Why are parent-child relationships complicated in adolescence?
The main problem is that parents do not assume that their children grow up and the principle of authority begins to be questioned. Growing up means forming an opinion, creating a criterion that usually goes against the established precepts. This arises from the adolescent’s imperious need to create a personal identity that allows him/her to see his/her individuality and if he/she follows the family’s criteria it is as if he/she were still a child, he/she is not able to see where his/her family ends and where he/she begins.
For this line to be clearer he has to differentiate himself and for this he rebels. The greater the obligation to obey without explanation and communication, the greater the degree of rebellion. Faced with this, the parents exert more and more pressure and the children more and more resistance; normally a difficult balance is reached with the acceptance by the parents that they have lost the control they want to exercise, which relaxes the relationship a little and an acceptable coexistence is reestablished. When this does not happen and the situation becomes entrenched, it is advisable to consult an expert for advice.
How to know if you are overprotecting a teenager?
We know that we overprotect a teenager when we do things for him or her that they are perfectly capable of doing. Also when we do not allow them to suffer the consequences of their actions trying to minimize them or solve them in their place. It is an interference to their person that will have devastating effects on their present and future and that ends up bringing to consultation young people who do not know how to manage their life and who feel incapable and insecure to do productive things for themselves.
With all the best intentions parents try to avoid all suffering and frustration that appears in the life of these boys and girls but they do not take into account that childhood and adolescence is a training for life; learning to manage these emotions that life situations present us with makes us develop strategies and tools that make us strong to face the future that is to come. By not allowing them to go through these situations and protecting them from all pain, we leave them naked in the face of the problems that we all face in the course of life.
To what extent should we continue to make it clear who is in charge at home?
It is necessary to learn to distinguish which rules are immovable, as basic principles of coexistence and which rules we can agree on and make our children participate in their elaboration, which will make them more acceptable and accepted. Knowing who is in charge, who has the last word and who really has the responsibility, which are the parents, does not imply subjugating, not listening, not respecting those who do not; this, sometimes, generates confusion and endless problems.
What we forget is to count on them, to know what they think, what they can contribute to a reality that affects them and that nobody bothers to explain. Adolescence is a time of rediscovery and of beginning to count on our children; they have a lot to contribute and normally, we are not able to see it.
What are the classic mistakes parents make when dealing with their teenagers?
The most classic mistake is to continue to see them as small children and treat them as such. The “because I said so” may make sense when we talk to small children, but with adolescents this no longer works. Adolescence is a time for parents to re-evaluate because it is at this moment when we see the result of the education we have given and we realize the successes and shortcomings we have had. If we have allowed certain behaviors when they were small because it was funny or because it was more comfortable or easier; when they get older and continue to maintain the same behaviors; at this age, we no longer control them, it is no longer funny and begins to be a problem.
Another classic mistake also appears, which is to become ‘buddies’ of your children. They already have their peers and more than ever they need a father/mother to serve them as a reference, shelter and support in the complicated, doubtful and unstable path of adolescence. They will need someone with criteria who knows how to give them a vision of reality beyond what they see, because they already have “buddies” for partying and they are short of the other. It is important that when we see that a situation is getting out of hand, we consult a professional as soon as possible, because time worsens the problems; and this is a period that due to difficulties in adapting, both parents and children, generates a lot of instability.