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Raising teenagers can be tough and can increase a parent’s personal anxiety to unhealthy extremes. It’s important to be reminded of parenting strategies that can sometimes feel like there somewhere between how you used to parent when your teen was a child and yet not quite at the point of being able to treat them like a fully grown adult.

Here are some anxiety therapy Calgary Tips for Parenting Teenagers.

Anxiety Therapy Calgary Tips for Parenting Teenagers #1: Be present while listening

Listening to teenagers can be super difficult, especially if you have other priorities you are trying get complete and or are just plain tired after a hard day of work. However, we have to remember what we feel like when people don’t listen to us to remember our teenagers deserve to be listened to and paid attention to. If you are struggling to listen to your teenager do your best as the more interested you are in them the more they will finish what they want to say and then move on and explore their inner and outer world…or simply attempt to complete their homework without too many distractions.

Anxiety Therapy Calgary Tips for Parenting Teenagers #2: It’s not just hormones that are changing.

Although the teenage years are filled with developmental milestones known as puberty, it is important to remember that your teenager’s brain is also going through a unique developmental stage.

When your child becomes a teenager, the top thinking part of the brain called the pre-frontal cortex goes into construction mode. Kind of like the bridges being built all around Calgary Alberta at the time of this writing. You see, when the thinking side of the brain goes under construction that allows the middle part of the brain called the limbic system, which controls emotion, to take over and thereby causing all sorts of emotional sensitivities and impulsiveness.

The good news is once they get around 21- 21 you will often begin to see less emotional outbursts and less crazy what was I thinking moments in their life. 

Anxiety Therapy Calgary Tips for Parenting Teenagers #3: Remember what it was like when you were a teenager.

It’s good to go way back into our memories and remember what we were like as a teenager. For some it was the worst years of their lives, for others it was awesome and for others, it was like “whatev’s”

Going back into our memory can help us to reconnect to our teen(s) to simply remember the challenges we had at that age which helps us to cultivate empathy with our teenager. The challenge of course is to attempt not to overreact depending on what we got away with as a teenager that might be causing huge anxiety today in dread that what we did or happened to us with also happen with our teen. This is where a parent might struggle to not either become super controlling as a parent or go to the other extreme and get super lackadaisical in our parenting.

Anxiety Therapy Calgary Tips for Parenting Teenagers #4: Be calm and patient.

If having a teen means one thing it’s that if you were never patient before, you now have a few years to redeem yourself and become an expert at patience and demonstrating calm behaviors.

Demonstrating a calm and patient demeanor is so important as it will help support your own personal sense of stability. Meanwhile, by demonstrating being calm and patient, your teenager may not react as much if they feel threatened or unsafe, and will also help them to see how to self-regulate in a healthy way, rather than a reactive way.

And yes, I want to make it clear to anyone reading this article I have three fingers pointing back at me as this is an area I continue to work on being calm and patient in my own personal life. Hey, I hope it’s okay that I’m being honest and vulnerable as parenting teens can be tough so it’s important to remember it’s okay to take a break or a personal time out with your teen(s) in order to not say or do something you might regret…Also, remember you might need to tag team with a partner, family member, or friend if your teen is increasing your anxiety to the point you realize you’re not going to be able to demonstrate being calm and patient.

Anxiety Therapy Calgary Tips for Parenting Teenagers #5: Remember their teenagers.

Seriously, it’s important to remember they are not babies anymore, that cute 4-year-old skipping in a park, nor are they fully mature adults ready to dive into a serious relationship and be a father or mother…there just developing physically and mentally into something that is part you (and that includes if your child is adopted) and part of who they are destined to be when they do fully mature.

If you are dealing with anxiety, whether it’s due to having teenagers, or finding your own personal anxiety is getting in the way of successful parenting it might be time to seek out a qualified counselling therapist, clinical counsellor, or psychotherapist and begin to walk in New Life.