Unison Parenting Blog: Help Your Teen Process and Manage Emotions

During June, I want to devote my blog to helping your child (especially your teen) process and manage emotions. Let's start with two basic principles.

1. You are not responsible for your child's emotions.

2. You are responsible for your own emotions.

Basic, yes, but parents can get it backward. They might fail to manage and be responsible for their own emotions, providing the wrong kind of role model. On the other hand, they might try to micromanage their child's emotions. This can lead to either permissiveness that allows child emotions to rule the household, or to harshness that tries to accelerate resolution of the child's emotions.

So, give them space at times. When I started at quarterback in 8th grade for my middle school football team, we were lousy, and so was I as the quarterback. We didn't score an offensive touchdown all season!

But I was competitive. I would storm into the house after a game and refuse to speak to anyone for an hour or more. Fortunately, my parents figured out it was best to give me space instead of trying to fix my anger and embarrassment.

Speaking of anger, we parents need to make sure we don't misread anger. Teenagers sometimes think anger is a more acceptable emotion to others than sadness or fear. Often, a child's emotions may become jumbled; it's hard to separate one emotion from the other. Parents should let them know all their emotions are valid.

Research shows teens who know they can share difficult emotions with a parent are more likely to constructively work out their problems. So, be that safe sounding board for your kids.

Since this is a unison parenting column, it's important to share information between parenting partners and to combine on an agreement on handling a child's emotions. Perhaps one of you is a better sounding board than the other; that's OK. But the other person may need to be the one present for the child when the other is unavailable. Communicate about what works best for each child; don't keep secrets from each other. Be open so each parenting partner has a clear picture of what's happening.