teenagers help: I have a 17 yr old son who over the last 3 or so years that I’ve been having problems with his behavior. - Help.com

He is a sociopath. He doesn’t feel anything for anyone. You must get him help or get him out of your house for your own safety. If left untreated (and even with being treated) he may become a serial killer.

I can’t offer you much from a parenting perspective, but I once was a troubled teen like your son, and I feel that my insight there may give you a different vantage point.

Like your son, I went through an aggressive rebellious phase from age 15 to 17. I spent most of my time fighting with my parents, or doing things I shouldn’t have been doing. When I look back and try to identify why I acted the way I did, it’s hard to come up with any good reasons. I didn’t like my family situation at the time because I had to move to a new city at the beginning of high school. I was very insecure with myself, and I felt isolated. I mostly kept my thoughts and emotions bottled up, trying to fit the “strong male who doesn’t get emotional” stereotype. I became abusive towards my family members, and there was very little that could control me. So when I read your post, I almost felt as if my own mother was writing it 10 years ago.

I think a major issue for me was the overall lack of control over my own life. When you look at a teenagers life, many outside forces are constantly enacting decisions on the teen without allowing them to make the decision for themselves. I can’t speak for your son, but this was terrible for me. It led me to rebel and reject other people trying to force me to do anything. I just didn’t feel like I was part of anything, and I didn’t understand my place in life yet. When I look back now, I think that a lot of my rebellion stemmed from me thinking “I’m a man. No one can tell me what to do.” It was very difficult for me to stop being a boy, and transition to being a man because I felt that I had to immediately become the stereotypical alpha male. And high school only perpetuates this problem because you’re around other boys who are going through the same developmental changes to varying degrees.

As for the rage towards my family, I think that much of this stemmed from the fact that they were the people who knew me the best. I didn’t have to be on guard with my words and actions around them, and I could unleash my anger and rage towards them because the repercussions were minimal…at first. If I had acted that way towards my friends, I would have either gotten my *** kicked, or lost many of my friends (both of these are worst case scenarios for teen age boys). lashing out at my family brought neither of those consequences. And there’s also a certain bravado to it. I know that’s horrible to say, but there really is. I feel that young boys are raised on television, video games, sports, and a multitude of influences that perpetuate a tough, rebellious, ‘bad ***’ image of what a Man is. So lashing out and physically harming people has a certain allure, and can reinforce the behavior through repetition.

I don’t know what I hope for you to gain from this, but maybe I’ve been able to give you a glimpse of what it may be like from your son’s perspective. My advice: Love your son (Obviously you do or you wouldn’t have written this post). Make him feel like part of the family. Try to take an interest in his life without pressuring him or forcing him to do things he doesn’t want to do. Focus on achieving quality time with him doing something that he loves. Don’t force him to do it, but let him choose. For example: I was always an athlete. I remember sometimes my mother would just randomly ask me if I wanted to go to the batting cage, or to the driving range. She had no interest in sports at all, but if I agreed, she would take me in the evening. In the moment, it was just an appeasement, but now that I look back as an adult, I see that it was just a way for my mother to reach out to me and show me her love. She could care less about the actual event, but the car ride there and back was gold for her. And something that really helped me come out of my rebellious phase was meeting someone a few years older than me who acted as a positive role model for me. It was from him that I really learned that being a man was not about how bad you were.

Thats all I’ve got. Hope everything works out for you and your family. I’m sure it will in time.