adolescents | TSAGE&TBOG

USING THE S.T.O.P. PRINCIPLE TO DEAL WITH UPSETTING SITUATIONS

by TBOG | Oct 5, 2021 | Parenting, Workplace Emotions

It had been a pretty hectic week for Maggie. This week alone, she ran two shifts daily with less than four hours of sleep. On her last shift, she became overwhelmed. The rent was almost due and her payment had been delayed due to an issue with her bank account. She had to pick up groceries but her car mysteriously broke down so she had to take the bus with two arms full of heavy groceries. Her daughter, Helen, had recently started acting up and it was concerning. She had been very defiant of late and they almost always ended the day with heavy confrontations where hurtful words were exchanged. Everything that could go wrong was going wrong and Maggie was feeling terribly stressed.

She sighed in relief as she put her key in the knob, thinking of the long shower awaiting her, only to get a call from Helen’s class teacher. Helen had not been turning in assignments and her performance was woeful in the few she did turn in. She also had a pending project that was due in two weeks, yet no draft had been submitted. This was totally unlike Helen so, she decided to give Maggie a call to clarify things. Of course, she thanked her daughter’s teacher for the information and ended the call. She was furious! Here she was trying to make life as comfortable as possible for her daughter instead, she’d been playing truancy! As she rushed to Helen’s room to give her a piece of her mind, she decided to practice the S.T.O.P. principle that she had learnt from one of our training sessions.

Life is full of twists and turns. Some days, it’s all exciting and other days it’s gloomy. What do you do when life decides to skip the excitement and hands you the gloom? How do you deal with your emotions when everything that can go wrong is going wrong? How do you respond to such upsetting situations? The answer is simple, utilize the S.T.O.P. Principle.

The S.T.O.P. principle is the acronym for:

S – Slow down
T – be Thankful
O – Observe your emotions
P – Plan the next steps

This is an important principle to adopt if you ever want to become an emotionally intelligent manager or parent who is not ruled by emotions. Emotions in themselves are not the enemy. They’re like pilots that inform you about what’s going on in your body. How you handle that information is what determines whether you’re emotionally intelligent or not.

When something happens that jolts you out of your comfort zone, which is what upsetting situations do, the biological response is usually to react not respond. To “react” is to respond through your emotions rather than logically thinking through situations. To “respond” on the other hand, is to rise above your basic emotion and delay your come-back until you can access the logical part of you.

It is human nature to react to upsetting situations rather than respond. This is the default biological design. Here’s how it works: When there is a trigger (i.e. the upsetting situation), the first part of the brain that receive these signals is the amygdala. The amygdala is the seat of emotions and it is responsible for every emotional reaction you give. Therefore, when you take an action while the signals are still stuck in the Amygdala, your responses are likely to be reactionary. The prefrontal cortex (PFC), however, is the seat of logical thinking and it takes some time before these triggers (i.e. the upsetting situation) make it to the PFC. The time frame is dependent on your mastery of Emotional Intelligence (EI) tips and applications. When you respond aggressively to an upsetting situation, it is most likely because you did not give your prefrontal cortex enough time to receive the signal before responding, hence, your reaction.

STEP ONE: SLOW DOWN.

The S.T.O.P. Principle gives you adequate time to recalibrate so that you can view the trigger objectively. Helen’s mom held back and decided to slow (calm) down, which is the first step in STOP. She refused to let her amygdala control her despite the intense stress she was under. So, delaying her response to the upsetting situation gave her time to gather her thoughts. Now, this time interval will vary for different people depending on the severity of the situation and (most importantly) how well they’ve trained themselves to respond in a logical manner above emotional responses. To engage the first “S” in the STOP principle, you could:

meditate,
count from one to ten in your mind,
take a stroll (away from the object of stress),
take deep breaths,
listen to soul music,
go to the spa, or
lock yourself up in a room and scream your heart out!

Just do something relaxing. Anything that takes you out of the “fight or flight” stance triggered by the upsetting situation works perfectly. In my moments of intense emotions, I try to watch a movie if my situation permits otherwise, I take very long strolls preferably around nature so that I can clear my head and return to my pre-stress state.

STEP TWO: BE THANKFUL.

Once you escape the clutches of an impulsive response, learning the art of gratitude is your next stop. Gratitude is a powerful calming mechanism It helps in the release of all your happy hormones. When you express gratitude, your brain releases dopamine and serotonin (they are the two crucial neurotransmitters responsible for happiness and ‘feeling good’), and they make you feel calm. Gratitude infuses your heart with love. When you step into an aura of gratitude, your mountainous problem pales in comparison to the goodness in your life. Do you know that when a person is high on drugs, these “happy hormones” are usually released in excess. So imagine the powerful infusion of goodness that’s being evoked just by stepping into a state of thankfulness. These hormones enhance your mood immediately, making you feel happy from the inside out! This is an absolutely important process in the S.T.O.P. Principle because sometimes when you are calm from your walk [or whatever calming technique works for you], the emotions evoked by that upsetting situation may still be brewing underneath. Sometimes, it’s a false sense of calm you experience when you take that stroll. Thankfulness ensures that you truly let go of the pain and anger that has been triggered and it positions you to be empathetic and in charge of your emotions.

STEP THREE: OBSERVE YOUR EMOTIONS.

When you are done practising the “S” and “T” of the S.T.O.P. Principle, the next step is to observe your emotions. Are you calm enough to make a rational decision? Do you still feel clouded by your emotions? Are you able to understand why the other party behaved in that manner even if they’re wrong for doing so? If your answer is no, simply repeat the first two steps because we need you to ensure that you can identify the specific emotions you feel, understand why you feel that way and own those emotions. You need to be in a state of mind where you can accept whatever response you dole out as your unbiased thoughts not a reactionary mistake. When you react emotionally, chances usually are that the issues become forgotten and persons feel attacked. I know that when I do not practise the S.T.O.P. Principle, I end up going back to apologise for my actions or utterances even if I was not initially wrong. It is quite painful to apologize for acting rashly when you were the one who was attacked in the first place. I can assure you that when you do not observe your emotions before taking a step, you’re setting up yourself to be the “bad guy”.

STEP FOUR: PLAN THE NEXT STEPS.

If you observed your emotions and are self-aware enough to identify your dominant emotions, then it may be time to plan what your response should be. It’s your response, therefore, you’re under no obligation to hurriedly reply [except in the case of an emergency]. Take your time to think through your thoughts, the consequences of your actions and responses as well as the synchrony your response has with your value system. When all of these are aligned, then it’s time to take action. You’ll feel more at peace with your response when you do this.

So, what did Maggie do when she realized that her daughter was not just spinning out of control but truant? She simply went back to her room to vent off her anger. She screamed off her frustrations, pain, and anger. When she was done, she felt better. She was able to find things to be grateful for and as her hear swelled with gratitude for the beautiful memories she’d had with her daughter, love and empathy filled her heart. By the time she engaged Helen, it was from a place of connection, empathy and a desire to genuinely understand why her daughter suddenly flipped. They had an intimate conversation where she found out that Helen had been depressed lately which was why she skipped assignments, had emotional meltdowns, among other things. It was eye-opening. Imagine that Maggie had continued with the exchange of hurtful words during their ‘usual’ times of heated arguments, Helen could have become suicidal thinking (wrongly) that no one loved her.

SUMMARY:

Leaders, managers, teachers, administrators, counsellors, have all used the S.T.O.P. Principle to break down emotionally limiting barriers. This simple yet profound principle has the potential to not just make you an emotionally intelligent parent but an emotionally intelligent human as a whole.

If this article helped you in any way, do write to us at info@tsageandtbog.com and don’t forget to leave a comment

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LEVELS OF PARENTING

by TBOG | Jul 24, 2021 | Parenting

Let me first introduce you to the levels of parenting. Some time ago, I had the opportunity to engage some professionals during a specialized TRAIN-UP session and I introduced them to the four levels of parents. I’ll like to do so here as well.

The First Level is the Family Level of Parenting. This level is dominated by the biological parent, the adopted parent and the foster parent or guardians. These are the parents saddled with the primary responsibility of defining the value system through which a child must operate from. Wikipedia defines parenting as the process of promoting and supporting the physical, emotional, social, and intellectual development of a child from infancy to adulthood. So going by this, the responsibility of a seamless and wholesome transition from infancy to childhood, to adolescence all the way to adulthood lies on the shoulders of parents particularly the level one parents. This is a huge responsibility and as such, parents need the help of collaborators at the other levels of parenting however, the foundational principles guiding the child should be laid by the Level One Parent.

The Second level is the Neighbourhood Level of Parenting: They are the parents by communal responsibility. Parents will not always be everywhere but neighbourhood parents can be anywhere. Once an adolescent steps out of the home, he steps into the neighbourhood and can be engaged by a parent at this second level. These people are not necessarily parents themselves in terms of having biological or legal children, even though they can be parents, but they step into the office of a parent by carrying similar parenting values and they will ensure that adolescents are in adherence to these values even in your absence. I remember during my National Youth Corp Service year as a fresh graduate serving her nation, a young boy passed by my side sagging. I called him back and engaged him. For those of you who don’t know what ‘sagging’ is, it is a dress sense adopted by adolescents mainly where the males pull their trousers below their waist in order to expose their boxers. In Nigeria, it automatically communicates that the child is an irresponsible one even if that might not be the case. By the time we were done conversing, he understood that his dress sense could make a positive or negative statement about him and he pulled up his trousers before he left. It could be something as simple as correcting an erring adolescent.

There was an adage in Africa that used to be potent many many decades ago. I do not know how potent it is anymore. That proverb says, “it takes a village to raise a child” The Neighbourhood parents are in the similitude of the Village used in the adage. On a lighter note, I remember a particular afternoon, my mom was working at home and I kept pestering her with questions. I do not recall those questions but I was persistent. I kept asking and asking to the point where I frustrated her. Then she sent me to our landlady to go get “arodan” and I happily dashed out. Very good girl. As soon as I told our landlady what my mom asked me to bring, she asked me what my mom was doing and I told her so she asked me to check a particular place for this arodan. I did. She told me to shake up those places in my search and scatter whatever I needed to just so I could find it. I had no idea what I was looking for but when I found something out of the ordinary I’d show her and she’d tell me, “Tope it looks like this one but it’s not it. Check again” When I had completely made a mess of the entire place and scattered everything, she asked me to re-arrange them. For about an hour or more, I rearranged. When I was done, she showed me another spot to search for this arodan I searched till I got tired. Then she sent me back home to tell my mom that I couldn’t find it. I didn’t realize until many years later that arodan meant “nothing”. It’s just a futile search quest that parents use on their errant children in Yoruba land whenever they want to get such children off their hands. When anyone receives the arodan message, they know their job is to detain such children with different tasks that should last for at least an hour, before sending them back home. However, with the level of depravity in our society today, the level three parents are becoming scared and community life is fast disappearing, sadly.

The Third Level is the Professional level of Parenting: These are the ‘parents’ with a defined responsibility such as Teachers who function in schools to tutor your adolescents in a particular course, School Counsellors who give guidance on academic problems understanding your adolescent’s learning needs and blocks, Pastors and Imams who are responsible for giving guidance on spiritual matters, etc. The level three parents have the specific job of teaching the adolescent in specialized ways that are peculiar to their offices. But they also rely heavily on the level one parents and build upon the value construct of the children entrusted into their care. In the event of a gap in level one parenting, usually identifiable by the absence of morals and values, they can step into the Office of the Parent to redefine the value construct for the adolescent.

The Office of the Parent is an important position because the level one parents will not always be everywhere. They need collaborators who will step into this office to become PARENTS to their children. Only those with similar value systems can ascend that office seemlessly.

Emergency Level of Parenting: We call them the Parent-in-Emergency. They are also professionals but the distinction is that they do not have regular interaction with the adolescent like the level three parents. With a high Awe-Q, the adolescent typically shouldn’t need such parents frequently until they need care in order to attain, maintain, or recover optimal health and quality of life. We find them in caregiving environments like hospitals, counselling homes, etc and their role is mainly intervention. They step in when the other levels of parenting are unable to prevent the adolescent from reaching a crises point. So these parents are required for emergency intervention in times of crisis. Doctors, Nurses, Psychologists, Psychotherapists, etc. you might be wondering how a nurse for example can stand as a parent, right? This was something the nurses I spoke to in a specialized TRAIN-UP session also wondered and I can encapsulate the answer with the story of Anabel. Anabel lost her mom when she was just 9 years old. Her dad was the one driving so he blamed himself for his wife’s demise. In his grief, he stopped catering to his daughter and became a major bully. He would beat her at the slightest provocation and even send her to bed many times without a meal. Anabel was a bright student and no one suspected she was having challenges at home. She had mastered the art of keeping a poker face. She had also learnt to take care of herself lest she starved. Exactly five years after her mom’s death, her dad came home drunk to stupor. She had this feeling of danger lurking around her so she ran to her room and shut the door. She just cowered by the bedside in fear. Then her dad began to scream, “Anabel where are you?” His voice sounded deadly but she still couldn’t move, paralyzed by fear. When he said, “Anabel if you do not come out now, I will kill you” that was when she rose up to open the door because she knew he meant it. That wouldn’t be the first time he had attempted such but this sounded even more intense. As the door flung open, he landed a slap across her cheek making her fall to the floor from its impact. As she fell, her gown went up and her thighs were exposed significantly. That was how he pounced on her and raped his own daughter. That was the beginning of many episodes until Anabel landed in the hospital one afternoon while she was returning from school. It was found out that she was pregnant but a pregnant 14-year old was not going to be left to wander all by herself. So, the nurse on duty asked about her parents but Anabel was so rude. The nurse in response to her behaviour cut her off and concluded that Anabel was definitely a promiscuous teen. Now, to be fair to the nurse, she was also having a bad day. She had just found out that her husband was cheating with her best friend and she’d been kicked out of the house that morning.

Her things were still at the hospital because she was kicked out as she prepared for duty. So having to deal with a rude and promiscuous [in her own understanding] adolescent was not on the agenda. Anabel snuck out of the hospital eventually because she couldn’t deal with such a judgmental nurse as well. When she got home, her dad came, as usual, to rape her only that this time he met with his untimely death. You see, Anabel knew he would come like he always did and hid a kitchen knife under her pillow. As soon as he climbed her, she stabbed him endlessly then stabbed herself. It was the screaming a neighbour heard that made him rush to the house but by the time he got there, her father was dead but she was still alive even though she had cut a major artery. By the time she got to the hospital, she was dead. The nurse on duty recognized her immediately and wondered if the outcome could have been different if only she had stepped into the office of a parent.

This story portrays the influence that all the other co-parents can have on the adolescent and how they can wield this influence to support the level one parents. The parents in all the other levels, that is from levels one to four, are called the collaborators and that’s because they work with you to parent your adolescent.

The Secret to Raising an Emotionally Agile Teenager

by TBOG | Jun 7, 2021 | Adolescence, Parenting

Have you ever watched a polar bear defending its cub? Or the gorillas and elephants fighting off a predator just to protect their young? Do you observe how these moms ward off predators even if it cost them their lives? These animals are fiercely protective of their young and this desire to protect their young is an instinctive one. As parents, there is no impulse more natural than the desire of parents to protect their children from harm. While humans do not have to protect their young from the immediate dangers of predator animals, there are a thousand and one things we want to protect our teenagers from, whether it’s protecting them from bullies or from the pain they feel from the loss of a loved one, or from being body-shamed in class or from falling apart the night before a big speech. It’s the same desire to protect them from pain irrespective of the situation.

But can this be counter-productive?

In excessive quantities? Yes! Nobody wants to see their teenager in distress. We want to save them from any form of harm. However, the tendency to rush to their defence can end up aggravating their apprehensions rather than alleviating them. By shielding our teenagers from the parts of life that make them easily agitated, we can inadvertently discourage growth and impede the development of emotional agility (resilience). Have you wondered how many emotionally fragile teenagers are out there? According to Time Magazine, “adolescents today have a reputation for being more fragile, less resilient and more overwhelmed than their parents were when they were growing up.” If this doesn’t make you concerned, what will? We are raising adolescents who are spoiled or helicoptered because we are trying to NOT make the mistakes our parents made with us which is amazing! But you must know that in the midst of the mistakes our parents made, we turned out to be a more resilient generation. So, is there a way to eliminate the negatives from our parents’ own parenting style while absorbing the positives in order to raise resilient teenagers? Of course, there is. We offer courses, masterclasses, etc that cater to these things. Before we delve into how to raise resilient teenagers, let’s talk about what resilience is…

Resilience simply put, is bounce-back ability. It is the ability of our adolescents to bounce back to a pre-crisis state following a traumatic situation. In a dispensation where there are a lot more adolescent mental health crises now than ever recorded in human history, speaking about resilience is a non-negotiable discourse. Training our adolescents to be resilient is even more important now than ever before. The social clime in this dispensation is completely different from the kind we grew up in and that of our parents before us. It’s been a steady evolution over the years but with these advancements in civilization has come to a huge problem over time – the emotional fragility of our children.

We know how important resilience is or at least I do. If you were at my first webinar, HOW WELL DO YOU KNOW YOUR ADOLESCENT? you will be familiar to a great extent with my journey to adulthood. How turbulent it was. While I am not endorsing that any child goes through that, what I have found is that a lot of adolescents today cannot go through what I went through and still turn out right. It doesn’t mean I don’t have scars to show for my errors, it does however means I was able to bounce back. Developing that bounce-back ability is what I am concerned about. How do we expect our adolescents to grow if they are easily distressed by difficulty? In this age of social media likes and a false sense of accomplishment from the number of following one garners, how do we ensure that our adolescents measure success by higher standards than these fickle things? If social media pack up today and Instagram for example shut down, a lot of our adolescents might lose their sense of identities. How do we ensure that irrespective of what life throws at our adolescents, they are emotionally agile enough to bounce back? I will show you in a bit!

As parents, it is our duty to protect our children from harm and if it is within the power of our hands to do so, our children will never get to experience any form of negativity or adversity. But I ask, how will they gain mastery over their emotions? How will they rise above the fragility threatening this generation if they do not have practical situations to work out their resilience? Do you not realize that resilience is built in the midst of adversity and crisis situations? Besides, if you do not give them room to become emotionally agile, when they leave your nest, what are they to do when tough times come? Because tough times do come. You can play a big role in helping your teen build resilience and here are some ways we think you can help cultivate resilience in your adolescence:

Do not see the crisis as a bad thing. That sounds super weird, right? Isn’t that why it is called a crisis in the first place? You may not know but the word “crisis” originates from the Greek word ‘krisis’ – which means ‘decisive moment’. Crises can therefore be seen as an opportunity. When handled appropriately, it can strengthen the bond between you and your adolescent. If you find out that your adolescent has been anorexic for a while, how you handle it can either break the communication lines between you and your teenager or strengthen them effectively. Having open lines of communication is what keeps crises from developing into full-blown disasters. Every crisis with your adolescent is also an opportunity to further strengthen your relationship. When your perception of crisis changes, your response follows suit almost immediately

Always Listen. Instead of rushing to help your teenager avoid the problem, or even immediately providing them with possible solutions, you can simply listen. This is usually a tough one for parents. It is not really easy sitting still knowing you could easily proffer solutions to the problem and it’ll all be over. But if you do this consistently, you risk raising a dependent teenager who will grow into a dependent adult. I am sure you want to raise a wholesome adult of the future. One who is confident in his/her decisions and does not need to second-guess himself/herself every single time. The process begins now. In simply not saying much, but really paying attention, you are creating a psychologically and emotionally safe haven. Their perception is most likely, “mom/dad values my thoughts”. That’s a huge impact on your adolescent.

Be Sure to Empathize. This is an important part of grooming a resilient adolescent. You have to feel from your adolescent’s perspective. Let her get those feelings out, no matter how upset she is. Do you recall how you always felt that your parents never truly got you? That’s right. You don’t want your child feeling this way. Even if you have all the answers in the world, you have to make them see that you are on their side. You might be wondering how empathy might help. Empathy makes you vulnerable. Vulnerability is good! In our course, we speak about the power of vulnerability and how potent a weapon it is in befriending your adolescent. As parents, we have been conditioned to always show our strengths while masking our vulnerabilities. This is, however, inappropriate not just by our unconventional parenting guidelines but also from research-based and parent-based feedback. Becoming empathetic towards their plight also teaches them the importance of being empathetic towards others. That’s intentional parenting. You actually get a chance to connect more deeply with your teen, to teach him how to problem-solve with really big problems, and to show him how to manage upsetting feelings – a skill they desperately need to learn during adolescence. After listening and empathizing with them, you can then use the opportunity to teach them problem-solving skills while you help them explore the sources of their anxieties. Once you’ve figured out what’s really worrying them, you can brainstorm together about steps they can take to navigate their situation. Ask open-ended questions that will help them solve the problem themselves.

Teach Them to Feel Emotions. This is very peculiar to our male children. Society keeps telling them, “you’re a man, deal with it”, “men don’t cry”, “why are you behaving like a sissy, deal with it like a man”. Over and over again, we are raising our boys to be very disconnected from their emotions. While this is more peculiar to boys than the girls, I have seen this at play in many teenage girls too. Our goal is not to suppress or deny emotions. Rather it’s to help them learn to benefit from emotions while knowing which ones may undermine their well-being. These are the skills our adolescents should build because, in this shark-infested world, those are basic survival skills for them so that they do not cower under the pressure of a bottled up emotion. That being said, we must fully protect our children from “toxic” stressors, those challenges that can be threatening to develop brains and bodies, such as drugs, abuse, (rape series) neglect, and violence. As we build resilient teenagers, we must not believe resilience means invulnerability. Everyone has limits. And we actually don’t want to build invulnerable human beings. Why? Because we want our teens to be passionate and compassionate. We want them to experience joy. To be committed to lifting others up and building a better world. To do so, they must have emotions — even though feelings set them up to experience pain.

Finally, I advise that you create support systems. Your teenager can also draw the strength to bounce-back from other supportive adults, like grandparents, aunts, uncles or teachers. Friends and classmates can be great sources of support too. Your adolescents’ success throughout life will depend on their ability to navigate difficult interpersonal situations either at work, in intimate relationships, with neighbours, in places of worship, literally in whatever situation they find themselves in. Adolescents learn skills more by doing it rather than just being taught. If they learn from you that difficult situations and conversations are to be avoided, they’re more likely to get divorced someday or fired because they lack problem-solving skills. If they learn that your world comes crumbling after every crisis situation, they are likely to give in to despondency, depression, and other mental health situations because they are emotionally fragile. If, on the other hand, they learn from you that people who love each other can disagree but work things out so that both people win, they are likely to put that skill to use with peers, in intimate relationships, and in the rest of their lives. If they learn from you that bad things happen to good people but the ability to feel the emotion, without getting sucked into the dark hole of depression is a possibility, they will thrive in life.

Please leave your comments in the comments box and if you want to reach me personally? Send me a message at tbog@tsageandtbog.com

WHAT TO DO IF YOUR ADOLESCENT KEEPS BAD FRIENDS

by TBOG | Feb 10, 2021 | Adolescence

“Why don’t you like my friend’s dressing?”

“So, what if Samson wears a durag? It doesn’t mean he’s a bad boy.”

“Why don’t you trust me? Amanda isn’t a bad friend.”

“Relax! It’s not like he’s a yahoo boy!”

Bad friends are every parent’s nightmare. What should parents do if they notice that their adolescent is hanging out more with a peer whose values don’t seem in sync with their own? Is there ever a time when you should forbid your child from being with a particular friend? Absolutely! But don’t jump to this conclusion too quickly. First, you know that this will be more difficult to achieve with your older adolescent but not impossible and second, it’s perfectly okay for your adolescents to have different kinds of friends. In fact, we should encourage such relationships. Exposing our children to diversity is a big part of helping them broaden their horizons, develop tolerance and even empathy. It helps them learn new habits, develop new perspectives, and get along with others. More importantly, it gives them an opportunity to test the waters and make mistakes all under your guidance such that when they eventually move away from home particularly because of education, they are better judges of character. The trick here though for parents is to figure out when the other child’s values or lifestyle is really reckless, self-destructive, or totally inappropriate. Then a separation must ensue.

Something to Ponder: Could hanging around this peer damage your adolescent’s character, reputation, or health? Keep in mind that our adolescents are rarely “made bad” by another peer, but the friends our adolescents choose to hang around with sure can increase the odds that they may—or may not—get into trouble.

I have engaged a lot of teenagers with behaviour problems over the years and their parents definitely had issues with their friends. Interestingly, these parents complain that the reason their teens behave in that manner is because of the kind of friends he/she keeps. But my response is very simple, “That might be true, but what if the reason he hangs out with that group is that he’s similar to them? Might it be that the parents of those other teenagers are saying the same thing about your own teen?” Before we go on, let’s explore the depths of our hearts by asking ourselves a very truthful question. Is your concern really legitimate, or is it that this friend doesn’t measure up to your expectations? Not all our adolescents’ friends can be the “perfect” type or the “ever-studying” type or whatever your favourite type of friend is, so don’t expect to like all your adolescent’s friends. I am reminded of Stephanie whose father was a preacher and whose mama was a social worker. She surrounded herself with friends who had tattoos all over, tinted hairs, piercings and her parents were very very worked up about it. They were always having clashes and Stephanie would sometimes leave the house for hours after such episodes. Eventually, both parents decided that if they couldn’t get their daughter to change her friends maybe they could change their disposition towards her friends and actually get to know them. You’d be amazed at how powerful that simple decision turned out to be.

Adolescents are not very good judges of character, it’s why we must as parents stay on the lookout. However, we must not be overbearing or judgmental.

First, they realized that a major reason their daughter hung out with these guys was that they were hurting emotionally and she was showing them that love was strong enough to bring healing, a family value that had been taught her since she was a little girl. One of them had sought her dad’s love ever since she was little but never got it so she got into the wrong relationships that broke her and almost pushed her to suicide. That was when she met Stephanie. Another friend was abused by her uncle and when she told her parents, they beat her into silence saying that no one must ever know about it. After multiple assaults from this uncle, she ran away from home when she was just 14 and had to cater to herself ever since. Meeting Stephanie was a stabilizer for her. Yet another friend lost his parents in a car crash. He became withdrawn and helpless. He at some point became scared that he could lose the memory of his parents so he started drawing tattoos all over his body ever since he turned 16 as a way to remind himself of the pain of losing his family. In themselves, these friends were not bad people. They were broken people, though loving and protective of themselves. They were striving to become better humans if only others would give them a chance. Their way of expressing themselves might be questionable to many parents but they were all broken people who found friendship and love in a person and more importantly, a desire to become better versions of themselves. When Stephanie’s parents realized the bond that brought them all together, they wept. At that moment, they realized that their daughter truly upheld their family values, even when it wasn’t easy for her. They couldn’t have been more proud of their daughter. Research proves that the more you know your children’s friends—and they you—the less likely it is that your child will choose problem pals and engage in risky behaviours. So, let’s play a game, shall we? How many of these can you accurately answer?

What is the name of your adolescent’s best friend alongside the next three or four closest friends?
What is the favourite leisure activity of each friend?
What are the first names of the parents of each friend?
What kind of relationship does each friend have with his or her parent?

Some adolescents have poor social skills. Keeping ‘bad’ friends might just be their own way of filling that void. They need help

If you weren’t able to answer at least two of those questions above, then it’s time to get more involved in your adolescent’s social life so that you can boost your influence on his friendship choices because as you know peers have a strong influence on the behaviour of adolescents. In fact, some researchers have even suggested that parents exert virtually no influence on their children’s behaviour when they are adolescents — peers are seen as that much more important. However, Chris Knoester, lead author of the research study and assistant professor of sociology at Ohio State University found evidence that parents can act as architects of the friendship choices that their children make. So, you see the need to understand the process of friendship formation. You cannot do that without having answers to those questions above 😊. The case with Stephanie isn’t always the norm. What if you have established that this “friend” is not only a bad influence but also a danger to your adolescent’s safety or values if the relationship continues? Then it’s time to halt the friendship and teach habits that help your adolescent move on and make new friends. Here are a few skills to teach your adolescent to help him stand up to a troublesome pal.

- Does your adolescent keep hanging around this peer because he doesn’t know how to make new friends? If so, teach your adolescent how to introduce himself to a new peer, make simple conversation, and listen attentively. Friendship skills are teachable, and the easiest way to teach the skill is to model it for your child and then let him practice and practice it. If you need specific tips on teaching social skills, you can reach out to us, or get books that teach social skills or you can just talk to your school counsellor or psychologist for more advice.

- Teach your adolescent how to say no. I had this problem as an adolescent. I never knew how to say no and it cost me a lot. Whether your adolescent has a problem friend or not, he/she needs to learn exit strategies to help her get out of awkward or risky social situations.

- Tell your adolescent that he can always pin the blame on you. “My parents won’t let me.” “My dad will ground me for life.” “It’s their stupid rule.” This happened to be my favourite as an adolescent. Everyone knew my dad so when I blamed him as my exit strategy, they dared not pressure me. I’d just say, “my dad said…” and that was it!

- Tell your adolescent to always proffer alternatives. “Why don’t we go to Domino’s?”, “Let’s do this instead . . .”, “how about we do it this way…”

- Develop a secret code with your adolescent. Once he calls you with the code, you know he needs help in a tough situation and wants you to come to pick him up or help out. It could be something as simple as, “Mom, I think I’m having a migraine.” If he calls with the code, drop everything and go pick him up or do whatever is required. And by the way, never let your adolescent out of the house without some money or a cell phone that’s fully charged and loaded with airtime so he can call home if required.

- Finally, stress to your adolescent that it may be hard, but he should learn to stay firm. He should continue to repeat “No” like a broken record until the other peer gets the hint. Emphasize that his goal is not to change his friend’s mind or alter his behaviour, but instead to stick to what he himself knows is the right thing to do. And stress this idea: “If it feels wrong, it probably is.”

It’s usually best to let your adolescent choose the ones he/she feels most comfortable with and then practice them over and over until they can finally be used in the real world.

A Story from a Parent: My fourteen-year-old befriended a peer who should have been nicknamed “Trouble”. I have no idea how they became friends but my son became involved in many troubling activities in school ranging from skipping classes to jumping over the fence for outings. I was sure that my son was well on his way to being a full-blown criminal simply because of the entrant of this boy into his life so, I changed him from being a boarding school student to a day student then enrolled him into a music school for after-school lessons. Ever since he was little, he had always had this knack for the piano so I figured it was about time he channelled his energy towards something more productive. He found two boys who shared his music passion, and they started a band. By that time the other ‘trouble friend’ faded from his life.

As parents, what’s the biggest thing you’re struggling with right now that I can help you with? You can leave your comments or send me a mail at TBOG@tsageandtbog.com. If you enjoyed reading this, don’t forget to share it with other parents.