I need some advice

[jessicacook]

I need to know what to do.

I have a 15 (almost 16) year old nephew that is really troubled. He has gotten his girlfriend pregnant (thankfully she had a miscarriage. I know that sounds awful to say.), he smokes, probably drinks, and we suspect strongly is/has done drugs. He has hit, kicked, punched, and thrown things at his parents. They can't/won't control him. He has been to juvy once about a month or so ago. His mother had him put in there because he took a cigarette and burned a hole in her new couch.

Now he is back to his same old tricks. His mother (my sister) has said that she won't turn him in anymore. He was told by the judge to stay away from some guys that he was hanging around with. One of which they were looking at for rape. He spent a few days at their house, of course, without his mother's approval.

My sister is at her wits end of all of it. But she won't do anything about it. Neither will her husband. That baffles me beyond anything else. And she doesn't want any of us to do anything either. She will just not tell us about what is going on or lie to cover for him.

My mom wants to do something because we fear he will end up dead someday. What di we do? Where do we start? My mom suggested getting all the grandparents together and going to the court to have him removed from their care because my sis can't control him. Who would he live with? With his history of violence, I don't want him in my mom's house or mine. Again, it's sad to say, but I am just being truthful. When he came home from juvy, I couldn't sleep that night because I was scared to death he would kill my sis and her husband while they were sleeping. I spent the whole night praying.

We love him, and something has to be done. My sis is obviously not going to do anything, so what can we, the rest of the family, do?

[MacUser]

Romans 11:32
For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all.


The good news is that he sounds ripe for Jesus to do a great work in him.
Again.. Mark 4:26

Continue to cast the seed in him (others around him) when you can... but then don't worry (sleep easy and rest!) get up every day and take care of your family without a care...... and let God handle it. Don't fear... because we can't make the seed grow only God can.

[JohnDB]

For some reason your sister nor her husband has taught their son the boundaries...

and there are consequences for that...not only for the son but also your sister.

If the courts find out that they knowingly allowed him to go against a prohibition by the judge...they can be held liable. Both on a civil and criminal level.

They need to file an unruly minor charge on him...or else be culpable in his activities.

Something is amiss...children usually don't get this unruly unless there is a reason. He is angry and defiant about something...or spoiled rotten and never told "NO"...but that seems hardly the case at the moment.

I got a feeling that your sister isn't covering for just her son on this one...something else is and has been amiss in her household for quite some time. She hasn't spoken of it to you is all.

Family matters are always the stickiest of them all. Sorry to hear it. I got my own to deal with. LOL

[dolfan]

Sometimes there's simply nothing you can actually do to intervene. You can pray for God to intervene, you can make yourself available to obey Him should He use you to intervene, but people do what they want to do, even if it is stupid and harmful to themselves and others. There is no law to stop them until they cross the line. Even juvenile laws, which vary greatly from state to state, are usually ineffective. The system is usually set up to put them in alternative behavior programs, like "boot camps" and such, to dissuade them from more misbehavior; after that doesn't work, you move toward confinement in a facility --- teenage jail.

The state can intervene if he continues, but by then he'll have crossed a certain line. They have a place for him if your family doesn't. Ultimately, he's given a certain amount of responsibility for himself and if he doesn't do what's necessary to avoid trouble, he'll find himself on the business end of true accountability. I hope that doesn't happen. But, your family needs to come to grips with that reality and your own real lack of power to make him do any differently. For whatever reasons, he has arrived at this point in his young life and is making some big-time bad decisions. I don't know if your sister and brother in law would be able to afford putting him into some kind of counseling, but it would be a very positive thing for him, I'd think. Boundaries, too, although once the horse is out its a little late to close the barn door.

[jessicacook]

Something is amiss...children usually don't get this unruly unless there is a reason. He is angry and defiant about something...or spoiled rotten and never told "NO"...but that seems hardly the case at the moment.

They have never been his "parents." My sis has always just wanted to be his friend. She thought that if she disciplined her boys then they wouldn't love her. My mom tried to tell her that is not true. She disciplined my sis and my sis loves her!

There is a lot going on. My mom and I have tried talking to my sis and telling her that if she doesn't get him help, he could end up dying from a drug overdose or a car wreck. If I typed every situation he has gotten himself into, I would be here all night. He has been troubled his whole life. My sis homeschools him because the teacher always "did him wrong." Nothing he did was ever his fault. I think the primary reason is the lack of discipline. The kids have always ruled the house. I have an older nephew who is 21 and married and out on his own. For the most part, he turned out really well. Although, he did make us wonder at one point.

It's nothing for my nephew (15 yr. old) to curse his parents out. He won't say anything like that around the rest of us. Just his parents. He knows the rest of us won't stand for it. My mom has even told him that he better never lay a hand on my sister again or she would see that he was in jail. So far, he hasn't (or at least she hasn't told us he has).

Please just pray. My sis doesn't want to do anything about it because she says he will hate her for the rest of his life, and she will have to endure his wrath. She has admitted to my mom that she realizes she has messed up in raising them. She is honestly just biding her time until he is 18, then she says she will put him out. I wonder about that as well.

[jessicacook]

S

The state can intervene if he continues, but by then he'll have crossed a certain line. They have a place for him if your family doesn't. Ultimately, he's given a certain amount of responsibility for himself and if he doesn't do what's necessary to avoid trouble, he'll find himself on the business end of true accountability. I hope that doesn't happen. But, your family needs to come to grips with that reality and your own real lack of power to make him do any differently. For whatever reasons, he has arrived at this point in his young life and is making some big-time bad decisions. I don't know if your sister and brother in law would be able to afford putting him into some kind of counseling, but it would be a very positive thing for him, I'd think. Boundaries, too, although once the horse is out its a little late to close the barn door.

Thanks for responding, dolfan, I was hoping you would. So there is really nothing we can do until he does something major? I guess that is what I don't understand. We don't want to sit by and watch him continue down this path and wait for something to happen because we are afraid that he will end up dead before anything else. The kids he is hanging around with is the brothers to his girlfriend, and she told my sis that her brother has a gun and is not afraid to use it. They are older than him, like 19 or 20.

It's frustrating.

[Pastor Bill]

Unfortunately in a situation where parents aren't being parents often that's exactly what the kids are looking for. My brother in law is a really good example, he was a really good kid, went through some things at the hands of his Mom's boyfriend that are unspeakable, once she found out, she left, they filed charges and the man went to jail as he should have (though still not as sever as what some of us would have liked), at that point he began to rule the house, he got them run out of their apartment, got into drugs, and for awhile I really felt about how you are describing what you are going through (he was about 8-9 when Rose and I got married and I had watched him grow up as a really great kid till all this happened).

God moved, a new girl in his life, who pushed him to straighten out, go back to High School, respect his mother, they got engaged, and both came back to God and got serious in church, he even started to preach. flash forward a few more years, they've moved close to us, have two beautiful kids, are both active workers in the church.

He'll tell you now through it all he wanted his Mom to set some boundaries, he was floating through life not knowing up from down.

He is very open to share this in his ministry, so I know he won't mind me sharing here.

I share this for two reasons, First, you can let you sis know if you get the opportunity that setting some boundaries not only will not make him hate her (even if he says he does over it), but may very well be what he's looking for.

And two, to let you know that no matter what, God still sees him where he is, and hasn't given up, you never know what plans God has for him, just keep praying and loving him.

[dolfan]

Thanks for responding, dolfan, I was hoping you would. So there is really nothing we can do until he does something major? I guess that is what I don't understand. We don't want to sit by and watch him continue down this path and wait for something to happen because we are afraid that he will end up dead before anything else.

As far as the law is concerned, there's nothing else for you to do. Getting a change of custody for a kid his age is nigh impossible ('round here, anyway), and you've already said no one in the family is in a position to do it if it could be done. There's no other avenue for him except for love, tough love, gentle love, etc., whatever y'all believe will work.

[JohnDB]

In addition to what Pastor Bill has said...

I have seen times when my son seemed to be enjoying his punishment...even if it lasted a while.

He took it as a sign that Daddy cared about him and never forgot about him. Sometimes in the strangest of ways.

Like the time I grounded him from having Pizza...it lasted like nine months. But even if he seen one in the freezer he was more happy about not eating it than when the grounding was over and he could have pizza once again. (of course I fed him other things like "hairy broccoli"...

And the boy does like pizza. Today I try to show him in positive ways that I think about him...and try to avoid the negatives...kids will seek the negatives for attention if they do not believe that the positives will get it for them.

To this day my son always speaks of a vacation that I took especially for him as his favorite in the whole world...it was all about him. (went to DC)...he had a blast even though he flung a couple of minor tantrums during it because he was tired and grumpy...there was so much to see and do.