One-up-man-ship everyone loses!

I have just been preparing for the start of a couple of new classes.  A youthwork programme and the Surviving the Teens Years Teleclass, another of which is running tonight.

Whilst attending a parent support group in my capacity as a life coach, the discussion between the parents led me to wonder how to encourage separated or divorced parents NOT to play one-up-manship with their children.  It is a great space for teenagers to get all that they want whenever they want from both parents.  What am I talking about?  Well, take two parents living apart, one is Mum the other is Dad and yet within their own homes they insist on trying to play both roles, even though the other is alive and well and sometimes only living up the road. Only, by playing both roles, they never seem to refer to one another and each ends up jealously trying to do better than the other, trying to be a better parent; buy better things; cater better for the childs needs; be more hip and cool and win the 'favourite parent' badge from the other.  I came up with the following things as observations:

1. Your teenager does not need you to be hip, cool and trendy, that's THEIR job.
2. Your teenager does not need another friend, they have their own, their own age and you have yours.  they need parents.
3. Whatever, the difficulties between you and an ex partner, your teenager needs to see that you have a united approach to poor behaviour, consequences and discipline and these are being discussed by both parents in an effort to give a balanced approach.
4. The way you are behaving between each other is a template for your teenagers relationships in the future. i.e. if Dad takes no notice of Mum and disrespects her, expect your son to treat his wife or female friends similarly.
5. Whatever your relationship with your teenager, they are following your lead.
6. In the long run oneupmanship is harmful to your teenager or children whatever age they are.
7. If your teenager is chastised by Mum and allowed to run to another home where Dad lives without  a) being sent back home   or b) no further consequences. Guess what? they have got away with poor behaviour and lack of respect and obedience to a parent and whilst you are revelling in the limelight that they have come to you for comfort, all of you will have lost out in the long run. They learn that it's okay to disrespect the parent they walked out on and in fact they are rewarded for doing so, but worst of all that they know that their bad behavioiur has been condoned.  In short you have added to their weakness.

One thing I am really clear about is that teenagers absolutely see right through what is going on and will use every possible opportunity to their advantage.  They are young, intelligent and we all did it at sometime!