How to Deal With Your Teenager as a Parent When He or She Reaches Puberty

Children's puberty is a difficult time for both teenagers and their parents! Future young people go through a period of change, which involves physical-hormonal changes but also mental and social changes - emotions, values, attitudes, behaviors.

All these changes can make the teenager sometimes react inappropriately or exaggeratedly in the face of trivial situations: either too emotional, too indifferent, or too aggressive! Childhood puberty involves successive and rapid transitions from one state to another (the action of hormones) so it will be difficult for you to have a serious conversation with a child who at one moment is happy and carefree, the next moment becomes sad and sullen because then be nervous!

Thus, if you are the parents of a teenager, all you can do is be understanding and not create more difficulties for him. Remember what puberty means to children and what you went through in your time during this period! Puberty has effects on many aspects of life:

● In terms of physical appearance, children's puberty is the period in which they become as aware as possible of their sexuality, their desires, and in this context, physical appearance becomes very important! Children become aware that to be successful in the opposite sex, appearance is important!

So any small inconvenience - inevitable, by the way - such as pimples, improper height, a figure that is too thin or too bulky, delayed breast development, a denture, glasses, can become a real disaster for the teenager! Since teenagers are extremely aware of their appearance, these small flaws will create more intense negative emotions than normal!

● Children's puberty can make it difficult for them in terms of the school environment: first of all, they become more impatient and become more interested in practical things than in the theoretical ones learned in school! If you are the parents of a teenager, it seems to you a very well-known reply: "what will I need this for in life"?!

So a teenager will have learning difficulties, difficulties considerably increased by the attitude of some teachers - who are perhaps aggravated by their profession - too authoritarian and who forbid the teenager to express themselves or too sarcastic - the funny and ironic type, who makes the "panorama" of young man, thus creating another problem for his image (as if he needed another one)!

● Relationships with friends become very important in terms of children's puberty; this is the period in which friends begin to have a greater influence and importance than family, in which integration into a certain group is essential for the development of the adolescent. Therefore, young people who are closed to themselves, less sociable, and have problems with self-confidence will have real emotional difficulties, failing to integrate properly in a group.

They can become the target of other teenagers' jokes (through their frank sincerity, teenagers can be extremely cruel), the ones they joke about, the so-called "nerds", "four-eyed stove", "suckers". It will be much harder for a teenager who has not formed a group of friends to get through this period. But you, as parents, have little to do: only if you are asked for advice, calmly tell him that you have been through this and that after a certain age, all his problems will disappear!

Relationships with friends can be viewed from another perspective: if you are the type of popular teenager with a large group, then you, as parents, must discreetly follow what kind of activities young people do together and intervene if you see signs of deviant behavior: smoking, alcohol, drugs. Do not think that the child is too small for such a thing - the influence of the group creates a mass mentality, in which the collective conduct is more important than one's own opinions and values!

● Children's puberty involves an extremely delicate subject: the teenager's first true, intense love! And because teenagers often have an almost morbid tendency toward hopeless love (they always find an unattainable ideal), you need to be prepared as parents to face black depression. Don't be alarmed if you hear him talk about death, it's a normal time.

And again, this would mean that you have to spend on these processes. Because the first love will pass quickly and will make room for the second and third… About love: if you haven't done it so far, don't forget to fulfill your parental duty and talk to him about sex!

● The living conditions and the socio-economic status of the family can create difficulties for the integration of the young person during the puberty of the children! Because teenagers are overly critical and superficial, a more modest material condition of the family can affect them! Thus, no matter how difficult it is for you financially, make sure - if possible - that it has at least one object that is "fashionable" among his peers: phone, I-phone, etc.

● Children's puberty involves changes in their relationships with their siblings, changes that can be beneficial. Thus, if he has an older sister or brother, he will be able to turn to him for advice - being closer in age - and if he has a younger brother or sister, he will take on the role of protector!

But make sure you do not show a preference for any of the children because they struggle for strength and attention between siblings starts from early childhood and is always present!

● And finally, children's puberty involves changes in your relationship with you as parents! Any small conflict or misunderstanding will become exaggerated, it will create intense negative emotions. In particular, the adolescent should not be shown disapproval or rejection - he lives long enough in the middle of the same age!

Thus, as parents, you must be as understanding as possible, always open to discussions, but without "sticking your nose in". Intimacy is important for young people, if he feels that they are too curious, they will withdraw. So you have to wait for him to ask you for advice, to be prepared for this situation, and to intervene actively in his life only when there is a real problem - worrying school results, deviant behaviors.