The Simple Way To Stop Your Teenage Daughter From HATING You

When she hits the teen years, it's time to re-think your parenting strategy.

By Keith Dent — Written on Nov 05, 2015

My daughter repeatedly doesn’t listen and she refuses to do it my way, even when her way doesn’t make sense.

I'm sure you know that from your girlfriends, Rosie O'Donnell's challenge with her 18-year old, or even your own parenting experience. At some point, your daughter shifts from being your ever adoring princess to your teen adversary. To overcome the challenges with your tween/teen wanna-be adult, you have to shift parenting styles.

Here's something that's interesting and will help you shift your parenting — have you ever noticed how there's one authority figure that your teen daughter WILL pay attention to? It’s her coach. Why? Because a coach has a vested interest in her growth in the moment. Since the coach isn’t in the game, they can only give your daughter the tools to excel.

Follow these coaching steps to learn how to re-brand your parenting style and get your teenage daughter to listen up:

1. Create a plan

This is a crucial to establishing a deepened relationship with her. Hopefully at this point, you've given her tools to be independent and make her own choices. She's been watching you and has modeled the type of independent woman you are and how you handle your business.

Creating this plan will give clear instructions on what is and is not acceptable for a young woman. You need to discuss the type of woman she wants to be as she enters adulthood — it will empower your her to have a role in her own development and it will allow you to have a document you can refer to when she forgets. Just keep in mind, even when your daughter knows what to do, she'll still make mistakes — and that’s okay.

2. Let her do it her way

Your daughter will never grow as a young lady if you don’t give her opportunity. Give her responsibility over something and then let her do it her way. At first you might feel fear and anxiety when you're on the sidelines watching but you'll soon learn to take joy in the moment and you'll feel the excitement with her once her decisions go according to plan.

3. Know when to re-group

Lots of times you may beat yourself up when you see the outcome of your child’s actions. It's not because of the end result, but because you say to yourself, “If only I had done something.”

Throughout a game, coaches are able to sense when their team is struggling, so it's up to them to jump in, call a timeout and regroup. As a team that's still learning and developing, they will never take themselves out of a game because they've been taught to compete. It’s the same way when it comes to your daughter. She may feel overwhelmed, frustrated, and angry, but she will keep going (or maybe even give up) because she wants to please you. It's your job to call the time out. You can do that by changing her routine, or even taking a break to go on a random mother/daughter outing. The goal here is to give her some breathing room and coach her along the way.