Teen-Proofing Fostering Responsible Decision Making in Your Teenager

One of the best books I’ve read to help guide me with my soon to be teenager. Very eye opening & thankful I was able to read this before my daughter turned 13! Great tools

I am a police officer who has been working the gang unit for most of the last 10 years. I have been asked by parents all of that time what they can do to regain control. After reading this book, and his other book "The Well Behaved Child" I finally have a resource to point people toward. These books are both very informative, easy to read, and very funny. While this book may not work for the "worst of the worst", most kids I deal with still have a glimmer of hope. If parents will read this book and follow the advice herin, I believe they will have a lot of success. Not only can it help parents regain control, but helps the kids gain control over their own actions, some for the first time in their life. IF YOU CAN ONLY READ ONE PARENTING BOOK FOR TEENS, READ THIS ONE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Finally, someone courageous enough to call out the toxic parenting psychobabble. Unlike other parenting books, Rosemond provides concrete examples and scenarios and suggests how to handle them. Some of the hypothetical dialogue in the book is silly, but I was able to look past that and appreciate the fact that he's not delivering parenting advice in vague, abstract terms. I don't agree with everything he says (like his seemingly casual approach to underage drinking), but I came away feeling unburdened. He assumes, probably correctly, that anyone reading his book cares about their kids. And he assures the reader that, despite your best efforts at parenting, kids are going to make stupid decisions and do stupid things, and guess what? It's not your fault, parents. You cannot control everything your kids do. What's important is how you handle their stupid decisions and make sure they learn from them. My biggest complaint is that this book desperately needs to be updated. This was written before the smartphone and social media, and as you know, the smartphone has completely upended an entire generation and made parenting exponentially difficult. As I was reading, I was trying to imagine how some of the advice in the book would be altered in light of 21st century technology. It's remarkable how much things have changed in 20 years.

Great book for parenting teens. Saved our lives as parents and has tons of great advice! Wish we would have had it when kids were in elementary years because it would have given us a jump start! We recommend it all the time to friends! All three kids made it and are highly functional, happy, well adjusted and productive young adults now. With two of the three being girls, I ended up with a lot of grey hair, but the book was still invaluable! LOL! Good luck parents and as my wife always said, "This too shall pass!" ;)

John Rosemond's common sense approach to parenting is a breath of fresh air to parents who don't believe that "helicopter parenting" is the best way to go. Implementing several of his strategies has resulted in a closer, more relaxed relationship with my children and, just as important, improved behavior for ALL of us. The book is very readable, and the author's humorous descriptions of specific situations had me laughing out loud! Because parenting teens begins with laying a good foundation of respect and obedience in the preschool and elementary years, I would recommend this book for parents of younger children as well; however, it also explains how to recover from mistakes made in the early years. My main criticism of the book (and it is a BIG one) is the author's outdated misunderstanding of ADHD; numerous well-designed scientific studies show that symptoms result from a physical disorder of the brain, not from lax parenting or lazy educational system practices as he suggests more than once.

I am so glad I read this book! My son decided to turn into a teenager in the matter of a week or so and I saw all of my “parenting” skills go down the drain. As I felt like I didn’t know how to parent a teenager I went to a counselor who suggested this book. I couldn’t put it down and within a few weeks my relationship with my son took a drastic turn for the better. I stopped feeling like I was out of control as a parent and he started gaining the freedom and responsibilities he was craving as a young man. I am very hopeful that with these new tools my husband and I have we will be able to have (for the most part) smooth sailing into adulthood (with the normal hiccups that humans make!) Also for the single parents that co parent, I do believe it would be harder to enforce these standards of responsibility= freedom on your children but coming from a single parent household with a mom who cared and a dad who didn’t, I will tell you personally your child will respect and love you more for trying to instill real world responsibility on them instead of enabling them. Easier said then done but keep fighting the good fight, they will be out of the house before you know it. And once they are adults and parents of there own they will be so grateful that you were there parent above being their friend.

Very helpful!!

one of the best parental books out there period.

Live by this!