Ending the Parent-Teen Control Battle: Resolve the Power Struggle and Build Trust, Responsibility, and Respect

"Full of practical expectations ... Warmly ­recommended."
—Library Journalstarred review

Power struggles between parents and teens are nothing new, but chronic control battles are destructive to teen development as well as the entire family. According to psychotherapist Neil Brown, these battles occur as the result of self-perpetuating negative relationship patterns. Chock-full of powerful and easy-to-use evidence-based tools, this book will help you understand and end the painful tug-of-war with your teen and foster a peaceful and loving home environment.

In virtually all families, there are moments when teens are unhappy with parental limits, rules, and requests—as well as times when those kids are disobedient or noncompliant, or get caught up in the moment and make bad decisions. But the parent-teen control battle goes beyond this; it’s a chronic relationship pattern that uses up the family’s emotional resources and can seriously impact child identity, self-esteem, and development, resulting in destructive behavior and causing stress for everyone around. This book offers a thorough understanding of the control battle and a clear prescription to end it.

With Ending the Parent-Teen Control Battle, you’ll learn about the three elements that support this chronic conflict—reactivity, negative emotional tone, and being “other-person focused”—and discover the two key changes that can be made to address the underlying issues, allowing you to move toward a more positive way of seeing your teen while creating vital behavioral change. Using tools based in structural family therapy (SFT), which targets the core relationship pattern driving the control battle, you’ll be able to address specific issues and create a healthier pattern.

If you’re tired of the constant battle for control and you’re ready to cultivate a more loving, peaceful, and supportive environment for the whole family, this book has the skills and understanding you need to be successful, no matter what you and your teen face.

Neil D. Brown, LCSW, is a psychotherapist who has worked with families, couples, and individuals for more than thirty years. Deeply steeped in the theory and practice of family therapy, Brown uses a systemic approach that allows him to understand the system, or context, in which problems are both formed and are healed. This approach has revealed a simple yet profound method of empowering parents and their adolescent youth to put an end to destructive control battles for good. Brown is also a trainer of parents and mental health professionals. Additionally, Brown works in industry with teams and workgroups to increase organizational effectiveness.

Foreword writer Donald T. Saposnek, PhD, is a clinical child psychologist, child custody mediator, and family therapist. As a national and international trainer in mediation and child development, Saposnek has presented hundreds of workshops to judges, lawyers, mediators, and therapists over the past thirty-eight years. Saposnek is adjunct professor at Pepperdine University School of Law’s Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution, where he teaches courses in family law mediation and child development. He also teaches on the psychology faculty at the University of California, Santa Cruz.