“Do you know what my mom did?” asked my 15-year-old former patient. “I asked her to buy me a pack of cigarettes and she did. Why couldn’t she just be the parent and say No?”  I asked this high school sophomore how she would have reacted had her mother said no to her demand. “I would have gotten mad and stomped my feet. But why couldn’t she just be the parent instead of trying to be my friend?”  In the next breath she told me that the family had just moved to another town. On her first day in her new high school, she went to the guidance office and told the counselor, “I’m not going to class.” He told her to just sit in the office, where she remained the rest of the day. She asked me, “Why couldn’t someone just tell me to get my ass back to class?” Continue Reading