I Don't Like My Middle Schooler Right Now (and I feel terrible about it)

Have you ever looked at your middle schooler and quietly wondered:

"I love my child . . . why is it so hard to like them right now?"

If so, this episode is for you.

In one of the most honest conversations I've had on the podcast, I answer a vulnerable question from a mom who feels hurt, disconnected, and ashamed that she's struggling to like her 13-year-old son.

Together, we'll explore:

• Why these feelings are far more common than most parents admit
• How hurt can begin writing the story of your relationship
• The difference between your child's capacity and their caring, especially for middle schoolers with ADHD
• What may be happening beneath behaviors like lying, complaining, and resisting help
• Why your child's attempts to reconnect after conflict matter more than you might realize
• How to find your way back to seeing your child with compassion without minimizing your own pain

This episode isn't about pretending difficult behavior is okay. It's about learning to tell a truer story about your child, yourself, and your relationship so that hurt doesn't become the loudest voice between you.

If you've ever worried that something is wrong with you because you're not enjoying this season of parenting, I hope this episode feels like sitting down with someone who truly understands.

You're a human in a real relationship with your child and real relationships are strong enough to stretch without breaking.

You can find Bridget on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/bridget.parentcoach/

The Ultimate Middle School Parent Survival Toolkit is here: https://bridgetparentco.samcart.com/products/ultimate-toolkit

Transcript

Speaker 0:00

Welcome to Middle Years. I'm Bridget KerMorris. If you're parenting a middle schooler, you're in the right place. Each week on this podcast, I'll answer one real question from a parent who feels stuck, has tried everything they can think of, and who isn't sure what to do next. Together, we'll look beyond short-term fixes and focus on what matters most, your relationship with your child. Before jumping in, I want you to hear something. I'm not worried about your middle schooler because they have you, the best parent in the world for them. The person I worry about is you. I promise you, there is joy to be had in the middle school years, and I'm here to help you find it. Hello, my dears. Welcome back to Middle Years with Bridget KerMorris. Today's episode is probably the most tender one I've recorded so far because it's about a feeling middle school parents experience, but we're not saying it out loud. What do you do when you love your middle schooler, of course, but you don't really like them right now? When that thought comes up, you might immediately think, what kind of parent feels this way? Or does this mean something's wrong with me? Or everyone else seems to enjoy their kids more than I do. If you've ever had a version of that thought, I want you to know something before we go any further. I do not think at all you're a bad parent. I think you're an honest parent and a parent who's hurting. One of the things I talk about all the time is how important it is for our middle schoolers to know that we don't just love them because they're our child, we genuinely like them. Seriously, that is one of the cornerstones of my framework. Yes, absolutely. I want our kids to feel delighted in, to feel enjoyed, to know that home is a place where people want to be with them, laugh with them, and know them. I stand by that wholeheartedly. And that's exactly why I wanted to record this episode, because there are seasons when accessing those feelings can feel incredibly hard. Not at all because you've stopped loving your child, you have not. Not at all because you're failing as a parent, you are not, but because relationships are real. Sometimes the person you love most in the world is also the person who's complaining the most, rolling their eyes the most, arguing with you the most, or pushing you away the hardest. You are a human in a real relationship with your human child. And if we can't honestly talk about what it feels like, we end up carrying shame instead of support. And I'm never gonna be okay with that. So today, I want us to tell the truth. Not so we stay stuck there, but because honesty paired with compassion, that's when things can really move. One of the things I love most about this podcast is that parents send me incredibly vulnerable questions. I feel so honored that people trust me with some of the most tender stuff they're grappling with as parents. These are questions they might not even say out loud to a friend because they're afraid of what someone will think. Today's question is one of those. I've shortened it just a bit for time and privacy, but I think you're gonna hear the heart of it. Here's what this mom wrote. Can I ask for two minutes of your help? I find myself struggling with liking my son right now. Overall, our relationship has actually been much better lately. He's happier than he used to be, and that's been wonderful to see. But his day-to-day behavior feels rooted in unkindness. He tells little lies, he complains about almost everything we ask him to do. If I ask for help, he acts like it's the biggest inconvenience. I know so much of this is typical for a 13-year-old boy with ADHD. My question isn't really about changing him, it's about me. How do I stop taking all of this so personally? How do I stay connected to someone who, in my mind, doesn't seem to do a single thing all day to connect with me? I know I'm the parent. I'm not expecting him to behave like a friend or a spouse. I just don't know what to tell myself anymore. I feel sad about my feelings. And honestly, I don't know how anyone feels differently. Wow, thank you so much to the mom who wrote this. I have to tell you, when I read that last sentence, I stopped. I don't know how anyone feels differently, and it tells me so much because underneath all of the examples she gave me, the lies, the complaining, the irols, the resistance, I don't really hear a mom who doesn't like her son. I hear a mom who feels really hurt, a mom who keeps reaching towards connection and she feels like she's getting pushed away. And I really, really hear a mom who is emotionally exhausted. In fact, I wonder if some of you listening right now aren't actually struggling because you dislike your child. Because let me assure you, I get DMs on Instagram regularly from parents saying, I really feel like it's super hard to like my kid right now. So, yes, I know that some of you listening right now are in this season where it is a struggle to like your kid on a day-to-day basis. So I want to try to shift that because I wonder if you're struggling because you're grieving the kind of relationship you thought you'd be having right now. I know you. I know the moms and dads who listen to this podcast. You're working incredibly hard. You're showing up every day, you're making breakfast, driving to activities, thinking about your middle schooler all the time. You're trying to connect, trying not to overreact, trying to understand. And sometimes it feels like all you get back is complaining, irols, indifference, or criticism. That hurts. Of course it hurts. You are a real human person, and your child is so important to you. Yes, absolutely. You are the adult in the relationship, but you are still a human being. Your nervous system notices when someone seems irritated with you all day long. Your heart notices when your efforts don't seem appreciated. That does not make you immature. It makes you a real human person in an important relationship. So, yes, before we talk about this mom's son, I really want to talk about her because I think that's where healing begins in the season. So, as I read her email, I found myself wondering what was happening inside of her. Absolutely not because her feelings are a problem. It's because our feelings always make sense in the context of our lives. When someone we love seems irritated with us over and over again, when we feel like we're trying so hard to connect and getting very little back, when we're pouring ourselves into a relationship that doesn't seem to be returning what we're longing for, of course something gets stirred up. Maybe for this mom it's hurt, sadness, loneliness, resentment, disappointment. Maybe it's a quiet grief for the relationship she imagined having with her child at this age, or maybe it's something even deeper. So maybe her child's tone reminds her of someone who made her feel small growing up, or maybe she's spent much of her life trying to keep other people happy so every complaint lands like evidence that she's failing. Maybe she learned early on that being liked was how she knew she was safe, or maybe she's just simply exhausted because parenting a middle schooler asks so much of us, and her emotional reserves are running low. Whatever is coming up for the mom who wrote this question, I want her to hear this. It makes sense. I don't want you arguing with your feelings. I don't want you trying to convince yourself that you shouldn't be hurt. I don't want you to think you have to become perfectly calm before you're allowed to say that you're a good parent. In fact, one of the things I've learned over the years, both as a therapist and as a parent, is that the more we fight our own feelings, the less capacity we have for the people we love. It's almost like we're trying to carry two heavy backpacks at once. One is whatever our child is bringing into the relationship, the other is all the energy it takes to tell ourselves, stop feeling this, don't take it personally, you're overreacting, a better parent wouldn't feel this way. Whew, that is exhausting. What if instead you met yourself with the same compassion you're trying so hard to offer your kiddo? What if you could say to yourself, of course this hurts, of course a part of me feels rejected, of course I'm tired, of course I'm wondering if I'm getting this wrong. Notice that none of those statements require you to stay stuck there. They simply acknowledge reality. And I think here's why it matters. When we stop spending so much energy fighting ourselves, we gain something really valuable. Choice. The hurt doesn't have to become the loudest voice in your relationship with your middle schooler. The disappointment you're feeling, it doesn't have to decide what happens next. And any resentment that comes up, that doesn't get to write the whole story. Instead, I want to offer that you can notice those feelings with kindness, make room for them, and then ask yourself, how do I want to show up? Not because your feelings have magically disappeared, but because they're no longer in the driver's seat. And once you've done that, once you've cared for yourself as a parent who's hurting, you're in a much better position to become curious about your son. Because I have a feeling there's a lot happening inside this 13-year-old boy that he doesn't yet have the words to explain. One of the things that stood out to me as I read this mom's email is that she already knows her son has ADHD. She even says, I know this is very typical, and yet she's still hurting. I think that's because understanding something intellectually is very different from living with it every single day. It's one thing to know ADHD affects emotional regulation, executive functioning, flexibility, and impulse control. It's another thing entirely to be on the receiving end of those challenges when you're the person making breakfast, asking for help, driving to practices, planning the family outings, or trying to have a simple conversation. Those moments are real and they wear on a relationship. So I don't want to rush past this mom's hurt by saying, well, it's just the ADHD. That's not helpful. But I do want to offer one distinction that I think has the power to change how we experience these moments. Sometimes as parents, we confuse capacity with caring. In other words, we assume that because our child didn't do something, they didn't care. Because they complained, they didn't appreciate us, because they lied, they didn't value honesty, because they weren't thoughtful, they weren't thinking about us at all. But many middle schoolers, especially those with ADHD, care much more deeply than they're able to consistently show. There's often a gap between what they intend, what they value, and what they're actually able to do in the moment. So let's think about this for our own lives for a second. Have you ever cared deeply about getting enough sleep and stayed up far too late anyway? Or have you ever cared about exercising and still skipped your workout? Have you ever cared about being patient with someone you love and snapped at them because you're overwhelmed? Most of us have experienced that gap. We know what matters, we genuinely care, and sometimes our capacity doesn't match our intentions. Middle schoolers experience that too, only the gap is often much bigger. Their brains are still developing, their executive functioning, it's immature. And for kiddos with ADHD, that gap can feel especially wide. That does not mean we stop expecting kindness. It doesn't mean we ignore lying or stop teaching responsibility. It simply means we become careful about the story we tell ourselves. Because if I believe my son complained because he doesn't care about me, I'm going to feel one way. But if I wonder, I think my son probably cares about me a great deal and he may not yet have the skills to consistently show that when his nervous system's overwhelmed. I still address the behavior, but I don't have to carry quite as much of the heartbreak while I'm doing it. And one of the things I love doing with parents is slowing down these everyday moments because when we look beneath the behavior, we often discover a completely different story than the one our heart is telling us. Let me show you what I mean. One of the things I think parents appreciate most about study plus connected parenting is that I don't just want to help you understand yourself. I also want to help you understand your child because understanding it doesn't excuse the behavior, but it often changes the story that we tell ourselves about the behavior. And the story really matters. So yeah, if the story is he's so selfish, I'm gonna parent differently than if the story is he's struggling with flexibility right now. If the story is he doesn't care about me, I'm gonna respond differently than if the story is his nervous system just shifted into self-protection. If the story is he's trying to make my life difficult, I'm going to feel very differently than if the story is he's having a hard time doing what I know he wants to do. This is one of the reasons I spend so much time helping parents understand what it actually feels like to be a middle schooler, especially a middle schooler with ADHD, because these kids often have an internal experience they simply don't have the words to explain yet. And if we don't understand what's happening beneath the behavior, our brains naturally fill in the blanks, usually with a story that hurts us. And by the way, I want to say here that it makes sense that we're trying to fill in a story, because I don't think that any of us are being unreasonable. What I find with middle school parents over and over again is that we all tend to have this protective part that starts creating certainty by telling stories about what behavior means. And this is because uncertainty is vulnerable and it's hard for any of us to sit in a vulnerable place. So yeah, like if we don't know why our kid is acting a certain way, we're forced to sit in discomfort. But if we make the decision, even if the decision is, well, she just doesn't care, at least we have an explanation. So I point this out because middle school parents aren't unreasonable. I again, I know the parents who listen to this podcast are being so generous, but it's important to mention it because we all fall into this trap of explaining something away rather than waiting to see how things pan out. And that's what I want to help with here. Okay, so let's look at a few of these moments together. So, yeah, absolutely one of the things I love doing with parents is slowing everyday moments way, way, way down because so often what looks obvious on the outside has a very different explanation on the inside. Again, that doesn't mean we excuse the behavior or lower expectations, but when we understand what might be happening beneath the surface, we often stop telling ourselves stories that make us feel even more hurt. So, yeah, a few of the examples that his mom shared in the email. So let's look at a few examples that this mom shared with me. Okay, so she told me that one day she put a small bag in her son's bike basket because her own bike didn't have one. For the next several minutes, her son complained about it over and over again. So, yes, at first glance, it seems like such a small thing. You might even think it's just a bag. Why is it such a big deal? But yeah, one of the things I wish people understood about ADHD is that it's not simply about attention. ADHD also affects flexibility, transitions, shifting gears, managing unexpected changes. Many ADHD kids have nervous systems that really like to know what to expect. When something changes unexpectedly, even something that seems insignificant, like putting a bag in a basket on a bike, their brain has to work much harder to reorganize. Finding someone else's bag in his basket may have felt surprisingly irritating. Again, not because the bag itself mattered so much, but because his brain had already created an expectation for how that moment was going to go. And now it had to pivot. That pivot can feel much bigger on the inside than it looks to us from the outside. Now, again, does that mean he gets to complain for five minutes? No. You can absolutely say, sounds like you're not loving my use of your basket, or I hear you and the bag, it's still coming with us, then keep riding. No debate, no power struggle. What changes isn't the expectation, it's again like the story you're telling yourself. So instead of why is he trying to make this difficult, you might wonder, hmm, I wonder if his brain is having a hard time letting this go. And that's a very different story. Another example she shared was when she knew he had taken a taxi to basketball practice, but then she casually asked how he got to basketball practice, and he told her he took the train. When she gently let him know that she already knew he'd taken a taxi, he immediately started trying to explain it away. Again, if we only look at the behavior, we might conclude he's lying. And yes, honesty really, really matters. But I also wonder if something else happened first. Many middle schoolers with ADHD, they spend years feeling corrected, misunderstood, or like they're getting things wrong. Over time, some kids become incredibly sensitive to the feeling of being caught. The moment they realize they've made a mistake, their nervous system shifts into protection. Suddenly, explaining feels safer than admitting. That doesn't mean we ignore the lie, but it means our goal becomes making honesty feel safer than defensiveness. And that's a skill to work on. Okay, there's an example about breakfast. So one morning she asked if he wanted breakfast and he snapped, I just woke up. Honestly, I smiled a little when I read that one, not because it's okay, but because it's so familiar for many ADHD kids, mornings are genuinely hard. Their brains aren't fully online yet. Sometimes what sounds like rudeness is actually a brain that's saying, I don't have the bandwidth for this question yet. That doesn't mean we excuse a sharp tone, but it may mean we respond with fair enough. We'll check back in a few minutes. Sometimes preserving the relationship matters more than correcting every rough edge. And okay, there was an example, and this is actually the moment that stayed with me the longest. This mom asked her son to hold a piece of fabric while she steamed it. He complained, he said his arms hurt, he didn't want to help. Then he said something that I think is so, so important. He said, No, then you're gonna think I'm not being helpful. And I think he was talking about, she said, like, just don't do it. And he was like, Ah, then you're gonna think I'm not being helpful. And oh my gosh, when I read that, that totally stopped me because suddenly I wasn't hearing a kid who didn't care. I was hearing a kid who already knew helping mattered and a kid who suspected he was disappointing his mom and felt stuck between wanting to help and struggling to access the skills to do it without complaining. Many ADHD kids quietly carry an internal story that sounds something like I'm letting people down, I'm disappointing everyone, I'm not doing enough. When that's the story running inside, shame often shows up before action, and shame rarely makes helping easier. It usually makes it harder. That's the conversation I become curious about, not the complaining, but the sentence underneath it. Hey, buddy, tell me more about what you meant when you said you thought I think you weren't helpful, because I have a feeling that that's where the real story begins. As I sat with this mom's email, there was one sentence I kept coming back to, and she mentioned it in passing. She said, he used to take a long time to reconnect after an argument, but now he's coming back much quicker, which is great. And also confusing for me because one minute he's complaining about something so simple, and the next minute he's awkwardly trying to hug me. Whew, can I tell you what I heard when I read that? I heard hope. I almost wanted to underline that sentence because I think it's incredibly important. She was paying so much attention to what was happening during the conflict that I wonder if she almost missed it. But again, I'm so glad something must have caught her attention about it because she did include it in the email. But yeah, I want to totally underline this, maybe shoot it up into the sky, have an airplane ride it in the clouds, but he's coming back. That matters so much. One of the things I say all the time is that relational ruptures are part of real relationships. The goal can't be to never have conflict. That's not a real relationship. It has to be creating a relationship where people know how to find each other again. So that's what I hear happening here. This woman's son, he isn't staying disconnected for hours or days the way he used to. He's finding his way back, maybe awkwardly and imperfectly, but he's coming back. And that really tells me something. It tells me that this relationship with this wonderful mom, it really, really matters to him. It tells me that somewhere underneath the complaining, the defensiveness, the impulsivity, and the irritation is a 13-year-old who doesn't actually like feeling disconnected from his mom. I think that's easy to miss because we tend to give so much more emotional weight to the hard moments than the repair moments. But if I were making a graph of this relationship here, I would not be measuring how often this mom and son pair argue. I'd be measuring how quickly they reconnect. And by this mom's own description, that's getting better. That's not a small thing. It is growth. There's another sentence from the email that stayed with me. She wrote, I don't know how to connect with someone who, in my mind, doesn't do a single thing all day to try to connect with me. First of all, I completely understand why it feels this way. When we're hurting, our brains naturally start collecting evidence to explain the hurt. We begin noticing every eye roll, every complaint, every lie, every sigh, every moment that confirms the story our nervous system's already telling us. And I think that's what's happening here. The experiences mom is having, it's totally, absolutely real. But because I actually notice several moments of connection, what I hang on to is I'm seeing a boy who comes back after conflict, a boy who's worried if he's seen as helpful. So think about that for a second. If this kiddo did not care about his mom's opinion, why would those thoughts ever even cross his mind? The fact that he's worried about disappointing his mom tells me that her opinion matters enormously to him. And I'm hearing from this mom that her son's overall mood has improved over the last few months. That's meaningful too. So, yes, there's moments of hurt, but this is also a relationship that is still very much alive. A relationship where both the mom and son are reaching for each other, sometimes awkwardly, sometimes clumsily, sometimes after saying things that they wish they hadn't said, but still reaching. And I think that the hurt that comes with these hard moments makes it hard to see the connection that's really there. So I hope just for today, that the mom who wrote this question that she'll borrow my eyes, because I don't see a mom who's losing her son. I see a mom who's emotionally worn down by a season that asks so much of her. And I don't see a 13-year-old who doesn't care about his mom. I see a 13-year-old whose behavior is often outrunning his skills. And you know, as I think about the question here, I realize that sometimes my role as a therapist, as a parent coach, isn't to give parents a brand new strategy. Sometimes it's simply to help them see their child again, to help them fall back in love with the story they're telling themselves about their child. Because when we're hurt, our brains naturally write the story of they don't appreciate me, they don't care, our relationship is slipping away. And that makes so much sense because this relationship with our kids, it's so important to us. So sometimes the most healing thing we can do isn't to change our child first, it's to really explore is there another story that's also true? Maybe this is a 13 year old who complains far more than he'd like to. Maybe this is a boy. Who cares deeply about his mom but doesn't yet have the skills to consistently show it. Maybe this is a relationship that's stretching rather than breaking. Those stories feel different in our bodies and they invite us to show up differently too. This is not a mom who's losing her son. This is not a son who doesn't care about his mom. And one of the reasons I love working with middle school families is because I get to remind parents that middle school is exactly what it sounds like. It's the middle, not the finished product. These years are training ground for empathy, for honesty, for perspective taking, for responsibility, emotional regulation, repair, and learning how to think about someone besides yourself. The son in this question, he is practicing those skills. Some days he'll do them beautifully, some days he'll completely miss the mark. That's what learning looks like. And here's something I hope every parent listening hears. Your child does not become the adult they're going to be by age 13. Thank goodness. If they did, I'd be very worried about all of us. I want to share something that really, really touched my heart. When I respond to these questions, I always send the answer to the parent before I record the episode. So I sent the answer to this mom and she replied and she told me she cried while reading my response. And then she wrote something that I'll probably never forget. She said, I'm printing this out to read every morning as a reminder of how I want to show up in this relationship. I got pretty emotional reading that. And anyone who's ever coached with me knows that I can get tearful. This work, it means a lot to me. My words aren't magic, but I do think every once in a while, parents need someone to hold on to the bigger picture when they're too hurt to see it themselves. So if today's episode felt like it was written for you, I hope you'll come back and listen again and please share this with a middle school parent who could use a hug. Sometimes we all need someone to gently remind us that our relationship is probably stronger than our heart is telling us right now. Again, you are a human in a real relationship with your child. Some seasons you're going to feel incredibly close, and some seasons are going to stretch us. Stretching is not the same thing as breaking. Keep showing up, keep noticing the moments your child comes back, keep letting them know that your relationship is strong enough to hold hard feelings, imperfect moments, and awkward hugs because those ordinary turns over and over again are what build an unbreakable bond. Before we wrap up, I want to mention a resource I created because of conversations exactly like this one. Over the years, I've created courses, trainings, scripts, and practical tools to help parents navigate the middle school years with more steadiness and connection. Parents kept asking me, is there one place where I can find all this? So I put it together. It's called the Ultimate Middle School Parent Survival Toolkit. Inside, you'll find my complete Steady Plus Connected Parenting Framework, support for the biggest challenges middle school families face, more than 1,200 real life parenting scripts, and practical guidance you'll come back to whenever parenting feels hard. Because here's what I know: you don't need to become a different parent. Sometimes you just need someone to help you remember what's true when you're too hurt or overwhelmed to see it clearly. If today's episode felt like it was written for you, I think you'll find a lot of comfort and support inside the toolkit. You can find the link in the show notes. Thanks for joining me today, and thank you again to this wonderful mom who shared this question. You are so dear, and your son is so lucky to have you as his mom.