....So the moral of the story is what? Parents do not always have the right answers or are fit to make right decisions.. Parents are not always looking out for their childs best interest but theirs. Each child's needs, abilities, interests and tolerances should be judged on its own merits, without generalizing what the child should or should not do without digging deeper. But that cannot occur with crappy communication between children and parents, and black and white thinking from parents. And that cannot occur when fear, disrespect or anger is brewing, masking is occuring and/or when conditions are worsening...
My wife's parents were manipulative and abusive to her, and mine was functional as a person, but distant and cold as a parent. These are not good examples to learn from, but sadly we do - at least to some extent. The result is that if not careful we can end up perpetuating the cycle of believing ourself good parents, yet being more centered on ourselves than our children when the going gets tough.
The going always will get tough with children at some point, and the better they have been as children in positive relationships with us beforehand, the harder it is when it stops. Not just for us as parents, but them as children too.
It worries me (and this is not a critique of the OP, just in the context of this particular type of problem) when a parent tells a child who is in some kind of difficulty that isn't defined and may be undefinable, something like; 'you don't have a choice...' because when you get to that stage, the problems the child faces have ceased to be the concern, and the child him/herself is now the problem, with the parent as the face of authority.
What we teach children at that point isn't what we think we are teaching them. In our minds, we're explaining reality, truth and consequence, the outcome of choices, the reality of it. In their minds, we're threatening them, ignoring their needs and fears, treating them as if we're a threat to them and their comfortable lives, as an obstacle they have to beat down into submission.
At best, the child may learn from this that there is no alternative but to conform, but without attention to their underlying problems, nothing is actually resolved and there are likely even more issues then heaped on top, not least the intrapersonal ones which are latent in many families.
The reality is that there is always a choice, and as a parent, part of the responsibility of that role is to find those choices and at least be aware of them, because there are many circumstances which can arise in an otherwise stable family, where things just can't stay the same, and the pushback isn't against a recalcitrant child who can be molded into conformity, but a circumstance that can't.
Great theory, but I admit I couldn't do it and found myself saying 'there is no choice' just the same too. It worked for a few weeks until something triggered the next step of the problem, and because I'd built a wall of resentment (and the child wasn't generally all that vocal), he wouldn't explain or provide any helpful answers. So I clearly didn't resolve it, clearly didn't help, and clearly didn't handle the problem the right way at all.
In the old days, we would just beat the child with a slipper, and he'd learn to conform or it would happen again. Today, many parents are a bit more subtle, but the result can often be much the same.
(Again, to the OP, this is not a critique or intended as one)
