I hear stories of teenage troubles from parents all the time. This is an important issue that many parents are grappling with throughout the world. Teenage life is tough, and so is parenting during these crucial years. However, with proper understanding and wisdom, it can be addressed and dealt with in a more constructive manner.
Every parent’s worst nightmare is to go through teenage problems. Children between the ages 13 to 19 are considered teenagers and for many parents their worst phase of parenting. This is the time when both children and parents are readjusting to changed behaviors, expectations and values. On one hand some parents find this phase most exciting on the other hand some call it their most challenging experience. However, this problem can be effectively addressed through wisdom, patience and proper planning. Once it is determined that you are not letting your child just slip away into perpetual nonconformity, it will not be that difficult to arrest the downward spiral.
Know your child
The most important step toward this goal is to understand your child. Think about their toddler years and how you had known about their each and every movement and their feelings without much effort. Try to understand their feelings, likes, dislikes, joys and sorrows. It’s not easy to know everything that you want to know, but some amount of knowledge will certainly be of help. Once you know and understand your child’s temperament, it will be easier for you to adjust your parenting style according to them. Always remember you are not their boss, but a loving figure whose primary objective is to love, nurture, protect and provide a safe and sound home. Once this kind of constructive, positive and conducive environment is created and propagated by you, it’s much easier for a teenager to integrate and understand your real concerns.
Positive reinforcement
No one likes to be criticized: particularly, children who are at the cusp of childhood naivety, and adulthood excitements. There are issues and behaviors that our children get involved in, which we do not approve, but have to deal with regardless. Sometimes as parents we do have the sense of ownership toward our children and we feel that it’s our right to show our displeasure and anger by criticizing them for their actions. It can help the situation to some extent, but mostly these criticisms are counterproductive and do more damage in the long run than they do good. Too many criticism destroys the bond and trust between parent and child. Additionally, it severely if not completely damages or reduces their self-esteem and self-worth. Instead, as a parent you must focus and highlight their good deeds and achievements. Remind them how good they have been in the past and how much you care about their wellbeing and personal growth. Instead of being harsh with them try to reassure your love and care and how much you want to help them. These positive acts of love and care will win the confidence of your teenager and would certainly influence their future decision making process.
Respect individuality
How much we all love our individual personalities. Our children are no different. We as parents should be able to bring out the best of their individuality and not impose what we think is best for them. All kids are different and unique in their own way and should be respected for the same. For instance, temperamental children need more attention than the less temperamental ones. Creativity, temper, intelligence, humor, ambition, art –these are the characteristics that are found in each child and parents should be able to identify these traits and bring out the best in each of them. We all have the tendency to tell the tales of what we did for our parents by following their wishes and instructions during our teenage years. We don’t have to do the same to our kids. Instead there should be an open conversation about their individual pursuits and aspirations and how we can be of help through our experiences. The emphasis should be to minimize the stumbles that our children face, and enhance their personalities in the best possible way. It’s comfortable to say that all knowledgeable parents should put all efforts toward empowering their children and to make them better human beings and citizens.
Have a dialogue
Most problems of life can be solved through dialogues. It has been tried and tested and you can seldom go wrong if done properly. Always find time to talk to your children whenever and wherever you can. Talk to them about your expectations and set certain rules for the entire family. Children are the most active members of any household and therefore they should be made aware of the values and traditions of the family. Set their expectations right and do not leave any room for guessing. Parents always make mistake by not defining their expectations, which leaves the children confused and bewildered. Children do take things lightly at times and parents must make them aware of the cultural roots and traditions that the family believes in, which can eventually help them in the long run. Express your disagreements and reward them for their good behavior. If you don’t agree with their ideas tell them what’s wrong with that idea and why. A constructive conversation can help build a solid bond between parents and pave way for more positive atmosphere at home. In the absence of dialogues a gap of communication is created and that makes the situation more volatile.
Healthy and safe home
Without a doubt a healthy home is happy home. When homes are healthy, organized, the productivity and happiness quotient increases manifold. Providing your children with the sense of safety and security is one in many steps toward healthy relationships. Children already cope with peer pressures, teenage problems, drugs, bullying, studies and fitting in. Therefore, their home should be a safe sanctuary form the everyday troubles of outside world. A loving, caring and safe home environment makes their lives much easier and helps build a healthy bond with parents. Safety and trust of parents allows children to share their concerns and problems with their parents and thus reduces their anxieties, which they have quite a few considering the kind of pressures they are put through. When children fear their parents, they tend to keep their problems to themselves and fall into more serious problems in the absence of parental support. A fearful and harsh home environment deters children from sharing teenage issues with their parents, because they are fearful of being vilified. Falling grades, drug issues or any trouble with peers should be handled by parents carefully without making them fearful and afraid of the consequences.
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Be a parent not a boss
We all love those angelic tiny tot days of our children. However, as they start to reach their early teen years, we tend to forget those feelings and expect our children to be at our command. They are individuals who have individual and assertive minds as they head into their teen years and beyond. They are not at our service, and definitely not obliged to obey anything that we say or do. The environment of mutual respect has to be cultivated between both parents and children to soften the rough edges around our teens. There are numbers of ways we can bring our children in tune with our expectations and aspirations. The best way is to give them the feeling of ownership, independence and responsibility. Also by explaining the risks and rewards that are associated with that independence. Once they understand these nuances, most likely they would come around us and understand our true feelings and concerns.
Remember, most things in this world can be accomplished through love, respect and dialogues.
Instead of commanding someone to do things as per our desire we should rather try to accomplish something through mutual dialogues and discussions.
No child shaming
I have seen many times in my life that parents have the tendency to speak about their children’s bad behavior with their friends and family in order to get some help or their opinions on that matter. Well, sometimes that approach backfires as children consider it as an encroachment in their privacy. Teens are fiercely private people and open up to very few trusted people in their lives. Discuss your child’s problems and their behavior only with the person your child actually trusts, loves and respects. Talking about your child’s bad behavior with everybody in your social circle breaches the very trust you want to build between you and your teen or for that matter children of any age. Shaming is one thing we all despise and never want to be subjected to, doing that to our children is one of the worst things that parents can do to their child. If your child is severely problematic and disrespectful, take them to a professional counselor and seek expert opinion. Apart from that try to win the trust of your children by presenting them and treating them as good and worthy citizens as much as you can, and may be in the long run they would start appreciating, and believing in your thoughtful parenting. Children need us at all stages of their development and we should be in the position to provide them with that support irrespective of their behavior. Do not make negative statements about your children in social settings that would make them feel minimized or relegated. We all want to hold our heads high and children are no different.
Don’t be confrontational
Most teens are confrontational by design. They go through variety of mental, physical and emotional changes and deal with social and educational pressures each day of their lives. Hostile and sometimes fast outside environment make them somewhat edgy and impatient. As a result, any negative statement in their direction is perceived as an attack which leads them to be more confrontational. We have all seen this play, when we were teens ourselves. Why repeat the very thing we hated when our parents were in charge. Therefore, try to be kind and calm with your teenagers, and it certainly would work if we are more accommodating toward their immediate issues. Confrontational parents drive their teens towards disagreements and rebellion. Their individuality and independence should be respected at all times, at the same time your family values and expectations should be vividly explained to them.
Your presence is better than your absence:
We always assume that providing for our children is all we need in order to be a good parent. Many parents are readily available with cash to buy anything that their children need or want, as a compensation for the time not spent together. Children more than anything in my experience crave for parental attention. In the absence of such attention they resort to methods of getting the attention–by behaving badly, hanging out with friends for longer hours, bad academic performance and in extreme cases drugs and other substance abuse problems. Be there for your children irrespective of their age. There is no substitute for a parent. Presence of a parent when the children need them the most cannot be substituted. Teenagers have many questions that needs to be answered, in that situation they need their parents and not Google. Make efforts to spend extra time with them, and understand their problems and challenges. Be available as much as you can and stop throwing excuses.
Technology and monitoring
Most teenagers are on the latest technology that are available in the market. Most of the time parents are the ones who provide their children with latest technology. Technology as much as it helps them to benefit from them also poses a serious threat. Social media has become a platform for many cyber crimes, especially for children who are unmonitored. In recent years many crimes have been committed against children who were accessible to criminals, pedophiles and other types of anti-social threats through social media. The best way to safeguard our children is to have an open monitoring deal with them. When they get the smartphone or when they are on social media, they should allow their parents to check their internet activities, whenever they want to in order to protect them from these criminal and antisocial elements. It always is a good idea to be an informed parent than to be in the dark.
The bottom line is there is no guide book or an instruction manual to bring up a perfect child. However, there can be times when with the help of better judgement and kind parenting the tables can be turned. Teenagers are not from different planet, but a very part of our being and have to be treated with all due respect. There are plenty of stereotypes and definitions of teens, and some of them are true, but much also depends on how they have been raised, groomed, taken care of vis a vis, their cultural, racial, social and economic backgrounds. Parents of all backgrounds–educated, rich, poor, black, white, brown across cultures and classes need to be the hallmark of character, value, judgement, integrity and above all love themselves, to inculcate the same or better value system in their children. Kindness and care does not cost money and parents must demonstrate more of these two human emotions toward their children, and at the same time educate them about their wellbeing so that they would be able to differentiate right from wrong. It is our duty to take care of the most significant members of our family and society, with tender love, care, respect and dignity. It is also important to inculcate sound value system and aspirations into them to succeed in their future endeavors.
Don’t fear your teenagers, don’t shout at them. Talk to them.
