Is Your Teen Aware of Their Choices?
Your teen may complain about having no say in anything, having to do homework or chores, they may complain about how they follow rules without getting to make their own decisions about things, but what your teen may not recognize is they have been given something more precious, choice. 
Your teen has choices. Accepting the freedom they have been given requires they make a choice just ask any teen that has dabbled in substance use or eating disorders. Their parents make basic choices for them about getting drug tests, when and what to eat and a lot of doctor’s appointments. Other choices your teen has may be more moral, the choice to sit idly by and watch a fellow student get pummeled to death by a gang, or they can use their cell phone to call for help; they can walk away from a friend who is stealing or they can steal something themselves.
Your teen always has a choice. They can forget how much power they have in the day to day of things. Days run into each other and seem too much alike; unless your teen realizes their choice to succeed or fail they may mistake all the “little” choices they make on these days as no big deal. However, with the right choices most of the time your teen will not only develop a sense of self-mastery and confidence, but they will most likely be successful. With choices that aren’t well thought out, your teen can end up struggling to survive and worse fail to learn from poor choices, which dooms them to repeating their bad choices, which can lead to a feeling of defeatism and failure.
Make sure your teen is reminded about their choice in the matter so they strive to make the right one and blame you less for making the wrong one. After all it is their choice.
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