The Teenage Brain- Parenting Strategies
There is obviously more to parenting a teen than can be found in a mere blog, but hopefully this one can offer some strategies to some common concerns. This blog is about meeting your teen where they are at developmentally. It can help parents and teens address typical teenage struggles as well as to reduce negative habits that can impact mental health concerns, which have been growing amongst the adolescent population. If you have not read the first part of this teenage development series, check it out here first:
It’s important to understand the developmental progress of your teens first so you can have realistic expectations and responses when they make mistakes, because they WILL make mistakes- their brains are kind of primed to. You can help reduce the gravity of those mistakes with some of the tips I’ll be discussing here. Also know, you and your teen won’t always be able to do these strategies. Sometimes frustration will drive your responses and that’s okay-we’re all human. Both you and your teen need to celebrate the successes when you’ve been able meet them and treat yourselves with compassion when you haven’t.
I’ve broken down this blog into the areas of school work, communication, and mental health (suicide/self harm, depression, anxiety).
If you currently feel overwhelmed with assisting your teens symptoms and needs, please don’t hesitate to reach out to a mental health professional. Teens are uniquely susceptible to mental health issues and a professional can help your child and your whole family unit heal. This blog below can help with understanding the differences between psychiatrists, therapists, and your primary doctor or pediatrician.
School Struggles
As you recall from the first blog in this series, the rate which teens are able to store and recall information is still developing, as is their time management, task prioritization, and task initiation. While this will inevitably become a source of frustration for you and your teen, there are some approaches to homework and studying that can help your teen build those habits, hopefully making those times of stress and frustration a little easier to navigate for you both. Because these skills are still developing, your supervision can really benefit your teens, but it’s critical that you supervise or check-in instead of “taking over” or reinforming your teen of the steps they need to complete. Checking-in is about “cueing” your teen to recall for themselves what they’ve completed and what they have left to do. It’s about encouraging them to verbalize their own prioritization of their tasks or the time they believe it will take them to complete them. In the beginning they may need you to brainstorm this process with them, but keep gradually pulling back from taking it on yourself. The goal is to help model these tasks with your teen without them fully relying on you.
When it comes to focusing on school work, environment matters. Having an area to work or study that is dedicated to those tasks impacts how your brain focuses. If you choose to do your work in your bed, then your brain is getting conflicting visual messages (cues) about being focused (laptop/books) as well as being relaxed and sleepy (blankets/pillows). This dual role of your bed can also carry over when you try to go to sleep that night. If your bed isn’t just paired to sleeping in your brain, then your brain’s release of melatonin can be impacted at night. For teens, sleep is critical to storing the information they have learned that day. In fact, it’s more important to get a good night’s sleep than it is to stay up late studying. Without enough sleep, the information studied won’t be fully stored in your long term memory.
Communication
Communication plays an integral part in assisting your teen with both the school/work/life skills previously mentioned and their mental health/emotional development.
The first part of this blog focused on task-oriented communication. As parents, when we are giving instructions to our teens, we still need to break them down so they are more clear and concise, just like with our younger children. Teens are able to learn more than their younger siblings, but retaining those details requires repetition and quality sleep . Teens are not good at multi-tasking yet, so don’t overload them with instructions. Verbally break things down concisely. You can write them down, or have your teen write them down, or give verbal breaks, like “come check in with me when that part is done”.
When it comes to task-oriented communication with your teen, having them do the processing part instead of telling them what you need from them can help build their multitasking abilities and their external self awareness. A key factor for task-oriented communication, though, is that you end those conversations positively. When they answer your questions from the slides above, it is important that you respond encouragingly. This can look like “sounds good, after that you’ll be done” or merely with a smile, nod, etc. Having a look of disappointment or frustration, though, can negatively impact their building of that habit as well as their self confidence and your connection with your teen. So again, focus on reducing your frustration before you even start the conversation with your teens. If you’re honest with yourself, you may feel an anticipation of frustration building as you walk to check on their progress. That is when you need to pause and remind yourself that if they’re off-task it’s likely not because of laziness, disrespect, or any other personal reason. It’s natural, it’s developmental, and it’s not personal. Still, it’s not helpful to them either, so your role is to help them get back on task, hopefully without judgement. Remember, you have the fully developed prefrontal cortex with myelination to help you prioritize your time, regulate your emotions, and be aware of future implication of your actions- they don’t yet.
Communication- Emotional Maturity & Connection- Building
Remember that it is natural for teens to prioritize outside friendships and relationships over family relationships at this stage. It’s an important part of developing a sense of identity and independence. Also remember that communication skills and impulse control are very different from adults to teens, so conversations can get heated and harsh quickly or they can dry up and leave you feeling shut out. This is a hard stage to not take personally as a parent when your bond feels like it is shifting away from what it was with your child previously. Keep in mind, it comes around again! It’s important to communicate to your teen that you are there for them while still maintaining your boundaries that you’re not a “verbal punching bag” either. When you keep healthy boundaries for yourself with your teen you are modeling the healthy types of boundaries they should have with their peers and other relationships. We can love someone and still be upset with them. It’s how we still respect them even in our moments of anger that shows our love. This is a skill teens are still learning and parents need to be modeling.
When you communicate with your teen can be just as important as what you talk about. Avoid scolding or venting your frustrations with them before they go to bed. Despite the old adage, “never go to bed angry”, it can actually be a good idea to let the sun set on an argument and reapproach it in the morning when tempers have cooled, moods have reset, and everyone’s perceptions may be more realistic. Also, even if you are able to work through an issue right before bed with your teen, it may leave them struggling to sleep as they deal with feelings of guilt, frustration, or anxiety. Sleep is so important for teens’ development and they are commonly already getting far less than they should. An alternative could be for you both to write down how you feel about a situation with the promise to look it over and then discuss it the next day.
So many aspects of teen behavior like homework debates, reductions in communication, isolation in their rooms, or retreating to their phones is normal behavior at this stage, but it doesn’t mean that those behaviors can’t have very negative impacts on your teens’ overall mental health and development. So a key part of parenting teens is modeling behaviors and leading expectations. An example of this can be pushing for a balance between interactions and alone time, otherwise teens will likely happily spend most of their time alone in their rooms on social media/gaming, perhaps only leaving for food. These are normal desires for a teen, but isolation can also increase risks of anxiety, irritability, and depression. As parents, we need to push for more balanced habits and interactions in teens- BUT- parents also need to be realistic that their requests are going to go against their teens natural motivations & that they will receive pushback from their teens, so parents need to resist the instinct to take it personally or become overly frustrated with the repetition of those conversations. I know that is big request and you will not always be able to meet it, so be satisfied with each time you are able to.
Mental Health
The teen brain is capable of high rates of learning, but unfortunately that can also mean learning the wrong habits and behaviors. Poor impulse control and emotional regulation, as well as more reward & gratification seeking, can lead to poor decision making and increased tendencies to take risks. It is estimated that 31% of teens in the US have had some form of an Anxiety Disorder. Around 20% of teens have experienced Depression (29% in girls) and the teenage brain is considered more vulnerable to addiction than adults. Those that engage in substance use in their teens years have a significantly higher risk of long-term addiction and a reduced rate of a successful detox.
On an encouraging note, though, talking to your teens about addiction and mental health can significantly reduce their risks. Studies have even shown a 50% reduced risk of addiction in households where parents discuss the risks of substance use with their children. So even when you feel like your teens aren’t listening, start these hard conversations. Leave the door open for future communication and support. Don’t dismiss or disregard concerns they bring to you, even if they feel small in comparison to your current stressors and concerns. A vital part to these conversations are that you’re listening- it’s not about solving their concerns or changing their perceptions. If you feel like you need more help in addressing your teens anxiety, depression, anger, or numbing, please reach out to mental health professionals. The successful impacts of mental health interventions are increased for teens.
You can learn about addressing anxiety with your teens in the blog below- it can be a great resources for teens and parents to read and discuss.
It’s important to understand that mental health symptoms can ebb and flow. Your teen can have periods where they seem to be doing great and symptoms return. Disorders like Depression can even have multiple faces- teens can look sad and overwhelmed, irritable or easily enraged, and even joyful or thriving all while battling the symptoms of clinical depression. That’s why if you find yourself feeling scared or overwhelmed as a parent by any of your teens symptoms in the image above, don’t hesitate to reach out for professional mental health support. Start interventions early for lifelong changes and mentally healthy habits. One of the determining factors of teen behavior is their view of the reward for that behavior and their ability to justify the risk of it. Risk taking behavior can be a normal part of a teens’ development, which is why it is important to have conversations about those risks and have your teen brainstorm ways they may manage risky situations or choices. Teach them to problem-solve scenarios before they find themselves in them and feel overwhelmed. Remember, teens are growing up in a world where followers and likes are currency, so the rewards for more extreme content can easily outshine the risks to them.
You can increase emotional and mental resiliency by priming their bodies to handle and adapt to stress better by building healthy foundations. This means focusing on good sleep habits, which are different for teens than adults. It means encouraging healthy eating and awareness of the nutritional values of their choices and how those choices impact their mental health. It also means encouraging good activity levels and socialization. Being a part of these interventions can be a meaningful way to check in and build better communication with your teen. Cook healthier meals together or go on walks and hikes with them and let them lead conversations about what has been on their mind lately. Yes it may be a struggle at first to get them to agree, but the payoff when you stick with it is worth the rough start. Overall, educating yourself and your teen about mental health goes a long way in understanding, addressing, and improving it. You can check out these blogs about stress and mental health, the role of healthy eating and mental health, and building healthier habits to start.
Take warning signs seriously and consider working with a therapist or psychiatrist. Remember, meeting with a therapist is not about prescribing medication or labeling, but about building treatment plans, developing coping strategies, reducing symptoms, and processing your experiences. They can help your teen understand their symptoms or disorders, reduce cognitive distortions, process their feelings, and build emotional resiliency and awareness even if they don’t have a clinical disorder.
Final Note:
Parents, you need to be taking care of yourself as well. Possibly one of the best predictors of you being able to support your teen’s mental health journey is if you’re also supporting your own and addressing the anxiety, frustration, and stress that you may be facing as well. Support is never a sign of weakness. Remember, you deserve peace as well.
