Parenting with All the Pieces

DRINKING AND DRIVING

This week in Fort Worth there was an unnerving MVA on the freeway.  I young man (I think 23) was intoxicated, went the wrong way on the freeway and hit an oil tanker truck which exploded and the truck driver was killed.  I stay confused about why we drink and drive.  I really do understand this but I still do not.  In my role as therapist of adolescents I have heard too many stories about drinking and driving. 

As parents we don’t want our children to drink at all.  I am in agreement with this.  But I think that setting some ground rules in case they break that is imperative.  Both as teenagers and as adults we want them to understand the gravity of drinking and driving. 

When my oldest daughter lived in LA they would do random checks even on the freeways when the bars closed and other such times.  I guess it would make you wonder how Lindsey Lohan gets away with this so often.  Although my daughter has always been good about drinking and not driving she became more vigilant from living in an area with this kind of monitoring. 

Only one of my daughters drank as a teenager and she understood that when she planned to drink (which was not often) she needed to tell me and tell me the plan to be safe.  She knew I would prefer she not make this choice but if she did I didn’t want her to sneak around about it. 

As parents we need to take a very hard line about drinking and driving and as citizens we should encourage things like the procedure in LA.  When I first moved to Texas I did not know what a roadie was.  I was shocked to learn that you would take a drink with you for the road.  How much sense did that make? This needs to change and we need to be both responsible parents and citizens.  This accident in Fort Worth and others like it should never have happened.  Sherri

 

SELF CARE NOT SELFISHNESS

Today I was thinking about all the things I blog about telling parents the things they need to be doing.  Parenting is a job that never ends; not on any given day or for the rest of your life.  As your children become adults the relationships change but you are still the parent.

So, today I decided to write about parents taking good care of self.   I see so many families where both parents are working full time.  The children are involved in many varied activities and the parents are running all the time.  When this is happening we tend to neglect ourselves.  Parenting is a 24/7 job.  Like any all encompassing job there are things one needs to do to survive well.  You need to get enough sleep, eat healthy and get some kind of exercise regularly.  Isn’t that the formula for everything?  Beyond that parents need to make time for themselves and couple time.  If one is a single parent this is even more critical.  We are less able to be effective parents is our own needs are not being met and we can’t meet those needs through our kids. 

So take time for yourself and your partner.  This will not only make you a better parent but also a better role model.  Have a good week.  Sherri

 

 

FAMILY WEEKEND CHALLENGE

Sometimes our teens seem angry or distant when they are worried about something.  This weekend talk to your teen to catch up on their week - and listen for any worries they may have.  Just listening and letting them talk is a good way to help them.  And find time this weekend for fun, too!  Catch your teen having fun.

Dr. Debra

WHEN GOOD PARENTING IS NOT ENOUGH

I have been thinking about the teenagers I see for anxiety and depression.  There are times when these kids have been suffering for a long time.  I wonder why we wait so long to get them help.  I believe that children, especially young children, but all children, want to be liked and loved and they want to feel their parents are proud of them. Actually, when I think about it maybe adults want the same thing.  

 I heard in my early days of being a therapist that when a child is acting out there is either a problem at home or at school.  Please understand I believe that parents have to be in charge and structure and discipline are a major part of parenting.  But if you have a good system in place and there are still major issues there is a problem.  It means we need to find out why.  This may mean that an evaluation should be considered by a psychiatrist, and clinical psychologist or a therapist trained to work with that age child.  We have not committed heresy by doing so.  We have not failed as parents if we get help. 

 There are really children that have either ADD or ADHD.  Parents worry that Drs are over medicating children.  If that is your worry don’t just not get the help but find a reputable child and adolescent psychiatrist for an evaluation.  The very competent psychiatrists I know would not prescribe medicine just because a child is in their office.  There needs to be an actual problem that could be addressed by medicine.  Anxiety and Depression do not always look in children as it does in adults.  Those are real conditions, which effect young children that may be physiological not just a reaction to life.  If my children were very physically ill I took them to the pediatrician and did not assume that they could shake it off or grow out of it.  Today we use the buzz word ODD like it is a condition.  If your child is diagnosed ODD (which is really Oppositional Defiant Disorder) this is an umbrella that describes a number of behaviors.  It can be a strong willed child.  It can be a child with a number of different conditions that present as a class of difficult behaviors.  Too many parents today simply say well, my child is ODD like that is the end of it.  This represents another issue may be present and further evaluation and treatment is necessary.  When children have another issue underlying their behavior they begin to develop coping skills related to that behavior.  If intervention is put off too long then there are two problems to fix, the condition and then the learned behaviors. 

 Do yourself and your child a favor.  If good parenting is not fixing a problem get them to the right help so that is can be addressed in the best manner.  Don’t wait so long that the child develops a poor sense of self worth, poor social skills and a reputation as a problem child.  Sherri

 

 

 

PARENTING IN A TURBULENT WORLD

I am no longer the parent of teenagers.  When my children were younger and even as teenagers there were world events that I knew would impact them both at the time and in the future.  I worried about how to help them understand those world events and the impact of the events upon their lives.  I wanted them to understand things from their own perspective not from whatever take I might have.  Today when I listen to the news reports I wonder how parents today are handling this. I hope that as you watch the news, read the papers or however you receive your news you talk with your teens and help them look at the events and ask the questions they may have about what is happening.  Help them to form their own opinions about these far too numerous events.  This seems to be a trying world at this time and they need your guidance and we all watch what is happening.  Sherri

 

Spring Celebrations and Resolutions

Tomorrow is the first day of Spring.  This season can mean many things for your family.  Some families see this as a time to celebrate winter ending and warmer weather coming.  Other families see Spring as a time to clean the house and prepare for the wrap-up of the school year. 

Spring can be a great time to celebrate with the family.  Easter is a Christian holiday associated with Spring; other religious faiths have holidays associated with this time as well.   A positive tradition can be to celebrate together the beginning of the season, whether you are having a time of spiritual celebration or celebrating the onset of warmer weather.  Scheduling a consistent time for celebration as a new family tradition can be very positive for your family.

I think the onset of Spring can be a good time to revisit your New Year's resolutions as well.  Most New Year's resolutions are made and then broken within a month.  Revisiting the resolutions can be helpful to decide what is reasonable and what is not reasonable at this time.   This might be a time for the family to set a resolution for the remainder of the year.

Happy Spring!

Dr. Debra

 

 

FAMILY WEEKEND CHALLENGE

So, spring break is drawing to a close and it is back to business as usual.  How was the week.  Did you get to spend any special time with your kids?  Why not plan a celebration this weekend for the special times during the week.  There are many things families can to do celebrate.  You could plant some special flowers to remind you of a special event this week.  You can together frame photos of the fun event and find a place for those photos in the house.  Since I spend some of my professional time working with girls or women for disordered try to center this celebration on something other than eating.  Whatever you do have a great time.  At the end you can focus on the business of getting back to life as usual.  Have a great weekend.  Sherri

Teaching Balance to our Teens

Reading Sherri's blog made me think about the importance of balance.  Generation Me is a generation out of balance.  The focus is on "it is all about me and my needs."  Sherri has talked about how we have overcorrected and focused so much on our teens feeling good about themselves that we have awarded them for "showing up."  No wonder they think the world revolves around them and their needs!

Clearly we want our teens to have the capacity to focus on and want to help others.  But we should also want them to be able to recognize the things in life that they need to celebrate.  Some celebrations should occur for routine events:  birthdays and holidays.  Other celebrations should occur for special events and accomplishments, such as graduation. 

Help your teen develop this important sense of balance.  He should be able to have the enjoyment of thinking about and helping others and should be able to have the enjoyment of celebration.

Enjoy teaching your teen about balance!

Dr. Debra

CELEBRATE

I believe we do not have enough simple rites of passage or celebrations in my puritan culture.  Too often accomplishments pass by with minimal notice.  As parents we may need to pay more attention to this. 

This is sort of a bit of a diversion from this week’s blogging so bear with me.   When my daughters were small we had a book titled I'm in Charge of the Celebrations by Byrd Baylor.  I loved this book because it talked about celebrating the small things and watching for those small things to celebrate. Today I am thinking about my adult daughters.  They both have something to celebrate this week.  One is moving into her first house and the other has been accepted into grad school.  This is a time of celebration for us.

This may sound like it could be in direct conflict with the writing we have been doing about GenMe but I think we need to give credit where credit is due. Trophies for showing up are not celebrations of accomplishments.  We want instead to celebrate real success and we should.  

So watch for things to celebrate both with our children and also our own accomplishments.  Families should celebrate all accomplishments.  One time I saw a red plate that said you are special today. At the time I thought that was odd but maybe every TEAM FAMILY needs such a plate.  

When you watch for things to celebrate you may find more that you expect.  Sherri

 

BEING PART OF TEAM FAMILY

I have been been catching up on our blog today.  It has gotten me to thinking about this GenMe thing and Spring Break.  I find that most families today celebrate Spring Break with their kids and often, but not always, this involves a family trip of some sort.  That can be a great way to spend time with your teenager when they are usually too busy to spend time with the family on a regular basis.  From there it can run the gambit.  In other households it may be a short trip, planned time of from work and at least a few days to do family things even if only locally, (I cannot use the term staycation) or just work as usual for the parents and the kids are on their own.  Any of these options are fine and depend upon the family situation and goals.  

In the recent years I have had teens tell me in a defiant manner, "This is my vacation and I don't have to do anything I don't want to do, I'm on vacation!"  When I think about GenMe this is one of the things I focus on.  That attitude of I deserve a vacation and I should be able to do anything I want is more typical of this generation than before.  

As I read Dr. Debra's last few blogs and her homework assignment I thought about TEAM FAMILY.  Our teenagers need to be a part of the family team.  This means for the good times as well as the bad.   Our teens should get the things they need and some of the things they want.  They should be heard and understood as should we all.  They should share in the responsibilities of the family and they should be taken care of as needed and be part of caring for others.  All of this is part of TEAM FAMILY.  The give and take and the empathy Dr. Debra recently talked about.  

Sometimes GenME is not about all of this and we need to redirect some of these beliefs into TEAM FAMILY.  Good luck with this and have a great Spring Break, whatever that means for your family.  Sherri

Spring Break and Your Teen

Spring break is upon us this week.  For many teens, this means hanging out at home with friends.  For other teens, this might mean travelling on a family vacation or school trip. 

Everyone needs a break - and spring break can be such a valuable time for your teen.  Getting a break from study and being able to sleep in are at the top of every teen's list.  Encourage your teen to take time to rest and spend time with friends having fun.  Time for play is important.

So is time spent with family.  Use this time to take the opportunity to see how your teen is thinking about the rest of the school year.  Help him prepare for deadlines he might be facing when he returns to school. 

For those of you who have seniors in your home, this might be the last spring break that you spend some time with your teen.  Make the most of it!

Dr. Debra

Family Weekend Challenge: Spring Break Week

Next week is spring break for many schools.  You probably have plans for your teen and family for spring break.  If you do - great. Be on the lookout for opportunities to talk with your teen about how other people feel.  Discussing the recent tragedy in Japan with the tsunami might be a way to discuss thinking about other people.  If you don't have spring break plans, make some with your teen.

Dr. Debra

Teaching Empathy: Changing "Generation Me"

Reading Sherri's blog about "Generation Me" has caused me to think.  How do we go about helping this generation shift their thinking away from "It is all about me?"  All of us know adults who are narcissistic, who take the position that everything is about them.  And those adults as a group do not have happy relationships with others and in general are unhappy people.  Somewhere during healthy adult development, one realizes that true happiness comes from giving not taking.  Narcissistic adults never reach this stage of development.

One major difference between teenagers and adults is that teenagers are in the process of developing their identity and character. So teenagers can be taught ways of relating more easily than adults. How do we help our teens change their viewpoint that "it is all about me?" 

I believe that helping teens develop empathy - understanding how another person feels - is one of the best ways of changing the self-centered mindset of Generation Me.  How to you teach empathy?  Watching television shows and movies with your teen and pointing out incidents in which a person feels sad or angry because of something that has happened can be helpful.  This is a good time to hit the pause button and ask your teen to identify what the hurt person is feeling - and why that may be.  Bringing the example close to home by asking your teen if he has ever felt that way can reinforce empathy by helping your teen generalize how he feels to how another person may feel. 

One of the best exercises in helping your teen develop empathy is to take your teen to volunteer in some capacity.  Working at a foodbank or mission can help your teen not only develop empathy, but to also begin to see how he can help others. 

Helping your teen learn how to care about and help others is one of the biggest gifts you can give to him.  After all, would you deprive your teen of the enormous pleasure that a person receives from helping others? 

Dr. Debra

 

WHAT IF IT'S ALL ABOUT ME?

Yesterday I blogged about GenMe.  I referred to an article I had read by Gary Schlee.  The actual work was written by Jean M. Twenge, her book is Generation Me.  I have been interested to read this information because it matches what I have been thinking about this generation for awhile now.  

I grew up in a generation where we were taught at home, at church and at school that humility was a virtue.  I knew I was never to think something I did was too good or to feel too proud of myself.  As a result I became an adult with pretty low self worth and not really understanding my gifts and talents.  Because of the times and my chosen field I began to understand that it was not only acceptable but preferred to understand what you did well.  

As I read about this GenMe stuff I realize we have over corrected.  As parents, raised in the style of my family, we wanted our children to have a better sense of self worth.  What we have grown into is a generation of narcissistic teenagers and young adults with an inflated sense of self worth.  That is not the same as understanding your strengths.  This has left them unprepared for the real world.   And maybe us for them.  

If you are raising teenagers who fall into this category what are your options now?  I don't believe it is too late.  We may be able to get to some of this through the decision making we have been talking about.  As your teens have to think through their own decisions they may be forced to be more discerning about themselves.  When we validate them we need to be quite specific and not give false praise.   But in addition we need to talk with them about things that are not going as well.  Finally I think we may need to be more honest.  Talk with our kids about how we wanted them to feel good about themselves but in doing so we may have not helped them to be cognizant of the other side.  We could tell them that no body is perfect and we don't expect them to be good at everything.  If we help them make a course correction we may protect them from a boss one day firing them for not accepting direction.  

 

GENERATION ME AND DECISION MAKING

So, are you sick of reading about decision making with our teenagers.  I really liked Dr. Debra's blog yesterday about the difficulty of being supportive but not being in the center ring as your teen struggles with the consequences of their decisions.  I was recently reading about what seems to be called Generation Me.  Parents, and this includes me, have attempted to bring issues of self esteem into education and child raising.  I still consider this to be a good idea but we have at times done this in such a way that we may have strangled our teens.  We have worried so much about their self esteem that we may not have even corrected their mistakes.  I know a high school english teacher that says you cannot ask children to read aloud in school because poor readers might be embarrassed.  And because we don't want them to feel bad about themselves we have inflated their grades so they will feel good about themselves.  

I have looked at a bit of Gary Schlee's work on this.  I see these teens and young adults in therapy and I am frightened about the prospective adults we may be turning our world over to in a few years.  I know I really sound like an old crone.  Gary reports that these teens may be self important and narcissistic.  They feel the world owes them and they cannot evaluate their performance well.  I saw a Community College student once that told me she thought she would be a pediatrician.  I asked her about what she was taking in college.  She only had two classes so as not to be overwhelmed, she was taking the history of music and a dance class.  I thought she might need to pick up the pace if medical school was in her future.  

This is why this stuff about decision making is so critical.  If we are to assist these teens in charting a better path they need to be able to think critically, make decisions and deal with the consequences.  I think I will write more about this in the next few weeks.  I will be interested in your feedback.  Sherri 

Helping Your Teen with a Difficult Decision

I don't know about you, but as a parent I find it difficult to help my teen sometimes with difficult decision-making.  The most difficult part of this is watching your teen struggle with the consequences of his or her decision-making.  I know that I want to rescue my teen sometimes, but rescuing your teen from consequences does not allow him to learn from these experiences.

We need to help our teens think through each decision and help them learn from those decisions.  Pointing out the consequences of a negative choice can help but don't be surprised if your teen does not listen to you.  No doubt you have had that experience already!

Where we help our teens the most is helping them understand "where things went wrong."  As parents we must accept the fact that our teen will make some mistakes.  And we need to be there to help them figure out what went wrong and how to make it better.  If they don't have the experience of making mistakes while still living with us, they will struggle more when they have to make decisions later.

Dr. Debra

FAMILY WEEKEND CHALLENGE

This week we have talked about decision making and helping your teens with the thinking that is important with decision making.  This weekend, try to find something that you or your teen is doing that takes decision making.  Encourage your teen to talk with you about how he or she would make a decision about that topic and have them talk you through their thinking process. 

Dr. Debra

 

RISING TO AN OCCASION

Tonight I want to think about expressing confidence to our teens in their ability to make decisions.  Sometimes we talk about the self fulfilling prophecy with kids.  If you set up an expectation for a child they will fall to that expectation.  If you say to a child often enough a negative quality, like you never try hard enough.  They will fall to that expectation.  It stands to reason that the reverse is also true.  If you tell a child I trust that you can make good decisions,  They will rise to that occasion.  

You don't want to go too far.  At one point I was telling my daughter about about age 10 that I believed she could decide for herself.  She told my mother, (that was like telling on me I think!) I wouldn't help her.  I went back to her and modified my approach.  It grew in to me telling her I trusted her decisions but I took smaller steps.   

As the teenager makes more and more decisions they develop the confidence to do this more often.  It is really fun to see that expression of pure pleasure when they make a decision that works out well.  Thanks for listening.  Sherri