Parenting Teens With Love And Logic: Preparing Adolescents for Responsible Adulthood, Updated and Expanded Edition

I recently read Parenting Teens with Love and Logic, and I found it to be a valuable resource for navigating the complexities of raising teenagers. The book offers a thoughtful approach that combines empathy with practical strategies, aiming to foster responsibility and respect in teens. The Love and Logic method emphasizes the importance of setting clear boundaries while also allowing teens to make their own choices and learn from their consequences. It’s a balanced approach that encourages positive communication and problem-solving without resorting to heavy-handed discipline. One of the book’s strengths is its practical advice, which is grounded in real-world scenarios and easy to implement. The strategies are designed to help parents build a stronger relationship with their teens while guiding them towards more responsible behavior. Overall, Parenting Teens with Love and Logic is a worthwhile read for any parent looking for effective and compassionate ways to handle the challenges of raising adolescents. It provides a solid framework for creating a supportive and respectful family dynamic.

I just want to point out that this book is "Parenting TEENS with Love & Logic". The focus is on TEENS! After reading many reviews, I noticed that the negative ones are from people that state in nine million words or less that this is not a good system for 0-6 ages or not for younger children. Really, Mr. or Mrs. Obvious!? It is written with difficult TEENS in mind. If you have not yet dealt with these alien creatures, please do not criticize this book. Those of us, who have sought the help of psychiatrists and counselors, bless this author and the logical suggestions the book provides. In our case, we are dealing with a 15-year-old grandson we raised from an infant, and have gone (literally overnight) from being the beloved grandparents he could not live without to the 'evil enemies he must endure, because we are now too stupid to see that he knows everything'. The examples and concepts in this book take a while to internalize, if you are like us and were raised with parents who used the "old method" of parenting, which was literally, "Do it my way or die." By the way, the book points out that today's teens are way too savvy today for that system to work. Believe me that is an understatement. Reverse psychology does not work. They throw that in your face. Corporal punishment REALLY does not work. They have you arrested. (Been there, done that. The law is NOT on your side.) Anyhow, we were shell-shocked when this change occurred so suddenly and completely. We both walked around shaking our heads and lamenting "I just don't know what happened", so I bought this book hoping only for survival. I needed to read it twice and am still referring to it, because it requires an entirely new way of thinking and reacting. I say, "Thank God for this book." The information in it literally brought our household back to reasonably peaceful on a daily basis, and our teen has started to actually think about others rather than himself. A true miracle. Now this does not happen immediately when you close the back cover. It takes some real effort to change habits of a lifetime. Personally my first thought still is often 'It would feel so good to just kill him and be done with it', but now I am starting to think more in terms of understanding the 'personality flip' that teens do overnight, along with respecting our teen as an "adult in training", and offering the sane and logical suggestions that have gotten myself and my husband to our mid-60's fairly successfully. To my delight and surprise, our teen responds much more favorably to this method. Yes, he still carries out some of his really bad ideas anyhow. If we think he is going to do this, we advise him what might happen, and then give him enough rope to hang himself. We have even called the police to assist us when we could not find him. Because of this, he now knows we mean what we say. He now HEARS what we say, and we get more respect. We even get a few positive words from him at times... another miracle. Those of you who are raising lovely little grade school children take heed. It may not last. If you think you have raised them really well, watch out. We woke up one morning and did not know what hit us. If you find yourselves in a similar position, buy the book, read the book, practice the ideas in the book, and you too may let your teen live to reach adulthood.

I've long been a fan of Parenting with Love and Logic... I purchased this book for a friend who was struggling with how to deal with her 12 year old daughter who is delightful, but a typical, challenging teenager. Mom was frustrated with the increasingly frequent "battles" over the smallest things, and not liking the feeling of always being at odds with her daughter. I was hoping sharing Love & Logic would help encourage her and provide her with some effective tools. Well, she called tonight to say she is working her way through the book and has already put some of the ideas she's learned into practice - with good results. What she is learning has caused her to review and re-evalate her past power struggles with her daughter from a new vantage point and recognize why she was struggling. This book is helping her find ways to effectively diffuse and disengage from power struggles and start teaching her daughter to take responsibility (instead of always trying to make things Mom & Dad's "fault"). She is excited that she is starting to see a difference in such a short time - and now her husband and her mom are anxious to also read this book so they can all have the same approach. Love & Logic is practical, logical, easy to understand, and effective. Highly recommend this book and this parenting program to parents and grandparents of children and teens of all ages!

from the very first page, this book gives you valuable insight into how teens think and feel differently than parents, and why they act the way they do. It provides practical ways to head off arguments before they start, and how to encourage teens to think and act independently and responsibly. Within the first chapter, and putting those suggestions to the test, the tone of conversation with my 12 year old changed instantly. By the time I'd finished the book and been using the tips for a solid week, I was really amazed at how much better I was handling challenging situations. There are three reasons why I dinged a star. 1) the way the dialogue examples are written, it plays off as kind of sarcastic and as if the teen is just going to go , "OK! Sure!" when you use the "one-liners". That's not real life and I feel the authors could have expounded more on how to say the phrases lovingly, as well as giving some examples where the teen attempted to escalate to an argument. All the hypothetical kids in this book are far too agreeable! 2) The conservative Christian slant. This is EXTREMELY valuable advice for parents of any or no religion, and the Bible references and such only serve to turn off parents who might otherwise greatly benefit from this book. Also, the chapter about sex and the authors' suggestion for parents of children who identify as gay, was a bit difficult to read. I say difficult because it goes on about how "this isn't the 'norm', and it goes against our faith, and blah blah blah." Minus one point. BUT...rather than being homophobic, the authors just left it as, "God says to love all people no matter what, and gay kids deserve our love as much as straight kids". Plus one point. It does lump homosexuality into the same chapter with some dangerous and immoral behaviors. Minus one point. So, there was some good and some bad in how the authors chose to address the issue of homosexuality. I feel that they tried too hard to be diplomatic, and it just came off as outdated and uneducated advice. Not offensive, per se, just not very intelligent. 3) One part of the book gave an example of parents kicking a 15 year old out of their home. They essentially gave her the choice of shaping up or living on the streets. I don't care what my kid has done or is doing, there is nothing on this earth that would make me suggest the streets as an option. If the behavior is THAT BAD, there are probably some bigger issues going on, so why not seek counseling or a group home, a mental health facility, or even jail if the behavior is threatening and illegal! At least in jail they are fed and sheltered and I won't be charged with criminal neglect and abandonment. The main takeaways from this book are to start from a place of love and a nurturing relationship, if that's not there you need to build a relationship first before any kind of discipline can happen. I like that the authors stressed that you can't have authority or credibility as a parent if you don't have the trust and connection with your kid. Also, that you should always expect children to handle their own problems, make their own choices within the options that you provide, and allow them to feel the full weight of the consequences of their choices. If you can do those two things, and refuse to engage in a fight-repeating to the child that you love them too much to argue-you will have a good handle on the love and logic method.

A colleague of mine told me about Love and Logic and, after watching a video, I bought this book. What I love about the information is that it's sensible and easy to follow. I began to use it with my own two teens and felt, for the first time in a long while, I was doing something right from a parenting perspective. I'm also a therapist and work with parents of teens engaging in high risk behaviors. This is a book I would absolutely recommend to them as well. The book literally tells you how to address your teen to avoid power struggles, ie fights. My house has been much more peaceful since reading this book. If you have a teen and your parenting style tends to be permissive or authoritarian, this is a great resource for moving more to the middle to help your teen learn personal responsibility and to be able to stand on his or her own two feet as an adult.

I found this book to be practical and helpful, easy to read and easy to apply to my life. I needed immediate help and I felt like I got it. I probably need to read it a couple more times, and I feel like it would be helpful to have a support group or at least another parent to help share ideas and hold me accountable. It would be better done together, which is why they offer workshops. But for working moms like me, downloading it on the fly onto my device was the best I could do and I thought it really pointed me in a different direction and helped me break out of old, negative patterns of parenting that simply weren't working. I highly recommend Love & Logic for parents of any age children.

This is a really great book with some easy to do items inside. We have been using these techniques for about 6 months with our teen girls and it is AMAZING the changes in them. I hear so much from others how they are more responsible than other kids their age and more mature. In the house there is a sense of calm that I didn't think would come with teen girls. It is crazy when the learn that their choices change how you function. Imagine a teen wanting a ride to get to work, and their room is not clean. You say... I will be happy to take you once your room is clean. I have heard the "but like it this way".... and I say.... ok, keep me posted on how you will get to your destination so I don't worry. :) As they know that is their choice. Either way... I highly recommend the book from a mom with 2 teenage girls :)

My ex and I divorced the weekend before my daughter started kindergarten and her counselor recommended the love and logic series to us then. I read the parenting with love and logic book one time and have read a few others since and utilized the parenting style I learned from the books. She is now entering her teen years. Although parenting isn't easy and I make mistakes like everyone else, my preteen (almost teen) and I have an amazing relationship and I owe it to the lessons I have learned thru this parenting style. I have 7 years of parenting with love and logic under my belt and am VERY happy with the results. And, as a daycare provider for 8 years I also used the book teaching with love and logic for my infants, toddlers, and preschoolers and saw amazing results with them as well. I also volunteer with a youth organization and use the love and logic concepts with the children I lead. I have even encouraged my fiancé to also adapt this parenting style with his own children over the past few years and I have seen dramatic results with their relationships too. We together, have read the love and logic book for lasting relationships as well and really enjoyed the concepts. So with experience, I recommend this series to parents with young children, preteens, and teens. I recommend this to teachers, caregivers, youth volunteers, single parents, blended families, and more. I can also say that even though I have used it in all aspects of my life, this style of parenting is something that I took bits and pieces from and adapted to. If you aren't willing to change, no self help book will work for you. I don't do everything that is recommended in these books, and I don't go crazy over love and logic everything. I have read each book only one time (and I haven't read them all) and what I have taken away from them and what I have utilized has worked for me.

Simple language. Easy to read.

Super helpful and practical... It helps me to love and care in a right way of my daughters! Looking forward to read the first one book

Dieses Buch ist ein absolutes must f[r alle Eltern. Kann man nur weiter empfehlen. Perfekter Ratgeber . Kann jeder Familie helfen.

Get this book! So helpful and easy to read. There are Youtube videos too!

a little out dated.