Yes, Please. Whatever!: How to get the best out of your teenagers. Penny Palmano

wrong?

      No teenagers are perfect, and to be honest if you had a fifteen-year-old daughter who sat at home every evening wearing the sensible clothes you had chosen, never rang or went out with her friends, agreed with your every opinion, never experimented with her hair and make-up, only listened to your music and kept her room perfect, would you be deliriously happy or seriously worried? Believe me, you should be seriously worried.

      Adolescents are at the crossroads between being an adult and a child and it is highly frustrating for them (and you). It is a time when they realize they can be independent from their parents yet still need their guidance, love and support, not that they’ll ever consciously accept that fact. All teenagers want to be adults but don’t have the maturity to master adult behaviour. They will often act childishly yet take umbrage if treated like one. And teenagers positively luxuriate in a world of non-responsibility; they can sit in front of a TV all day without a care in the world, make themselves sandwiches and leave the bread, filling and plates all over the kitchen.

      Adolescence is a time of experimentation, and difficulties arise when parents lose the balance between allowing their teenagers to experience their new independence whilst still setting boundaries.

      Trusting your teenagers is the key to their self-respect and respect of you. Most conflicts between parents and teenagers will stem from small, simple matters, such as getting in late, school work, untidy bedrooms and not helping around the house; all issues which can be settled with negotiation and compromise. Teenagers only rebel when they have something to rebel against.

      Parents simply cannot parent teenagers the same way they necessarily parented them as children; their behaviour must change if they want to change their teenager’s behaviour.

      For the past twelve years parents have guided and nurtured their children and now they have to step back in some areas. Although we are still there for love and support we must let our children learn new life skills, so we have to stop being over-protective or over-guiding in coping with every day problems. But teenagers still need boundaries as adolescence is a very confusing time and knowing their limits is comforting, although they may well occasionally cross them. Teenagers who are not given boundaries will be unhappy and feel depressed, although outwardly they would argue otherwise.

      Many parents find it difficult to understand that, just because their adolescents choose to spend more time with their friends than they do with their family, they don’t love them any less. They will love and respect us far more for accepting they are now independent of constant parental supervision and given more responsibility to prove it. Parents also find it difficult to adjust to the emotional distance some teenagers put between them, but again this is not because their love for their parents has changed, they are in their own way weaning themselves off us. Teenagers still seek their parents’ approval and if parents are constantly criticizing them they will seek approval elsewhere. Adolescents will not turn to parents who constantly say, ‘No,’ routinely judge, order, criticize or are not open to negotiation.

       Aggression – Yours!

      There will be times when your frustration and anger boil over, your heart rate shoots up and you want to shout and scream and even shake or hit them. ‘How could they have done that?’ ‘Why don’t they ever do as they are asked?’ ‘Why don’t they ever think of anyone but themselves?’ ‘Why do they have to leave such a bloody mess everywhere?’ Overload can be sparked by the smallest issue, even a look or a shrug. First, it’s normal to feel like this, you’re a parent not Francis of Assisi. You have your own anxieties and stress from other parts of your life which will obviously overflow into how you deal with your teenagers on some days. When you get to overload, lock yourself in your bedroom, lie on the bed or go outside and take a five minute break. Take some deep breaths, look at a few photos of your teens when they were young children and smile, hard as this may seem. You might even have a good cry with the frustration of it all – well don’t worry, you’re not alone, we all feel like that sometimes. And don’t feel guilty that you felt so mad you wanted to become physical; it was just anger. But it is much better to get yourself back under control before you tackle them over an issue. You can always resort to honesty, ‘Come here and give me a hug to remind me why I love you, otherwise I may have to kill you.’

      different priorities

      Accept it, teenagers have different priorities to us. They are suddenly not very organized, or good time-keepers, their room is a mess, school is boring. Two things prioritize adolescents’ minds: themselves and their friends.

      ‘All you ever think about is yourself!’ parents can be heard spitting at their teenagers. And to a point they’re right, but they may as well shout, ‘You’re going through adolescence!’ Teenagers do think about themselves, they do become more self-centred as they try and work out where they fit in, but messages are confusing, they live in a world that is constantly telling them to grow-up, but usually in a home where they are being treated like children. Society expects them to act in an adult way and yet nearly everything adult is illegal. They are very self-conscious of their changing shapes and voices, they feel insecure and the most important thing to them is fitting in with their friends. Above all, teenagers today need to feel they belong to a group. The group of friends they will be attracted to will be the group with the same interests in music, films, football, bands or whatever. And although they want to be individual they are very happy to conform to the code of dress or behaviour of their group of friends.

      There are more pressures for this generation of teenagers than ever before: broken homes, drugs, academic achievement, alcohol and sex. And it is our generation that has inflicted this confused, pressurized attitude upon them.

      With all this going on, they will naturally start to think more about themselves.

      Today’s teenagers are blamed for being too materialistic and a generation of consumers, but to a point whose fault is that? When we were growing up we got presents on birthdays and at Christmas, but this generation of children seem to have something new every few weeks, whether it’s from parents who feel guilty at working long hours or who gave in too easily to their pleadings for a new DVD.

      rule breakers

      Teenagers love to experiment and cross boundaries. They want to show us that they are free of our control and in charge of their own lives. Suddenly, an adult world and everything that is associated with it, smoking, drinking, staying out late, porn movies, sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll are within arm’s length (just remember these were even exciting to us once).

      Very few children get through their teenage years without breaking the law in some way or another, like underage drinking, fake IDs, smoking, and some even get involved in more serious crimes such as stealing or drugs. But the good news is that statistically, teenage criminal behaviour seems to peak at around 17 and then disappear by adulthood.

      ‘Wot?’

      The bad news is, as parents you will have to live through this.

      Adolescents break the law to appear grown up, to fit in with their peers, to impress their friends and, depending on your attitude, sometimes just to show you how independent and adult they are becoming, so the more you disapprove the more rebellious they may become.

      They have to start making their own choices and decisions and finding out the consequences of certain actions. This is all part of finding out their identity and should be encouraged and supported, as trying to quash it will lead to huge ructions.

      different types of parents

      Have we all got such short memories that we have forgotten what we were like as teenagers? Or more to the point, are we horrified at the thought our own children will behave the way we did at that age? Now that is scary.

      Depending on your age (and preference), your teenage years