Parenting a simple solution

My general philosophy about parenting teens.

First of all, kids will not admit it but they like and want boundaries. The reason why is because it makes them feel safe and when they enter adulthood, they look back on those boundaries as good parenting.

They also need love and as adolescents that love tends to be most appreciated in the form of praise, compliments, affection for some but not for all, statements of love and actions of interest like attending events and supporting interests in general. There is a universal truth about relationships that also applies here. Think about how to motivate your child’s success in positive ways rather than punitive ways. Instead of only noticing when the room is dirty, try noticing when the room is clean. You will have a lot more clean room days that way and the child will have a better self-esteem.

We need to support an adolescent’s developmental move towards adulthood by giving the child increasingly more accountability, responsibility, and freedoms where the child demonstrates good judgement and insight. This supports the child’s self-determination and independence which leads to a more successful adult. When we infantilize an adolescent, we take away their self confidence and end up with a boomerang young adult back at home wanting to be cared for.

Also, many parents want to be in the know about what their child is up to and adolescents generally speaking become more secretive as they seek to individuate from their parents. Parents need to be extremely careful about encouraging sharing and then making the child regret it by using that information to judge them or criticize them. If you truly want to become your child’s friend then you need to give them the same respect and non-judgmental validation that you would expect from a friend of yours. Feeling helped by a friend doesn’t always mean getting advice, most of the time we just want to be heard and validated. It’s difficult but bite your tongue and/or ask if your child wants advice. Otherwise you run the risk they just won’t be listening.

One of the most common complaints from parents concerning adolescents is about disrespect and back talk. Understand that adolescents have one foot in childhood and one foot in adulthood and have raging hormones and hungry and tired filled growth spurts. Adolescents today have a lot of pressures from increased competition and social media. In other words, they can be moody. It is very important to be understanding and forgiving but not to let yourself be run over or disrespected. Sometimes it’s a matter of picking your battles based on your values. Keep in mind that we can all be moody and they are often just throwing back at us the times when we weren’t very kind or respectful. Again, as children test the waters of adulthood, they deserve the same respect from you as you want from them. This is another universal truth.

Finally, Kids in general do not do what we say but they do as we do. Our greatest influence on our children is our own modelling. They are always watching us and unconsciously doing as we do. Just remember, there is no perfect parent just one that was good enough to launch their child into adulthood successfully. So this means their nothing to feel guilty about.