Archive for November, 2011

This is Your Body on Adolescence

Friday, November 25th, 2011

Over twenty years ago, there was an amazingly effective public service announcement by a group called Partnership for a Drug-Free America. It was effective – not so much because it caused a dramatic decrease in the use of drugs, but because this one short ad seared itself into the collective cultural consciousness. I remember the ad vividly. There was a man in a kitchen. He held up an egg and said, “This is your brain.” He picked up a pan and said, “This is drugs,” and put the pan on the stove. Cracking open the egg, he dropped it in the pan while saying, “This is your brain on drugs,” as the egg fried and bubbled. He looked at the camera and said, “Any questions?” Fade to black.

It was a graphic representation of a complex and difficult reality – the effect of drug use on the health of your brain. Up to that point, I’m not sure people had given much thought, as a whole, to what drugs actually did to a person’s brain. Sure, they could see the physical effects on a person’s body, on their demeanor and behavior, but the brain was sort of a mysterious, shrouded object that most people didn’t truly understand unless they were in a medical or research profession. That ad brought into focus drugs and what their use was doing to the brains of thousands of people. And the message was simple – drugs fry your brain. Easy to grasp. Easy to remember.

Fast-forward to today. You, as a parent, can see the physical effects of adolescence on your teen. You observe their demeanor and behaviors; you remember your own. But puberty and adolescence have been sort of mysterious, shrouded by a process you don’t really understand unless you’re in a medical or research profession. Frankly, it’s a process many of us tried very hard to just survive as teens and then to hunker down and survive when it’s our kid’s turn.

But reverting to this hunker-down-and-just-survive-it mode for adolescence is a cheat. Surviving isn’t really experiencing life to the fullest, and there are parts of this time of life you’ll want to fully experience. Remember – the slimy pupa morphs into a beautiful butterfly in time. You wouldn’t want to be hunkered down so much you miss it.

Do you remember the discussion in chapter 3 about the research breakthroughs regarding imaging of the brain? And about how different adolescent brains are from even young adult brains? There is so much going on in the body of your teen directly connected to that brain. While you may become focused on the physical changes you can see and experience every day, don’t forget there’s a lot going on “upstairs” as well.

The above is excerpted from Chapter 5 of my new book, The Stranger in Your House. I’ll be posting more excerpts from it here in the weeks to come, but you can receive a FREE copy of the book itself between now and December 15, 2011. To participate in this book giveaway, simply share some of your own thoughts or experiences about raising teenagers – in the comments section of this or future blog posts, or on the Facebook or Twitter pages linked to below.

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Know Yourself, Know Your Teenager

Wednesday, November 16th, 2011

In relationships, the only person you really have control over is you. To paraphrase Scripture: If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with your teenager (Rom. 12:18). You establish the peace, and you do that through stabilizing the relationship from your end regardless of what your teen does. You must become the port in the storm for this sometimes turbulent relationship. You take charge over yourself first by understanding and accepting the ways you’ve contributed to any difficulty in your relationship. You take charge by apologizing and making an honest effort to do better. You model by removing your own plank first and then bringing up specks. Teens don’t expect you to be perfect, but they’d appreciate a little honesty, especially where your faults are concerned.

The firm foundation your teenager needs is you as a parent to be clear about who you are and what your role as a parent is, even when that role is confusing and frustrating. There is a real danger here, if parents decide to abdicate their role as parents during the adolescent years for something else that feels more comfortable. Many of these situations, taken to extreme, are outlined in my book Healing the Scars of Emotional Abuse. Teenagers who are cheated out of that childhood role and thrust into another by a parent suffer a form of abuse.

The parent-child relationship can become warped during adolescence, especially creating a role reversal where the parent begins to look to and expect the teenager to fill the parent’s needs. It is not healthy for you to begin to look to your growing teenager as someone to fill your adult needs. These can be adult needs for companionship or camaraderie, even advice and protection. Adolescence is meant to be a process for teenagers to grow and mature into their own person, filling their own needs, not yours.

I have seen mothers, afraid of their own aging, being to morph into older, distorted images of their teenage daughters, even wearing similar clothing and adopting similar hairstyles.

I have seen fathers, fearful of their own aging, treat their sons as peers and demand their sons reciprocate, requiring time and attention to the detriment of same-age friends.

I have seen mothers, fearful of the coming empty nest, bind their teenagers to them through increasing demands and intentional displays of incapacity.

I have seen fathers, troubled and discontent with their own lives, transfer that negativity onto their teenagers, dragging them down just at the point of launch in order to experience companionship in failure.

I have seen parents burden their teenagers with the weight of their own fading dreams of accomplishment.

Granted, these examples are extreme and produce an unhealthy attachment and enmeshment, a sort of relational strangulation. However, I say this as a reminder to all parents. Adolescence is a time of discovery and possibility for teenagers. It can also lcome at a time of disappointment and a sense of loss for parents, because of the juxtaposition of age. Aging parents can become fearful of advancing time and look to their teenagers to help slow the march. Solitary parents can become fearful of being left alone and look to their teenagers to fill the gap. Angry, embittered parents can look to teenagers as an outlet for venting and release. Maybe these examples aren’t you, but please be aware and willing to look inside yourself to see if any of them claim even the smallest place in your heart.

Teens are growing into their potential at a time many adults may feel their own potential waning. This can cause jealousy and envy and contribute to the tension and friction between teens and parents. These sorts of issues have the capacity to damage and sever your connection with your teenager, without you even really understanding why. As you enter into this pivotal time of transition, I encourage you to make sure you hang onto your identity as a parent so you allow your teenager to retain his or her identity as a child for a few more years.

The above is excerpted from Chapter 4 of my new book, The Stranger in Your House. I’ll be posting more excerpts from it here in the weeks to come, but you can receive a FREE copy of the book itself between now and December 15, 2011. To participate in this book giveaway, simply share some of your own thoughts or experiences about raising teenagers – in the comments section of this or future blog posts, or on the Facebook or Twitter pages linked to below.

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Riding the Emotional Roller Coaster of Adolescence

Friday, November 4th, 2011

Veronica scanned the channel listings, automatically rejecting anything that looked like a drama; she had enough of that at home. Sitcoms are out; she simply couldn’t stand watching inane banter in a make-believe household. Same with sports; she was trying to get away from conflicts of any kind. Thank heaven for the Discovery Channel and the History Channel; she’d take the burrowing habits of mole crickets or the engineering feats of the Roman Coliseum any day of the week. She wanted escape and nothing remotely related to anything she was going through; although, she had to admit, burrowing had an odd sort of appeal.

She’d just hit her channel of choice when she heard the front door open and then quickly slam. Ahhh, Tyler was home. Let the drama begin. Veronica used to cringe at the thought of teen angst partnered with estrogen and menstruation. But her daughter, Robyn, had nothing on Tyler. Everything was either a crisis or a celebration with him; the roller coaster started when he was thirteen, a little later than with Robyn, but nothing had been smooth since.

When things are good in Tyler’s life — completely determined by him as opposed to mundane considerations like outside circumstances — Tyler was on top of the world. He operated at Mach 10, almost airborne. Of course, when he was down, he operated about an inch below the ground, slogging along at a snail’s pace, apathetic, dejected, and lethargic. She’d almost gotten used to the weekly mood swings, but, lately, he’d been careening back and forth, sometimes multiple times a day. Veronica couldn’t keep up; she was so tired of the whole thing, she could feel herself withdrawing from him.

With a sigh, she realized that just wasn’t an option. If he didn’t either fly down the stairs on elation’s wings or drag himself down within fifteen minutes, she’d go up and try to get a gauge on what was going on now. This was just exhausting. Where was neutral on that kid’s controls?

I said before that adolescence is a roller coaster your teen is on, with you along for the ride. Now, don’t get me wrong — I like roller coasters. They’re an awful lot of fun — if you can really use awful and fun in the same sentence. The nice thing about amusement-park roller coasters is that you get to choose whether to ride them. They’d have much less appeal if you were forced to ride them even if you didn’t feel well or if you were required to keep getting back on as soon as you got off. After a while, the body jerking and the stomach dropping and the head straining would become very old.

How do you think your teenager feels about the emotional roller coaster of adolescence? At least you can go read a book or channel surf or take a walk and actually get away for a bit, but teens gripped by adolescence don’t always have that option. They are in total reaction mode, and life serves as a huge trigger.

The above is excerpted from Chapter 3 of my new book, The Stranger in Your House. I’ll be posting more excerpts from it here in the weeks to come, but you can receive a FREE copy of the book itself between now and December 15, 2011. To participate in this book giveaway, simply share some of your own thoughts or experiences about raising teenagers – in the comments section of this or future blog posts, or on the Facebook or Twitter pages linked to below.

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