Congratulations, you are now raising a young adult. He desires to be treated as an adult without understanding or accepting the responsibilities that come with those privileges. Your relationship is changing quickly and you have to keep up. From this point on, your relationship will be built around trust, and both of you have violated the other's trust. As long as you don't trust him, you'll be more critical of his actions, choices, and reactions. As long as he doesn't trust you, he will naturally try to act outside of your influence by sneaking around the rules, lying, and other behaviors. To rebuild your relationship, you'll first have to rebuild trust.
Its time to start over. Sit him down and have a “clean slate” meeting. The past is gone in regards to his behavior as well as yours. Lay out clear and appropriate expectations. Tell him the rewards of good behavior and the punishments for subverting the rules. Involve him in making these rules and responsibilities. Actually give him a real voice in the process. For example, if you want 2 hours of screen time a day and he claims that 4 is more appropriate, meet in the middle at 3. By giving him ownership in the process, he will be more willing to accept it. He also needs to be involved in planning and determining those rewards and punishments. These things need to be decided in advance so that you can discipline him in a way that makes sense to him and he took a part in determining. By giving him agency in the rule making process, he is more likely to abide by it. Repeat this meeting a few times a year to reevaluate the state of your situation. You both need to come out of these meetings feeling that you have won some concessions.
There is absolutely no place in your relationship for physical punishment ever again under any circumstances. It will no longer be effective as most young men are more than capable of handling a bit of pain in exchange for getting what they want. More so, he could use physical punishment against you as a claim of child abuse. It will not get you the changes in behaviour that you want and it puts you in legal danger. Don't do it, don't threaten it, don't think about it.
Do not make empty threats. You've already mentioned that you've threatened to take away his phone, but by your writing it doesn't appear that you followed through with it. Empty threats tell your son that you don't take the situation seriously. If he doesn't think you are taking it seriously, he definitely won't take it seriously either. It gives him permission to go further next time by knowing that your bark is bigger than your bite. Moreso, it give him reason to not trust you or your words. If you don't follow through with punishments every time, how can he know that you will follow through with rewards? Make the punishments known well before he commits the crime so that when it comes time to warn or punish him, he will already know what to expect. Another benefit is that you don't have to scramble for a punishment after the crime has been committed. For example, if you have agree together that using his phone beyond the allotted time will be punished by taking the phone away for the remainder of the day, then you both know what to expect. Take the phone away and he has to deal with missing texts and the like. Be respectful, though. If he is in the middle of a conversation, its ok to let him end the conversation in an appropriate way provided it is respectful to you both in attitude and time. Simply, allowing him to say, "Hey, I gotta go," can save him the embarrassment of being punished "in front" of his friends. After all, you agreed to take away his phone, not embarrass him.
Don't treat him like an escaped convict. Your breaching his trust as well as punishing yourself in the process. Buy a router that lets you toggle specific devices on and off on the internet. Temporarily disable his phone on your wireless plan. By watching him like a hawk, you are only encouraging him to be even more subversive.
Finally, understand that its ok for him to grow up a little. If he desires more privileges, that's ok. He is changing and your relationship with him has to change along the way. You don't have to give him every priviledge that he wants, but you do need to allow him to grow up. Remember that you'll never get this time with him back and the same is true for his relationship with you. Learn to trust each other and both of you will be better off in the long run.
pramod
We went through this with our teenage daughter. She'd been difficult since childhood, really -- just extremely strong-willed. What turned the boat around for us was after I read a book that encouraged the parents in such a situation to focus less on discipline and more on building a strong, loving relationship first. Just little things like expressing pleasure at seeing the child in the morning. Offering hugs or pats on the back. Showing the child that, first of all, you want and enjoy him as your child.
... Honor killing is your only option.
