. Nothing overt is said. However, this act of emotional removal creates enormous tension within the children because the loss of approval by the parent is interpreted as a loss of love, one of the most frightening fears of children.
Hostile Indirect State
In the second case, the parent may argue over the phone with the other parent with the children in close proximity. The arguments can become emotionally turbulent, and many hostile words can be said. However, since the conversation has taken place over the phone, the children will only hear one side. The parent will then get off the phone and be nice to the children. Regardless, the damage is done and the child gets the clear message-don t mess with me or make me unhappy.
Hostile Direct State
The third state, Hostile Direct, is the most serious type. In this case, the parent doesn t care who is around, and exhibits the most out of control behavior possible (e.g., hitting a parent or throwing things in front of the children). The messages here are three-fold: (1) No one can stop me , and (2) I will do anything I want. and (3) Do not trust this man or woman. This type of behavior has the most negative effect on children. Not only do such acts constitute a serious issue of emotional instability on the part of the parent, but they indicate a complete disregard for the emotional well being the children. In our experience, if Hostile Direct State is occurring, then it is almost certain that the two other levels are also being used.
H-Hurt in the form of anger and resistance to test the sincerity and dedication of the parent: There are times when the teenager s reluctance to visitation may be a test of the parent s sincerity in their desire to restore or have a relationship with their child. This may occur in instances where the parent has been alienated from the child for a long period of time and does not believe the parent s intentions for reconciliation are genuine. Since anger assumes hope, the teenager s continued anger towards the parent is a test that this time the parent will not give up. The problem here is that in many cases if this motive is not fully understood, then the parent gives up believing the child wants nothing to do with him/her.
I-Interference with friends and social life: Sometimes, a teenager s reluctance may be as simple as not wanting to miss out on a Saturday or Sunday with their friends. While teenagers may not be able to clearly or maturely verbalize this, the need for socialization at this age is crucial and a priority in the child s life. Knowing this and working around it though compromise is crucial to maintaining the visitation schedule. However, misinterpreting the teenager s reluctance in this case can have far reaching effects on the future of his/her relationship with the parent.
J-Identification with the aggressor: This is a concept that can readily be seen in teenagers during hostile stages in separation and divorce. According to Frankel (2002), when we feel overwhelmed by an inescapable threat, we identify with the aggressor (Ferenczi, 1933). Hoping to survive, we sense and become precisely what the attacker expects of us in our behavior, perceptions, emotions, and thoughts. Identification with the aggressor is closely coordinated with other responses to trauma, including dissociation. Over the long run, it can become habitual and can lead to masochism, chronic hypervigilance, and other personality distortions. But habitual identification with the aggressor also frequently occurs in people who have not suffered severe trauma, which raises the possibility that certain events not generally considered to constitute trauma are often experienced as traumatic. Emotional abandonment or isolation, and being subject to a greater power, are such events. In addition, identification with the aggressor is a tactic typical of people in a weak position (Frankel, 2002). What often happens with teenagers who are in this type of weakened state is that they will side with whom they perceive as the most aggressive and potentially rejecting parent against the other parent in hopes that the aggressor will not turn on them. The teenager s behavior in this case will too often be to always make excuses for not wanting visitation, feigning illness, wanting to go home early, creating tension to cause shortened visitation and outright refusal to go on visitation.
K-Parent dependency syndrome: There are times when a parent will not intentionally alienate his or her children from the other parent but will instead create an unhealthy dependency through a series of subtle and/or emotional reactions. The need for this type of dependency often arises out of the parent s own fears of isolation and abandonment, low self esteem, a lack of adult anchors or meaningful relationships or sometimes unresolved issues from his/her past. While not an alienation process, the secondary effects of Parent Dependency Syndrome results in an unwillingness of the children to leave the dependent parent. The reactions of the dependent parent give the children the message that the parent is a victim, unhappy without them, in turmoil if they are not with him/her, and can only survive if the children stay with him/her. Examples include:
"It s O.K., I ll find something to do when you are not here"
"Mommy/Daddy will miss you so much when you are with Daddy/Mommy"
"I get so sad when you leave me"
"I will be here waiting for you to come home"
"I will wait for your call"
Such guilt makes it very hard, if not impossible, for the children to leave the parent s orbit. The effects on children of this dependency syndrome can be seen not only in the unwillingness to leave the parent but may also limit the children from venturing out to new social, educational, recreational, and any other experiences that would leave the parent alone. What inevitably occurs is an extreme limitation of the children s safety zone, the area in which the children feels safe.
L-Gender and birth order: Perhaps the most troublesome response of some adolescents to the divorce of their parents is to attempt to fill the role they perceive to be filled in the past by one of their parents. Some parents make this worse by encouraging this kind of behavior as indicating "maturity" on the part of their child (Divorceinfo, 2007). In this case the reluctance of the teenager to visitation with the other parent results from either the male seeing himself as the protector of the mother, especially if he is the oldest sibling or the only male in the family. Likewise, the daughter may see herself as the replacement for the father's lack of female connection and see her relationship with her father as special. In this case, she will protect and take care of him resulting in reluctance towards visitation with the mother.
3-Determine the level of civility of the parents: The greater the civility between the parents, the easier it will be for the teenager to move back and forth between relationships. We call this fluid interaction and it is a sign of civility and maturity in the parent s behavior. The greater the distance between the parents as a result of anger and rage, the harder it will be for the teenager to balance his/her relationship with both parents. What normally happens is an alignment with one parent. If the parents are not civil then the court should mandate some type of civility training or coaching.
4-Determine the length of separation between the parent and child: The greater the separation between the parent and child the greater the difficulty in restoring the relationship. While there is still hope, the question of why the parent allowed this to occur needs to be answered. The parent can still do parental things, i.e. emails, cards, gifts, phone calls even if the teenager is resistance. The messages here are positive and tell the teenager that the parent is not giving up on him/her no matter what. Pulling away out of hurt, frustration, or anger, communicates a very different message, namely this is over and you are not worth it. The parent will need to learn that this is a process and may take longer than they thought. However, a parent-child relationship is forever and any length of time given to restore it in a healthy way should be attempted for both the sake of the teenager and the parent.
5-Determine the level of anger of the teenager towards the parent: Our experience over the years has shown us that in the absence of alienation (discussed above), anger assumes hope. After all, one of the main reasons we get angry is that we hope that the person will change. Keep in mind that the opposite of love is not anger but apathy and it handled properly, the teenager s anger can be redirected towards working on solutions and redefining a new and better relationship.
6-Determine the level of apathy towards the parent (sometimes hard to distinguish apathy from suppressed anger): The most difficult relationship to restore is one in which apathy has occurred. It is these cases where the chances of success are very poor. This motive will need to be determined and diagnosed by court officials and if present, may have to accept the fact that this relationship may not happen no matter what is done. The teenager who is apathetic towards a parent is normally not angry, does not scream, attack, or use any energy towards the parent. He/she is resolved and has moved on in their lives. Whether they may change their feelings at a later time in their life is not known. What is known is that this type of emotional state has little chance of success in re-establishing the relationship.
Conclusion
It is imperative in cases of the reluctant teenager in separation and divorce cases for court officials to be cognizant of the true motive behind the reluctance of teenagers to visitation and not take it at face value, a decision all to often made by court officials who through no fault of their own lack the dynamic understanding of the teenage mind in this situation. A decision by court officials made for the wrong reason will have long lasting effects on the life of the teenager and the parents. Both deserve the best decision, direction, and insight available to help them through this very difficult process.