Greg and I explored the wonderful world of surviving the tumultuous teen years… for dads!.  One thing I find incredulous is how disrespectfully today’s teens speak to their parents.  The common lament I hear from dads is, “If I ever talked that way to my parents, I’d have had my head handed to me!“.  The temptation here is to take that observation, personalize our kid’s behavior, and offer a reactive response ourselves.  When we get hooked by our kids, we join them in their adolescent thinking.  How can they ever learn a better way to deal with their powerful emotions unless we show it to them?

Is this the Teen? or Parent?

A big hunk of recent brain research these days  is telling us that the brain grows from back to front, and it is the center of the brain which is in the process of forming in early adolescence.  The middle of the brain is the part which handles emotions – go figure!  Interestingly enough, it is also the section which is responsible for bonding.  Our teen’s brains aren’t fully cooked yet!  Our job is to help them learn good responses; to learn what bonding looks and feels like; while the cement is still wet.  The question I’ve got to ask myself is, If my kid is still partly brain dead, do I think acting like that too sometimes will help him/her grow up?” 

If we’ll take time to get into our kids’ worlds it can help!  I know that, in my household, some 80% of the time, the kiddo at least outwardly has less than zero interest in spending time with me.  It’s a bummer.  What ever happened to that little girl who could hardly wait to see me?  Overcoming those feelings of rejection takes work.  Three strategies I’m employing are:
1.  Plan to go places or do things together which they will still moan about, but do them anyway (i.e. run errands, watch a movie or, play a board game together, etc);
2.  Do things with them in their world (i.e. take them and their friends to a concert; play Wii, ask them to tell you about their music, get crushed by them in X-box, etc.);
3.  Make the most of your chauferring time in the car.  Turn the radio off and ask just one question, and then just LISTEN.
Oh yeah by the way, if you do these things and your kid still isn’t responsive, you’ve still succeeded. You didn’t quit.  You kept moving toward them.  And your efforts will mean something good down the road.

Dad’s who model what they want to see; who encourage instead of scream or humiliate; who have well thought out consequences for disrespectful behavior; these dad’s gain the love and respect of their kids.

One last thought, if we can just keep in perspective that these teens of ours are just passing through this stage.  When they get to the other side (for some it won’t be until age 25!), and they look back, they will remember their own knuckleheadedness.  What do we want them to recall when they think about how we acted? 

 I guess it’s time fo us to man up, eh?