Teenage Problems: Teaching Teens to Become Responsible Adults

You’ve spent your whole life protecting them, teaching them, and encouraging them to better themselves. And to what goal? To become healthy, productive, honorable, Christ-fearing adults. Now, they’re in their teen years, and you are slowly seeing them drift away, at least in some ways. You’re seeing them make their own decisions, good and bad. You’re seeing them hurt. You’re seeing them soar. Is this what you signed up for?

While you enjoy seeing them succeed, watching them fail is not so easy to handle. Your instinct, your parental reflex, is to jump in to solve their problems, minimize their consequences, and make their decisions. But is that really your job?

Letting Go

Oh, how difficult it is to let go of your child’s proverbial hand. You’ve spent a good portion of your life advocating, protecting, and guiding that child. But now, they are teenagers and on the cusp of adulthood. And while you feel like you have invested in your child, instilled good morals and God’s Word into their hearts, you’re just not ready to let go. You’re not ready to let them be their own person, away from your influence.

There is a misinterpretation of the concept of letting go that surrounds teen parent culture. It tends to be framed as an “all-or-nothing” concept instead of a gradual or subtle shift. Letting go doesn’t mean stepping away entirely. And you shouldn’t because you are their parent, after all.

Letting go of your capable, mature, almost adult still requires you to guide, but from a distance. It requires you to support them without taking over or micromanaging. Teens need space to make decisions, right or wrong, and to learn from them. After all, this is their trial run at being fully functional adults.

Natural Consequences

Each parent has their own unique style of parenting. Just like every parent has a different view of how and when to allow their child to experience natural consequences. Maybe you’re the kind of parent who has always guarded and protected your child, intervening and blocking when natural consequences follow their actions.

But the teen years are a good time to restrain your temptation to “fix” every problem your child faces. One of the best teachers in life is consequence. That might seem harsh, but it’s also true.

If your teen forgets an assignment, misses work, or stays up too late playing video games, let the outcome happen, within safe boundaries, of course. Your child’s teacher will likely confront them. Their boss may chastise or even fire them. And they might feel too tired to hang out with friends the next day if they haven’t gotten proper sleep.

These consequences might be difficult for you to endure, too, but they are teaching your child accountability, problem-solving, and the ability to rebound after disappointment. They will learn, through these naturally occurring consequences, that their choices have real-world implications. They might not like some of those implications.

Shielding them from every failure only delays the development of these adult skills. And isn’t it the goal of parenting to prepare them to be healthy, productive adults?

The Exception

Of course, there are times when intervention is appropriate, even necessary. If a teen’s choice puts them in danger, involves illegal activities, or harms them or others, you must step in. These are the moments when they especially need parenting, guidance, and love, even if they don’t initially embrace it.

Natural consequences are good lessons but should never come at the expense of safety or long-term discomfort. As the adult in the relationship, it is up to you to determine whether your child’s actions and decisions need intervention.

Emotional Regulation

Adolescence is a tumultuous, emotionally charged period in a person’s life. And it’s the perfect context in which a child can learn how to manage anger, disappointment, anxiety, frustration, and other human emotions. Learning to manage these feelings and reactions is crucial for living a healthy adulthood.

While it’s important to teach and model strategies like pausing before reacting, praying for guidance and intervention, and facing your fears, it’s also important to allow them the room to practice these skills.

Encourage them to express their feelings verbally or through art, but don’t relentlessly ask them to engage in conversation when they need space. Show them how to use Scripture to calm their nerves or encourage their faith, without making Bible memorization a punishment.

Give them the tools and allow them to practice using them.

Social Life and Boundaries

Teenagers need guidance in interacting with peers, authority figures, and even family. It’s your job to teach them about respect, conflict resolution, and assertiveness. It’s also important for you to help them recognize unhealthy relationships and how to set boundaries.

But it’s not your job to micromanage their social life. If you see something toxic or dangerous, it’s your obligation to step in. But most teen relationship drama is just that: drama. It’s not life-altering or newsworthy in the broader sense of the word. It’s important to them; therefore, it’s important to you, but that doesn’t mean it will have lifelong consequences.

While you should be available to advise if asked, it’s also important to know when to step back and let them work out the minor spats that will inevitably surface in their social life.

Through trial and error, also known as life experience, your child will learn how to communicate with others. They will begin to understand the importance of loyalty and how to spot positive and negative characteristics in other people. These are life skills that will make their transition into adult relationships more fruitful and clear.

Tenacity

Your child will be rejected. They will be disappointed, and they will be challenged. Life is just that way. But if you always shelter your child from the feeling of rejection or from meeting a challenge, you’re robbing them of an important and natural life lesson.

Learning how to pick yourself up after being knocked down or trying, trying, trying again, after failure is an invaluable life skill. If you never let them try something difficult, or you inorganically tilt results in their favor, they will never know what it feels like to be rejected, disappointed, or challenged. And when they face these truths in adulthood, which they inevitably will, they won’t be prepared to handle them.

Teach your child now, through word and action, that failure is not the end of the story. In fact, it’s an opportunity to learn and grow. Interfering in their challenges will also rob them of the joy of victory when they finally succeed. Of course, as a parent, it is still your job to provide for their needs and support them in their challenges, but you also have to allow them the opportunity to take a role in solving their own problems.

Therapy

Therapy can help teens transition from childhood to adulthood with confidence and skill. A Christian therapist can not only be a listening ear, but can also provide them with biblical advice as they embark on the longest season of their life, adulthood.

Your struggling child might appreciate having unrestrained access to a helpful, caring adult who can listen without bias and guide without personal motive. Even those teens who seem to be unfazed or unbothered by their life stage can benefit from the practical help a therapist can offer, such as how to better communicate in interpersonal interactions or how to plan for a successful career.

If you are the parent of a teen, please make an appointment for your child with one of the caring professional counselors in our network. If you’re struggling with defining your own role as a parent, consider making an appointment with me or one of the other mental health specialists who can help you sort out your own feelings. Contact our reception team today.