Please Help...16 Year Old Daughter, Behavior

If this is something that I saw I'd be calling around and finding an inpatient facility for her. Why? for a temper tantrum?

Well, because she's 16 and not 2, because pulling her hair out and breaking things is totally NOT acceptable behavior and indicative of several mental illnesses that can show themselves at this age up through the early 20's. Things that if caught early enough can be diagnosed and treated so she can have a successful high school experience and make good grades.

What she did was not normal teen behavior. Normal teen behavior would be more like "I HATE YOU!!!!! I'M NEVER SPEAKING TO YOU AGAIN".

What she did is more on the side that says she may have some more serious issues.

It really sounds like something more is going on... this is not a typical reaction from a rational teen.....

You are an AMAZING mom. Keep up the monitoring and tough love. Too many kids don't have any or enough supervision, parents now a days give all kinds of reasons for not parenting.

Your daughter could have had this childish meltdown due to many reasons; bad day at school, this weather is tolling, fight with a friend, a boy, maybe PMS, etc. Let her know that a 16 yr old should be able to handle herself better, and you would like to know if there was something else contributing to this behavior.

Forget the naysayers, keep on disciplining. You are a loving mom, one day she will appreciate you.

Blessings

That was way, way over the top. You ask her school crisis counselor for a referral to a good psychiatrist with access to a real counselor. You have two yrs to turn this around. Go at this equipped with all you've got.

Nobody taught her this behavior. This is an emotional reaction and has some emotional blackmail tied in with threats and blaming you for her own actions. This is her choice. I don't take kindly to this behavior. If she reacts this badly to checking a phone, she has bad anxiety that she may be coping with in bad ways. Teach her better ways.

It also puzzles me why on earth a kid is allowed a phone when she has low grades? It just says to me that you don't connect behavior with privileges.
That you would rather police usage then use your parenting power proactively. It might just turn out that some kind of phone usage is hindering her academic abilities.

There is always the possibility that she was expecting a text that she didn't want you to see. She's smart enough to clear some stuff right after she gets it. It may be her coping mechanism but it just might be her connection to other worse coping mechanisms, like drugs.

I'd take that phone in a hot min and keep it ALL day. It's not taking HER stuff if she does not pay for it. It's YOUR stuff and you can keep it forever if you want.

I hope you can be brave in the face of her anger. She really needs you to be.

First of all I would not give her back the phone. That behavior would be an automatic no phone for a good long time, at least a few days, if not a few weeks. And I would make it clear that if she ever acted like that again I would keep it and cancel the plan until she had her own job and could pay for her own plan. Temper tantrums are not okay for toddlers, and they are certainly not okay for an teenager.

And don't let others think you humiliated your child, you pay for that phone, and she knows it is monitored, and there is nothing wrong with monitoring it. If more parents used the "trust but verify" method maybe there would be less teenage sexting and the like going on.

Now, if she has her own job, is showing a mature adult attitude, and is paying for her own plan, then I would not check her phone because at that point she is proving to be a young woman and is deserving of some privacy.

Have you ever thought about a counselor for her, someone safe and confidential she can talk to, whether to just vent or whatever she needs. She clearly has some anger issues she needs to explore in a place where she feels safe and knows she will not be judged.

I do hope, however, that when you check her phone, you are just looking for inappropriate photos ect, and are not reading all her texts to her friends. That would feel like a huge violation to any young person.

Given this type of reaction, something more serious is occuring. I suggest that you take her phone again and sit down with it in front of Urbandictionary.com or another site that will translate teen speak for you. As a teacher, I know that what seems innocent may actually be slang for some disturbing things. A few examples from texts and posts to social media from my students.
"I'm a friend of ANA. Are you?" --ANA means pro-anorexia. The student started an eating disorder pact among several 7th grade girls. Two were eventually placed in treatment.
"Can't wait to meet Molly!" --this student ended up in ER for a club drug
"88" This stood for Heil Hitler (H is the 8th letter of the alphabet). The same student also used to type ** on his papers because the asterisk is above the 8 key.

I'm sorry if I am laughing reading this. Ah, 16, so fun.

You took away her phone, let her have her fit. Dad shouldn't be following her upstairs trying to reason with her. (Rule #1 -- Don't try to reason with a teenager.) You just calmly go about your business while she has her fit and sits out in the cold. Then you give her back her phone when it suits you.

I don't know what else is going on with her. This response only applies to teens having a fit about their phones being taken away.

Be sure that your teen is getting plenty of love, praise and attention when she's behaving nicely, and then you will feel confident in your decision to take away her phone or mete out any other rules or discipline.

Yeah, I have had a few meltdowns like that when I was a teen. Full of drama and nothing to do with whatever my mom had asked me.

Major PMS, along with a dramatic personality, stressed about grades, angry probably at a friend or boyfriend, freaking out about my future. The constant talk about college and what were my plans..

You know teens lash out at the people they love the most. Mom you and dad need to not over think this. Do not make this more than it is. She is a teen, who lost it. Does not mean anything sinister. Is she a good kid over all?

You still need to remind her you know she is more mature than this, you are going to give her time to herself. At another time when this has passed, let her know that this hurt dads feelings, you understand she must be overwhelmed about things, but this is not the way mature people behave. She needs to ask for what she needs. She needs to learn to control her temper. This is the only way you can help her or at least understand her.

My mom would not speak with me until I had calmed down. Sometimes she would tell me to go and take a nap. Later she would tell me she did not appreciate my behaviors and to tell her what was really going on.

My mom wanted the truth. She did not freak out. She seemed to understand what I was going through, she really never punished me, but rather guided me into solving my problems and concerns. She stayed calm and never acted shocked, even though I am sure she was sometimes. We talked about everything.

Just act cool.let her know when she is ready to talk you will listen.
Very normal for a teen.

She threw a temper tantrum.
Take the phone at random times more and more. Tell her that next time she pitches a fit, you will keep the phone for a couple of days.
It's not her phone it's yours.

She doesn't sound rational enough to have a phone.
Anything she breaks in a rage (bracelets, etc) don't get replaced.
Counseling sessions for low grades might not be enough.
Have her evaluated for emotional issues.
Sounds like she needs a psychiatrist and possibly medication.

Wow, way to humiliate your child. Can't imagine why she is so upset. Safety reasons is a lame excuse to treat your child like that. Has she actually given you any reason to suspect she is talking to predators?

I had the worst mother on earth and even she didn't invade my privacy. I have never monitored my children's tech and nothing bad ever came from that practice.

I would imagine she is getting bad grades to punish you for being overbearing. It isn't logical but then teens are not logical. It also seems pretty clear that she doesn't trust you to not hurt her by dragging out things like who she likes, what she says. Perhaps you need to get into counseling yourself and figure out why your daughter does not trust you to protect her.

Sorry but the flip way you called her miss smarty pants in the beginning just screams lack of concern.

While her behavior is over the top, it does seem pretty normal teenage drama. The better solution to your problem is a phone monitoring software. This way, you still have your safety concerns addressed while giving her trust. There are several companies out there... something like mymobilewatchdog.com. Start looking around and find one that's right for you.
I always say fight technology with technology. :)

Her backlash sounds more serious than that of just "typical teen behavior"
It seems worrisome. Either she was expecting a text she didn't want you
to see or there are some serious underlying issues. I would find her a
counselor outside of the school system & take her to right away.
You won't be able to do anything once she's 18. She'll move out etc.
Pulling hair out is anything but typical.
You're not wrong in thinking this behavior is wrong.
Definitely qietly monitor her, you know watch her when she isn't paying
attention to you. See what she does when she is home with the family.
Call for a counseling appt right away. You take her but most likely won't
be inside. You could go to the first one by yourself telling the counselor
what you've seen & your concerns.
When I was a teen & I felt my privacy was being upon I would get mad &
yell something like "you're trying to ruin my life" or "you don't want me to
have any fun". I even said "I hate you" once but it never occurred to me
to hurt myself or inflict damage upon myself.
Wishing you the best.

Wish I could give you a flower for your amazing response/followup. If only more people would understand that we are parents. We establish the rules, the routines and frankly most children feel safer for it even if they waggle with us a bit. And sixteen is a difficult age, almost adult, still toddler. Good luck to you.

This is NOT typical behavior for a 16 year old, and it doesn't come from getting academic counselling/tutoring for poor grades. Perhaps your daughter would benefit from actual psychological counselling, as there's clearly some underlying issue/issues.
These types of meltdowns and spite behaviors may occur in girls first going through puberty, but that's middle school age, not age 16. At 16, my daughter and the girls she knew were all going to SAT/ACT practice, working some part time job, doing volunteer work or playing a sport or participating in the school musical production. They were not throwing fits and temper tantrums.
However, the fact that you even need to "check" your daughter's phone speaks volumes for what you must be expecting. At 16, she is entitled to a private conversation. I did not check texts and PMs, to me, those are like a phone call. When the kids were young, middle school aged, I checked to see if there were phone numbers that I wasn't familiar with and I checked internet history and am FB friends with them, but I believe that looking at their individual texts so they can't even flirt with a boy/girl or tell their friends something private is way over the top for someone who should be living independently away at college in two years. Mine is a college freshman now. I think you have bigger issues to deal with than the checking of texts.
Good luck
I'm sorry if my comments or parenting style offend you, but your SWH makes me think of an article that I read some time back, and this case was mentioned in it http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/21-year-old-stal...#

unless she has given you reason to suspect poor choices with that device then I would not choose this as a fight to have

***I wish they would put the what happened so I could read it before I answer! I see that she HAS given you reason to need to monitor her more. Honestly if that was my kid I would have taken her smart phone away completely and given her a basic phone that can only call and nothing else. She wouldn't have MY money giving her something she hadn't earned and what you listed means she has not earned it. Phones are not a needed thing, and if they are then the PHONE part is good enough. SO, my solution since there are issues is to eliminate the problem and just cancel out that phone completely and downgrade her to a phone that only calls. If she wants something fancier then she can earn the money for it herself.

I do agree with you that teens become addicted to that phone instantly. What's funny is my daughter uses it to read fan fiction off the net. How can I complain about her reading? LOL. But since you check it at night I would honestly just let it go. Besides with snapchat and other such things they can have their things all disappear even if you were checking it every hour. More and more in this world we are having to just make sure we teach them exactly what could get them in trouble, and I know the schools have talks and lessons about this as well. We can't be over their shoulder all the time and they will go to college and be on their own very soon so we need to push them to knowing what is wise or not.