Are you the parent of a teen?
Parenting is hard–and the challenges of parenting are ever shifting. Parenting teens especially can feel unpredictable, as your kids grow and gain independence. Just like parenting a young child or an infant, it takes a village to parent a teen. Part of that village can be a counselor who can help your teen work through issues they don’t feel comfortable coming to you with. Another part can be finding resources available to you to help you support your child through this new, complicated phase of life! That’s why we’ve pulled together the following articles from our blog to help you work with your teen to build healthy habits, support their mental health, and navigate new types of relationships:
Helping your teen build healthy habits:
Building habits at any age is hard, but teens today have added obstacles that the generations above them didn’t have to balance while growing up, forming habits, and building complex relationships for the first time. One glaring difference between teens today and the generations before them, is the extent to which they need to consider and navigate modern technology–particularly smartphones and social media. While the youngest millennials often didn’t see smartphones until college, and were existing in their teen years as the earliest forms of social media were developing, teens now are met with the power of them full force at a much younger age. As parents, part of what your job is will be to help your teen manage these obstacles as well as you can. Check out the articles linked below for tips on where to start:
Recommended reading:
- The Impact of Technology on Sleep: Tips for a Digital Detox
- The Positive Impacts of Social Media
- The Negative Impacts of Social Media on Mental Health
Supporting your teens mental health:
Parenting a teen can feel like a totally different game than parenting a young child. While infants’ and toddlers’ first instinct when something is wrong is to run to mom or dad, teens often pull away from their parents. Because of this, it can be hard for parents to know if their teens are struggling, or just exhibiting typical teen behavior. Navigating high school, thinking about the future, experiencing rapid physical changes that come with puberty, and figuring out new relationship dynamics–all of these are added stressors on teens. Learning to help your teen identify excessive stress, and develop habits to manage it in a healthy way can be a great way to help them navigate this pressure filled time. Learning the warning signs of teen depression can also help you know when it’s time to step in and when your teen is pulling away to gain some independence.
Recommended reading:
- Helping Your Teen Cope With Back to School Stress
- Perfectionism in Teens and Mental Health
- Teen Depression
- Managing Separation Anxiety in Teens
- 5 Activity Books to Help Manage Teen Anxiety
Navigating teen relationships:
One of the major changes that happens during the teen years is learning to navigate more complex relationship dynamics. Friendships become more intense, romantic and sexual feelings are often starting at this time, and feelings of all kinds get bigger and harder to work through. Having resources at your disposal to help your teen better understand what their feeling, how to navigate new relationships, and teach them healthy communication skills:
Recommended reading:
- 5 Tips for Dealing With Conflict With Your Teen
- Dating and Teens
- Teen Relationships and Texting: What You Need to Know
- 4 Ways to Help Your Teen Set Better Boundaries
Pivotal Counseling Center has therapists who work with individuals and have many different specialties. We have locations in Woodstock, Illinois, and Lake in the Hills, Illinois. If you are in need of someone to help, please consider giving us a call at (815) 345-3400.
Pivotal Counseling Center is now accepting Medicaid including Blue Cross Community Medicaid, Meridian Medicaid, and Molina Medicaid for outpatient counseling.
