Parents as Patients

I read with great interest Bob Sipchen’s article regarding the alarming escalation in both the prevalence and severity of delinquency among our society’s youth (“Kids Out of Control,” May 18). As an adolescent psychiatrist practicing in Los Angeles I find myself confronted on a daily basis with the problem.

It is my personal and professional opinion that neither children nor their parents have “lost control,” but that in most cases otherwise fully functional parents lack the parenting skills necessary to demand and enforce responsible behavior from their children.

Parents well educated in parenting techniques are fully capable of controlling their children and adolescents. When such techniques are employed, parents feel in control and their kids feel safe and secure. While the raising of responsible adults is seldom an easy chore, it can be achieved with virtual certainty and a minimum of conflict when parents receive appropriate training.

The solution to dysfunctional families, (ones in which the children are in control and free to behave irresponsibly), is preventive in nature. We tend to focus our attention on and attempt to “treat” the child. It is clear to me that in most cases the true patients are the parents. I cannot recall the last time an adolescent called my office for a consultation because they felt out of control.

It is the parent who is in pain, who recognizes the problem and is willing to take steps to rectify it who is the “patient.” I believe it is time to stop squandering time and fortunes “treating” children and adolescents who are frankly enjoying the control and freedom they are exercising.

It is time to treat the parents.

GRAYDON G. GOSS MD

Director, the Center for Advanced Psychotherapeutics

Sherman Oaks