Skid2 has had a few months worth of being daddy's golden boy. With DH stupidly filling all of this kids wants, even at the expense of the other skids.

It seems he got himself into the mentality of what he wants, he gets. I did not subscribe to this theory at all to the point it caused an argument between myself and DH when I stuck up for skid4 at one point where skid2's "want" outweighed an outright promise DH had made to skid4. (Gun range, I deleted the post because DH said it made him sound like an a$$hole.. no your actions made you sound like an a$$hole, not the post).

Skid2 over the past 2 months has gotten a little more brazen with teenage attitude. Some of which both DH and I let slide because at this kids age, he is supposed to be testing limits and boundaries in an effort to fly the nest and 'grown' enough to do it. He has to make mistakes to learn, so on things that truly won't hurt him we are letting him make the bad decisions in order to learn from the negative experiences that result.

The kid calling me a liar and a bitch went way beyond my tolerance of teenage attitude. And he received my knee jerk instinctive reaction of fixing his out of control mouth, I slapped him. Had I taken a second and thought before acting, I can not honestly say that the slap would not have happened. In fact it likely would have been harder and more of a punch.

So, begins the saga: Little man did not get what he wanted. And I insulted his manhood by popping him in the mouth like he was a kid (his words were that I treated him like a child).

Then his dad comes home in a bad mood because I called him and told him "I just popped your kid in the mouth, I advise you to get home and do something before I kill him."

Dad gets home, Skid2 expects dad to take his side. Dad didn't.

Not only did dad not take his side against me, but dad also called him to task over skid2 cussing at skid1. Total betrayal since Skid1 for six months has been the black sheep.

So little man bows up on his dad, because his feelings are all butt hurt over dad not taking his side, despite how out of line he was. And he stupidly took it to the next level, a physical challenge to his dad.

I "get" that fathers and sons will get into these macho tussles of testosterone driven stupidity. So does DH. Not real certain that Skid2 "gets it" despite the fact that he initiated it.

I think he is feeling very sorry for himself. Rather confused over the fact he has gone from Daddy's 'lil golden boy to total lock down within 24 hours. And he decided to take his frustrations out on his older sister at school today. Stupid decision. And he is reaping the consequences of that decision now.

DH is in our room, watching TV. Skid2 is in his room, either staring at the walls or doing homework, I don't know which and it's not my job to figure out which is happening. I made dinner tonight a fend for yourself aka, "there are left overs and freezer meals, sandwiches and hot dogs: make yourself something" which prevents the two testosterone monsters from having to look at each other across a meal table.

I think DH did jump the gun on total lock down yesterday. I am thinking an apology, being restricted from his phone and perhaps not going to his friends house for a week would have been sufficient. I truly think part of his blow up at school today was he had nothing to lose, already locked down so why not... and DH is now stuck with, you have already taken everything away from this kid, now his behavior is worse, so what are you going to do to 'punish' him for this latest outburst and make it "so bad/memorable" that he never wants to step that far out of line again?

I agree, they need to stay away from each other this evening. But I also think DH needs to do some reflection on how his actions/ in actions during times of peace and tranquility can set his kids up for failure when in their eyes he rapidly changes course on them when they least expect it.