Bringing Up Responsible Teenagers
Description
ABOUT THE BOOK
This book describes a balanced approach to parenting, setting out a step-by-step guide that shows how you can stay supportively involved in your teenager's life while also being firm. It emphasises a positive approach that builds on your strengths as a parent, helping you not only to solve discipline problems and reduce conflict, but also to have a more satisfying and enjoyable relationship with your teenagers.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr John Sharry is a social worker and psychotherapist and the author of six self-help books for parents and families, including Parenting Preschoolers and Young Children, Bringing Up Responsible Teenagers and When Parents Separate: Helping Your Children Cope (Veritas 2005, 2001, 2001). John is also is co-developer of the award winning Parents Plus Programmes – dvd-based parenting courses – which are used extensively in mental health services throughout Ireland and the UK.
Editorial Review
'One major strength of JohnSharry's approach is how he demonstrates how parents can reframe potential conflict situations as opportunities for closer involvement and richer family interactions. A very readable, common-sense user friendly booklet'.
- The Irish Psychologist
First Chapter
A STORMY TIME - BECOMING A PARENT OF A TEENAGER
He just doesn't listen anymore and is so secretive and moody. He thinks that we [his parents] are for the birds and just wants to be with his friends all the time.
She's become so argumentative and abusive. Anytime we ask her to do anything she starts world war three in the house.
Becoming a parent of a teenager can be a troubled time. The young open child who chatted happily to you can suddenly become this argumentative and resentful teenager who challenges everything you say. Teenagers can become secretive and suspicious and you can feel redundant and locked out of their lives. In addition, you can be full of fears for your teenager. There are so many pressures on teenagers to be involved in drugs and alcohol or to become sexually active at too young an age. With their increasing independence, you can also fear for their safety, worrying that they might be attacked or placed in very unsafe situations. You struggle with setting boundaries and limits with a teenager who can resent your authority as a parent. Michael and Terri Quinn describe how the crisis of children becoming teenagers can hit parents at a difficult time. Parents are usually in their forties or fifties at the time and may be going through their own midlife crisis. At this stage of life parents are often wondering about the direction of their own lives and careers, sometimes feeling that life has passed them by. Having teenagers who seem to have endless opportunities and who appear ungrateful can stir up a lot of emotion in parents, even causing them to feel envious. Alternatively, parents may be looking forward to a quieter period in their life, only for this to be rudely disturbed by the arrival of a noisy and demanding teenager. In this context, it is understandable for parents to react negatively to this stormy period, to lose sight of the bigger picture and miss out on the enjoyable aspects of parenting a teenager.
IT'S DIFFICULT FOR TEENAGERS TOO
The transition from child to adult is difficult for teenagers also. So many changes occur in these short years that it is not surprising that they feel at times confused, frightened and lacking in confidence. Physically, their bodies grow and change in ways that might make them feel awkward and self-conscious. Emotionally, they can be subject to great mood swings as they discover the range of human emotions. From intense feelings of love and infatuation to anger and hatred, teenage emotional life can be like a roller-coaster. Physically, teenagers become fully developed and can experience intense sexual feelings that can be alarming to them, especially if they have no one to talk to about what is going on. Intellectually, teenagers also make great gains, being able to analyse things and to develop their own opinions and views. They can begin to see the inadequacies in the parental world (and often are very eloquent in pointing this out!) and wonder about their role and meaning in life.
Teenagers are under pressures, some of which are greater than in previous years, and need the support of their parents more than ever.
NAVIGATING THE TEENAGE STORM
When facing the crisis of the teenage years, many parents react by trying to take control. They may become authoritarian and strict, battling with their teenagers to ensure they tow the line. Alternatively, other parents avoid their teenagers' problems and back down from every conflict, effectively giving up at trying to influence their teenagers or to be involved in their lives. Both these approaches are problematic: the young person with authoritarian parents may rebel even more strongly, escalating the conflict, or they may go `underground' with their problems, hiding more things from their parents. The teenager with permissive parents may feel uncared for and neglected and, without parental supervision, get involved in out-of-control and unsafe behaviours. Both approaches rob teenagers of having involved parents who can support them through the difficulties they face.
This booklet aims to describe a `middle way' approach to parenting that shows how you can stay supportively involved in your teenagers' lives while also being firm to ensure that they learn to take responsibility for their actions. The aim is to help teenagers grow into confident adults who are separate and independent but also appropriately connected to their family and able to form their own intimate relationships in the future.
Many writers describe family life and especially parenting a teenager as being like embarking on a plane journey together. With a young child, the parent is in the pilot's seat, navigating the plane and in charge of the controls. As a child gets older, a good parent allows the child into the cockpit and begins to teach him how to operate the controls. As the child becomes a teenager, he begins to take the first steps of flying his own plane. The parent's role now becomes the important one of `co-pilot', with the teenager slowly trying out his new skills. The `co-pilot' is there for the teenager, offering encouragement and guidance, letting him learn from mistakes and achievements, teaching him slowly how to be a responsible pilot. Often this is difficult for families. Many parents fear that the child will not be able to fly safely and they battle with their child to take back the controls, insisting that he does not fly his own plane. Other parents do not give children any lessons at all, letting them learn the skills of flying fi-om other people, such as their school friends or from the television. However, a good parent realises that the aim of the journey is to teach the teenager how to fly his own plane in the future and that it is far better that he learns this with his parents as supportive, involved co-pilots. A good co-pilot has faith in the trainee pilot's ability and is there actively to support him in the crucial job of flying the plane.
A TIME OF OPPORTUNITY
While acknowledging the strife and difficulties involved in bringing up a teenager, this book also suggests that parents seek out the positive and brighter side of parenting a teenager. Rather than seeing the teenage years as solely problem years, try to see them as full of opportunity. During these years parents have the opportunity to form a different relationship with their child, one that is more adult and equal. Teenage rebellion is not a personal attack on your authority but a necessary stage for teenagers to go through as they forge their separate identity. If you remain curious and interested in this process, you can help them think through their values and ideas. By staying involved in your teenagers' lives you can get to know them in a different light - as young adults rather than children. Many parents report how satisfying it can be to begin to have adult conversations with their teenagers. In addition, by staying involved you can share in their achievements and discoveries as they mature and grow up. You can appreciate and enjoy their excitement as they face a world full of opportunity and you can have the pleasure of being one of their closest supports as they take on the world. In the difficult times, try to remember that parenting is a long-term task. By staying involved and being firm when needed, you can chart a course through the difficult times so that you can be there as your teenagers grow into young adults of whom you can be proud.
NINE STEPS TO GETTING ALONG WITH TEENAGERS
In the following pages we look at nine principles which, if applied over time, can make a real difference in helping you get along with your teenager and in managing conflict in your family relationships. The principles are derived from a parenting course (the Parents Plus Families and Adolescents Programme), which is offered in many clinics throughout Ireland. The principles can be viewed as nine steps that you can follow one by one over the next few weeks. Most of the ideas will be familiar to you and be recognised as good, positive habits of parenting to which we all aspire. While the ideas are well researched as useful to most families, none apply in every situation and in every context. Each family is different, and it is parents who know their children and their families best. I encourage you in the booklet to reflect on what works for you as a parent and to adapt the ideas and suggestions to your own unique family situation. While I encourage you to try new things out, trust your own gut instinct to lead you to what's best for you and your family.
STEP ONE - PRESSING THE PAUSE BUTTON
It's the last straw for Pete when his fourteen-year-old son arrives home hours late after specifically promising to be in on time. Pete confronts him angrily, asking `Where the hell have you been?' The son in return becomes defensive and angry and tells his father to mind his own business. The confrontation escalates and the son storms off to his room. Pete is left wondering what has happened between them.
Teenagers are at a time of life when they are separating from their parents. They are becoming their own people, with different ideas and values. Though this is healthy, it can bring them into conflict with their parents and lead to a stormy time for all. As we discussed in the last section, this period can be difficult for parents. Teenagers can become challenging and demanding. At times they can become disrespectful and even abusive to their parents. It is not surprising that parents, hurt and bewildered by these exchanges, can react negatively by criticising, lecturing, rowing and even lashing out at their teenagers. This can lead to unpleasant scenes, like that described above, leaving both teenager and parent upset and hurt.
PRESSING THE PAUSE BUTTON
So how can a parent handle this conflict? How can you stop things from escalating to a full-blown row? The first thing you can do is press the pause button. Rather than reacting to a situation or `flying off the handle', pause and ask yourself the following questions:
• What is the best way to manage this situation?
• What way do I want to respond?
• What result do I want?
In conflictual situations, pressing the pause button may mean taking a deep breath and calming down when you feel yourself getting angry or about to react to a situation. It can be best not to continue the argument, which may lead to hurtful things being said, and to set a time later to talk things through when everyone is calmer. Consider now how Pete in the example above might have pressed the pause button.
When his son came in late, Pete found himself getting very angry, but he quickly noticed this. He took a deep breath and said, `Look son, I'm just too upset and angry to talk now. Go to your room and we will talk tomorrow. ' The son went off in a huff but a serious row was averted. Pete sat down and collected himself, thinking what was the best way to approach his son about his being late. He decided on a way and then sat down with him at a later time when both were calm.
WHEN TEENAGERS ARE DISRESPECTFUL
Pressing the pause button can also be helpful when teenagers become abusive and disrespectful to parents. Rather than tolerating the teenager's abuse or responding with a few choice words of your own, you can `pause the row' by refusing to participate anymore and waiting for a better time to resolve the conflict. Consider the example below:
When Alice asked her daughter to stay in one evening, she exploded abusively, telling her mother to `back off' and `stop messing up my life: Though Alice was hurt and tempted to respond angrily, she pressed the pause button. She calmly said `Look, I’m not happy with you speaking to me in this way. When you can talk civilly, then I'll listen.' The daughter continued to protest and Alice repeated what she had just said and walked away. Away from the situation Alice thought about what to do and the daughter calmed down. An hour later her daughter approached her and the two of them sat down and talked. Alice calmly explained how hurt she was and the daughter apologised. Together they negotiated a compromise about going out.
By pressing the pause button, Alice `nipped the argument in the bud' and avoided the row escalating to a point where hurtful and damaging things were said. By not returning her daughter's abuse, Alice not only made it more likely that a more constructive conversation could take place later, but she also taught her daughter an important lesson about how to remain respectful and calm even in a difficult situation.
DON'T WAIT FOR A ROW - PRESS THE PAUSE BUTTON IN ADVANCE!
You don't have to wait until you are in the middle of a row to press the pause button and think through how you want to manage a conflict or how you want to be as a parent. In fact, the more often you sit down (either by yourself or with your partner or a trusted friend) to reflect on your parenting and to plan how you are going to handle situations, the better things are likely to be for yourself and your family. Good planning and communication can avoid many problems. For example, by taking time to plan with your teenagers the family holiday, a choice can be made that meets the preferences of everyone, and this can avoid resentment or a However, many parents caught up in busy schedules forget to give themselves `thinking time' or forget to plan things in their families. The purpose of this book is to `press the pause button' in your busy parenting schedule and to give you `thinking time'. Most of the exercises and suggestions in the book are about `pausing' by yourself or with your children to think and talk about what way you want to be as a family. Some things to remember in reflecting how you might approach problems with your teenagers are:
1. Focus on your goal and what you want to happen (what way do you want to be as a parent, couple, family?).
2. Focus on what you can do (rather than waiting for your teenager to change, what can you do to help her change or to make the situation better?).
3. Remember what has worked with your teenager in the past (for example, you may remember that chatting after dinner is more effective) and try to do this again.
4. If something isn't working, try something different.
PRESSING THE PAUSE BUTTON IN ADVANCE – EXAMPLES
• Rather than being authoritarian when her son refused to do something, Jean decided to take some time to listen to his point of view and then try to reach a compromise.
• Arthur realised that it was a`bad time' to harangue his daughter with questions about how school went the minute she came in from school and was tired, and remembered that a better time was later, after dinner, when everyone was relaxed.
• Instead of jumping in to referee when his two sons got into a squabble, Roy decided to back off, saying to them, `Listen, the two of you are old enough to sort your disagreements out.
• Julie used to constantly nag her daughter to clean her room, to no avail. She decided to pay no attention to it anymore, but told her daughter that she would only get her full pocket money if she cleaned her room.
TIPS FOR GOING FORWARD
1. Press the pause button when faced with rows and arguments. Step back and think how you want to respond.
2. Think of a particular problem that occurs in your family and plan what you might do differently to make a difference.
3. Sit down and make a list of your goals. What way do you want to be as a parent, as a couple, as a family? What is important? Maybe start a discussion with others in the family.
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