Episode 9: Setting Boundaries that Stick

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 I have had several parents reach out recently asking me for advice about how to get better at setting boundaries with their teenager. What these parents are telling me is that they feel like they're trying to set boundaries but either the teenager just ignores the boundary and keeps going with the behavior, or they feel like it maybe works once or twice, it feels a little gimmicky, and then they just fall back into the same old patterns.

And so they're reaching out to me asking, “how do I do this in a way that actually works and sticks? Because I really do want to try to set better boundaries.” Now, if you've followed me for any amount of time or you've attended any of my parenting trainings, you know that I love boundaries. It is one of my favorite things to talk about and teach about and it's because I feel like getting better at setting boundaries is really the secret sauce of parenting, especially parenting teenagers.

If you can learn how to set boundaries, be consistent, hold those boundaries, it will be a game changer in your relationship with your teenager. I am a thousand percent sure of that. So it's a topic that I think is worth revisiting over and over again. So today what I thought I would do is share with you three of my favorite examples.

These are real life examples from either myself or moms that I've worked with. Examples of boundaries in action and how these moms went about setting the boundary and what kind of effect it had on their parenting, their teenager's behavior, their relationship with their teenager, etc. So we're going to dive into three concrete examples that you can put into place and start using immediately.

But before we jump into examples, let's take a step back and first identify what is a boundary. How am I defining a boundary when I talk about it in these examples? A boundary is really pretty simple. It's basically a limit that you are placing on your own behavior. A boundary says to other people, “this is what I will tolerate, this is what I will not tolerate, and here's what I will do if the boundary is crossed”.

You are setting a limit around yourself. It is different from a rule, and this distinction is really important because it sometimes requires a shift in our parenting. A rule is about what the other person has to do. A rule says you need to do A, B, C or else X, Y, Z will happen. A rule almost always comes with some kind of consequence. And rules have their place in parenting, please don't get me wrong. I think that rules are very appropriate in some situations, especially any situation that involves our child's health or safety. So for example, you are not allowed to smoke cigarettes, period. That is an excellent rule for us to have with our teenager. And oh, by the way, if you do, here's the consequence that's going to happen. I think that's a perfectly appropriate rule for a parent to set. And that's an example of a rule. You cannot do this, or you will do this, and there will be a consequence.

A boundary, however, is more, is about you. It's about what you will or will not do, what you will or will not tolerate. Having said that, having defined it in that way, let's get into these examples.

Example number one is about laundry — one of our favorite topics. So this particular mom that I worked with, she had a middle school daughter and she was still doing her daughter's laundry. We can debate whether or not you should still be doing your child's laundry. That's completely up to you. That is not what the topic of this podcast is today. But this mom is doing her daughter's laundry in middle school and she's getting very frustrated because whenever she goes to gather the laundry, the daughter's dirty clothes are all over the floor of the bedroom, all over the floor of the bathroom, and never in the hamper, which has been provided for her. Instead of using the hamper, her clothes are just everywhere. And this mom begrudgingly gathers up the clothes, gets mad, yells at the daughter, tells her she doesn't like gathering up the clothes this way. Then she yells, “Why can't you just use the hamper? You need to use the hamper.” Probably an argument that we've all had at some point about some household chore, right? In this case, it was the laundry.

This mom and I came up with a boundary for her to try, and it was very simple. She went to her daughter and she said, “I'm getting very frustrated by gathering up all of your dirty clothes. And so I've decided that I'm not going to do that anymore. I have decided that I am only going to wash the clothes that are in the hamper. period. A very simple boundary. She says here's what I'm going to do. She's not telling her daughter what she has to do. She's not imposing any kind of rules or consequences. She's simply saying here's what I'm going to do from now on. Lo and behold the next week her daughter didn't really believe her or didn't really listen or didn't really care. The reason doesn't matter. But once again, none of the dirty clothes, or maybe just a few, were in the hamper.

And so the mom stuck to her boundary, and that is the most important ingredient. If you're going to use a boundary, you have to be consistent and stick with it. This mom said nothing but gathered up the laundry and only washed the clothes that were in the hamper. Now guess what? This daughter wants to wear her favorite thing and it's not clean. And so now she has a choice. She can either do her own laundry, which is a perfectly good outcome of this situation as well. Or she can abide by her mom's boundary and put the laundry in the hamper. And after a couple weeks of either 1)not having the clothes to wear that she wanted, or 2)having to wash them by herself, she started putting her clothes in the hamper.

A very simple solution, but this mom could have done it a different way. She could have made a rule. She could have said, “if you don't put your clothes in the laundry, you're going to be grounded. I'm going to take your phone.” etc. There could have been consequences. And that would have just escalated more conflict. And also, it requires you to keep enforcing it. And sometimes escalating consequences every single time. And that really gets old. It’s annoying for everyone and it's a drain on the relationship.

Instead, this was much simpler. The mom just said, “here's what I'm going to do from now on. And you can choose what you're going to do about that.”

And the beautiful thing about boundaries is that in order for kids to get what they want, they eventually have to come around and they have to abide by our boundaries because otherwise they don't get what they need or what they want. So that's example number one. So simple, but so effective.

Example number 2 is from my own parenting. When my daughters were in middle school — as happens with many kids — their social life exploded. They suddenly had lots of places to go, so many people to hang out with, lots of social events to attend, which is great for them. I was getting very frustrated because I felt first of all, they were just expecting me to be at their beck and call and drive them anywhere, anytime, and pick them up anywhere, anytime, without much warning, or without much planning, and I just felt like I was always driving them all over town. And also not on any kind of schedule. And I was getting annoyed by that.

So I came up with a boundary for myself and I said, “you know what girls, I am so excited for you that you have all these fun things to do. And I'm happy to help, but I want you to know that when you are going somewhere with a group I am only available to drive one way. So I will either take you and your friends somewhere or I will pick you up from somewhere And I'm happy to take other people home and drop them off at their houses and whatever. So I'm willing to take the entire group or pick up the entire group but I will only drive one way.” My boundary was that simple.

They said, “yeah, yeah okay, mom” but it didn’t really sink in. So then the next time that they had something fun to go do, they came to me and said “Hey, we're all going to go watch a movie at Susie's house. Can you take us at four o'clock?” And I said, “Sure. I'm happy to take you. How are you getting home?” And they both looked at each other and then they looked at me like, “Oh, that's right. You said that thing about not driving both ways. Will you bring us home?” “No, I won't. As I told you, I will only drive one way. Once you have that part figured out, come back to me and, we'll make this happen.”

And so they did. I drove a couple other kids and then one of those moms brought them all home. It worked out great. But the beautiful thing about that was not that one particular moment. It was that they learned that's how things are going to be. And even now I can remember so clearly hearing them making friends with making plans with their friends back then. They would say to their friends “My mom only drives one way. So we have to figure out the other way.”

And the reason I bring this up is because it’s another example of how the boundary didn't require any consequences. It didn't require any fighting. It didn't require any like escalation of conflict. It was a very simple thing. What it required was consistency and me always holding that line. And them knowing that's the way that was going to be. And so then they had to adjust their behavior and their expectations to meet my boundary. And that's what's so beautiful. Again, I keep saying it, but it's so true about these boundaries. They will adjust their behavior in order to get what they need and what they want. And that is so much more powerful than doing it out of fear. Or doing it because of a consequence. Adjusting their behavior to adjust to someone's healthy boundary. That's a beautiful thing for them to learn.

And so that became the way that we did things right up until they could drive themselves. That was always the thing. And even their friends came to know that about me — oh their mom only drives one way, so we're going to have to figure out the rest.

Example number 3 has to do with a favorite habit of our teenagers, which is procrastination. I worked with a mom who was becoming very frustrated with her daughter, who often needed mom's help, particularly with math, but would approach her mom to help her late at night. As in 9pm at night. She would come to her mom and say, “I need your help with math.” And of course it was always something due the next day or a test she needed to study for that was imminent. And this mom was getting very frustrated because she doesn't function well that late at night. She would be tired. And then frustrated or angry. And so then she would say things to her daughter like, “Why are you always procrastinating? Why can't you ever get your act together? Why are we always doing this late at night?” And then, of course, the daughter would push back with “fine, I guess you don't even want to help me. I guess I'll just fail.” And now they're fighting about the math homework instead of just getting it done. And it's causing damage to their relationship. The daughter is going to eventually either stop asking or they're going to fight about this every time. It's just a really unhealthy pattern that they're in and it's very frustrating.

This mom decided to set a boundary with her daughter. She just approached her and said, “I know this about myself that I am not at my best late at night. My brain doesn't work as well. I'm really tired. I'm foggy. I can't think things through well. It is not a good time for me to be helping you with your math homework and so I'm not going to do that anymore. I'm not going to help with math homework after 8pm.” And the daughter said, “yeah, whatever”, and then in a few days approached her again at 10 o'clock at night. And said, “I need your help with math homework.” Now this particular situation is going to be harder, knowing that maybe an assignment's not going to get done, or they're not going to be well prepared for a test. This one is a harder one to enforce. So you could make a one time exception with a stern reminder for next time. You'd have to play with it depending on your comfort level. But this mom held the boundary and decided one math assignment is not going to ruin my daughter's life. So I'm going to hold my boundary here.

And she said, “as I told you, I don't help with math homework after 8 p. m. Sorry, that’s a boundary that I have for myself.” And of course the daughter was frustrated. But she went on and did it herself. But guess what? The next time she needed help, she approached her mom right after school and said, “hey, I'm going to need your help with some math homework.What time would you like to do it?” And the time after that she approached her a couple days before it was due! So this daughter started adjusting her approach because she knew that her mom had a boundary around how late at night she would help with homework.

And again these things don't happen magically, and your kid might be the type who needs to walk into a wall several times before they get the idea that “Oh, I can't walk through this wall”. And so they might push your boundaries. many times before it finally sticks. But the magic part is to be consistent. Or if you're not going to be consistent, to let them know this is an exception. This is a one time thing, and next time it's going to be, this other way. I think where parents fail is that they try it once or twice and they notice that their kids are still pushing and so they feel like, oh, this doesn't work. And they give up. And so what I want to say to you is don't give up. First of all, start with something small, but also don't give up.

These are very simple, easy things. Literally just one statement where you say, “this is what I'm going to do, or this is what I'm not going to do.” And then the hard part is sticking to it. Saying it's not the hard part. Sticking to it is the hard part. But here's why I'm such a big fan of boundaries, and why I believe they, they really are magic.

They're so powerful. First of all, you're not telling your teenager what they have to do at all. You are not setting a rule. You're not saying you have to do X, Y, Z, and then having to impose some kind of consequences. You're not having to use any kind of threats or bribes or punishment to alter their behavior. What you're doing is changing YOUR behavior, and then they have to adapt, and they are going to adapt because they want what they want. And they're going to figure out that to get that from you, they have to change their approach, or change their timing, or change whatever. They have to change so that they can then respect your boundary.

And, so it teaches your teenager two really important things. First of all, it teaches them that you are allowed to have boundaries. I think so many moms operate from this position of believing “I don't have a right to have any boundaries” and they let their kids walk all over them. They have these people pleasing tendencies that kind of bleed over into their parenting and then they're allowing their kids to just push them around.

And so this teaches your child that mom is a person who has boundaries, who has limits, and I need to respect those. I think that's a beautiful thing for teenagers to learn.

But secondly, you are modeling for them what it looks like to set and hold and enforce a boundary. And what an amazing thing for them to carry with them into their adult lives!

What a beautiful thing to teach them. That they are watching you every single day and they are learning that I deserve to have boundaries. It's okay for me to have boundaries and that's how you do it. And they're watching you, step by step, set and hold a boundary so that then in their lives —whether it's with a boss or a roommate or a partner or a friend —they know how to do the same thing.

I think anytime we can use a technique that both helps our lives in the moment, but teaches our teenagers an incredible lifelong skill, I'm all for it.

I want to leave you with this idea, that first of all, you are allowed to set boundaries. You deserve to be treated in a healthy and respectful way. And so it's okay for you to set boundaries. And also, that boundaries take time. They are not going to work the first time.

In fact, you might see an escalation in behavior before you actually see a change because kids know that the old way used to work and so they're going to keep trying that until they figure out that it doesn't work and then they're going to come around and respect your boundary. And so I just want to wish you the best of luck in setting some boundaries.

Pick some one thing this week that you're going to try. Set a new boundary, enforce it, be consistent, and let me know how it goes.