We’ve all been there… the moment when the energy in the house feels like it makes a shift, and your child is pushing your buttons. You are on the verge of screaming, tears, or both!
I’m sure a lot of us can remember what it was like being a teenager and believing that our parents didn’t understand us or didn’t care. Now we’re in the parent role! What do we do about the mood swings, the risky behaviors, the defiance, the disrespect, and the lack of responsibility that we may see during this stage of development.
Here are some tips that can help you navigate this phase in your child’s life. When we have more information and more skills in our toolbox, we can make an informed decision on how we want to parent.
Tip # 1
Treat them as their own person.
This is not the same as treating your kid as your friend. We are talking about treating them as separate entities, independent from us as parents. We have our own thoughts and feelings and oftentimes our teen’s feelings and thoughts are going to be quite different than ours.
I’m sure you remember not agreeing with everything that your parents said. The teenage years are a time of testing opinions and testing people. It’s very important that our teen feels as though we respect their view even if it is different than ours.
What about when my team disagrees with me, and they speak to me in a disrespectful tone?! I hear you! This is where I am going to ask you to not assume that your teen is seeking to be disrespectful but clarifying what is going on and how you are experiencing their tone.
This may look something like, “I am feeling disrespected by what you just said and how you said it. Is that what you are trying to do or is there something else going on here?” Oftentimes your teen is going to respond with no I’m sorry I am really stressed out because I got in a fight with my friend today. If they do tell you, they are being intentionally disrespectful you can talk about what happened between the two of you to which that value is being crossed.
The key takeaway from this tip is that dealing with teenagers is like dealing with other people, we cannot assume that we are always right, and they are always wrong. We need to hear them out.
Tip #2
Stop calling these issues “teenage problems” or “they’re just being a teenager”.
It becomes easy to blame everything on hormonal changes or the ever-shifting adolescent brain. But if what we’re doing is generalizing the majority if not all problems into one thing, we are risking ignoring an underlying cause. If we are ignoring that a major problem exists and it is not just the mood swings of hormonal changes in a teenage body, we cannot address the problem.
Tip #3
Prioritize your relationship with your teen first.
This one really goes against those old school mentalities of it being the top priority for a parent to make sure that they raise a successful adult. Yes, this is something that we really want to do… but not at the expense of having a close relationship with our child. Research shows that the more teenagers feel connected to their family, the less they are associated with emotional distress, suicidality, substance use, and early sexual behaviors.
That would mean if your relationship is a priority, you are going to experience conflict. Conflict with your teenager is not always a bad thing because your teenager is learning to be independent and learning from you how to have a healthy relationship with others during conflict.
Even when disciplining, we can adopt a warm and responsive parenting style which uses disciplinary measures that will not damage our relationship. This is where we will be teaching boundaries and enforcing consequences if boundaries are not respected. And again, this will help our teen with relationships down the line.
Tip #4
Give clear guidelines and expectations.
As a parent of a teen, we want to set out clear guidelines about what is acceptable. This may also come after we model that behavior. For example, you are going on a trip, and you tell your teen who you were going with where you are going and when you’ll be back. If we do this, then we expect them to do the same. Oftentimes we may hear parents say something like I don’t need to do this because I am the parent and I do not answer to my child. I understand where that mentality comes from, and I want to reframe that mentality to if we do this ourselves, we are modeling what we expect from our children. And our children are often going to mirror what they see us do.
This is also where boundaries come in where we express the consequence if our expectations and guidelines are not followed through with. The most important thing to follow after that is enforcing that consequence that is appropriate for the transgression.
Tip #5
It’s okay if your teen needs mental health care.
A key component of being a teenager is that our brains are more malleable than they will ever be again. This is also a peak time when mental illness may begin to develop. If your teen needs extra support that is not a sign that you as a parent have failed.
Stress related mental health issues like anxiety, depression, drug use, suicide attempts, body image issues, and low self-esteem are rampant within this age period. Oops
20% of teens that do suffer from a mental illness will have that carried into their adult years. Seeking out some professional help as soon as possible can be the best thing for your teen.
Remember your patience will pay off. To help your child develop, it is important to remember that your child’s behaviors are not personal. Keep your relationship a priority and work on it.
