J.S.
V.~
I sympathize with you, I have a daughter that will be 17 next month and I think God that I may be on the downhill slope of this “mother and daughter attitude” I think that she was about nine when she became “wiser” than me.
All I can do is tell you what worked for me, and to be VERY PATIENT. First of all in our house we basically only have three rules. #1. Never lie to us. #2. You will respect us. #3. Let us know where you’re at and who you’re with by checking it no matter what. We have found that all other rule fall in to these 3 rules. This has gotten rid of the “but you said…” issue. We have always been consistent to these rules and have never back down. Having them so broad and catch all has made this so much easier.
Another thing that we did that really helped was having a foreign exchange student come live with us during my daughter’s sophomore year. I know that this sounds extreme, but it did indeed work. It started as a joke between my husband and me, after an “attitude” episode we would talk about how she would learn so much if she would have to share with another girl her age, and learn patients, etc. After I did some looking in to it, it became a real option. Not only accomplishing our goal for our daughter, it also ended up being a great experience for the whole family. During that year our daughter learned so much about tolerance, patience, and understanding. She has been a true delight ever sense, for the most part ;-)
I have shed more tears over that girl that I have any man. It is so hard not to take it personally when it comes to these young girls that we gave life too.
Good Luck!!
J.