Adolescence: The Challenges and the Opportunities

By Dr. Caroline Peyser, Clinical Supervisor of Hakshiva’s Therapy Program

For many of us parents, just the mere mention of the word adolescence strikes fear in our hearts.  We think of the teen years as a rebellious and unpredictable time when we do not know what our children may end up doing or how they will turn out.  Some of us remember our own adolescent rebellion and worry that our kids may to do us what we did to our parents.

Let me start then with some comforting facts. The truth is that most teens do not rebel – they do not reject their parents’ values, way of life, morals, rules and beliefs. It is only a minority of teens that do. Most fights between parents and teens are about the small stuff – your teen’s haircut, choice of clothes, choice of music, leisure activities, homework and chores around the house- which can be exhausting just the same. If you want to have some idea of how you and your child will fare together during adolescence, the best predictor is to look at your relationship before your child hits his teens. If you have a strong and relatively smooth relationship with your child during his early years, it is most likely this positive connection will continue during the teen years as well. Of course, teens can be more moody, test boundaries, and challenge your authority in ways that they never did as kids. But that is not the same as rebellion. As a matter of fact, that’s all part of normal adolescence.

So what is adolescence anyway? And why the big change from childhood? Adolescence is a time when children begin to prepare for their lives and roles as adults. It is a time of transition from childhood to adulthood. In past societies, this change happened in a matter of months or in the course of a year or two. In our culture today, as the roles of adults in the work world require more specialized training, adolescence spans several years, beginning when a child is 11 or 12 and ending anywhere between ages 18-24.

The most obvious changes in adolescence are the physical ones. Boys and girls bodies begin to turn into those of a young adult. At the same time that these visible changes occur, there are many other changes going on in the body as well.  One big area of development takes place in the brain and leads to changes in the child’s ability to think. Teens, unlike children, can think in new ways that are more similar to adults. They can think about possibilities for the future, about hypothetical situations, and about why they think what they do.  These new abilities lead them to question and challenge more. They no longer take the current situation as a given but instead they can think about alternatives to how they are currently living. With these new cognitive abilities, they question and challenge family rules and norms at times. They want to know why things are the way they are and why they have to be that way. These questions are often part of what parents find so challenging about their teens. They are often being asked to explain, justify, and defend their decisions and way of doing things in a way they did not have to before. It is as if the second son of the hagaddah (the adolescent) is always present asking “what is all of this to you, what is its meaning to you? Explain it to me.” If parents understand that this is all a very natural part of teen development, they may be able to respond from a less emotional place. By understanding that this is not a personal attack but rather an expression of the teen’s developing mind, parents can respond directly, informatively and less reactively.

In addition to the many biological changes occurring, adolescence is also a time of profound psychological development. Teens are figuring out who they are and who they want to be. Part of the psychological task of adolescence for both the teenager as well as his parents is the task of separation. At the end of this developmental period, the teen has to be ready to leave his family and go out on his own. Whether it is to leave the home to go learn, to get married, or to go into the army, your child now has to begin to make his or her own way in the world. In order to do this, each child has to go through a process of separating psychologically from his parents. They need to learn how to think for themselves, how to make decisions, how to choose a direction. This does not mean that they no longer want or need to consult with you and seek your guidance, but it will be in a different way than when they were kids.

The height of this process of separation occurs during adolescence. This explains the push-pull many parents feel with their teenage kids. On the one hand teens insist on being more independent (“ I can do it myself”, “I can make my own decision”,” I can decide how late to stay out”,” I can decide in which yeshiva I want to learn”) while at the same time, the child in them still wants to remain close and dependent (“Can you drive me to x”, “can you help me with my homework”, ”Can you help me decide what to do?” “Can I have a hug?”). When teens test your boundaries (e.g. arguing about when they are coming home, when they plan to do their chores, etc), you can think of it as their flexing their newly developed independence muscles and seeing how strong they are and what they can and cannot do. Parents’ reactions to this process of separation can make a big difference in how well their children do and how positive the relationship stays.

A few guidelines may help. The first rule is to recognize that this process is not personal. This is not about you or offending you. It is also not all a reflection of you and of your success or failure as a parent.  It is about your child and a struggle that he/she is working out within his/herself.

Next, you as parents have to be ready to let your child become a separate person (easier said than done!). This involves a process in which you, the parent, begin to recognize that you are going to have less of a dominant role in your child’s life than you did before. This is a realization that evolves slowly as your child moves from babyhood to adolescence. When your child is a baby, you are the center of his or her universe. Once your child enters gan, he begins to spend large parts of his day with other adults and children too and you are filled in by the teacher on the significant events of your child’s day. By the time your child is in elementary school, you do not know about large parts of his day. Finally by adolescence, your teen spends a lot of time in school and in the company of peers, and you are unaware of much of he thinks, with whom he spends time, and what he does during that time.  Teens need to know that you increasingly respect their abilities and need for greater independence while knowing that you are still there to guide them and keep them on track when needed. They also want and need you to take an interest in their lives.

The more you understand about adolescence and the needs of your teen, the better position you will be in to successfully negotiate this period together with your child. And, ideally, at the end of this process you will find that the second son of the hagaddah has turned into the first!