Is Your Teen Inside a Box?
Children seem to grow up pretty fast. It seems one minute they are crawling, the next they are riding a bike. Then all of a sudden, they are in driver's ed. The guidance needed when they are toddlers is different from the guidance they need when they are teenagers. Sometimes our guidance doesn’t evolve with a child’s developmental stages. It’s hard not to imagine them as babies even when they are in their thirties!
When a baby is born, they are helpless and in need a lot of guidance and care. Babies cannot take care of themselves and are unaware of threats or of what is right and wrong. As babies interact with their environment, their grey matter in their brain increases, creating neurons. The more environmental interaction a baby has, the more the neurons branch out. As parents, it is hard to let children fail, get hurt, or make mistakes. Yet, it’s those events that actually may help them the most.
When a child (or anyone) experiences a negative event, usually the event is encoded strongly in their brain. Positive events are not usually encoded as strong. If a toddler touches a hot stove, they are more likely to remember their stove burn as compared to picking a dandelion in the front yard. It’s events that help children learn, so they can make good decisions later in life.
As soon as a child is born, parents start making plans for their kids. Often, parents measure their child’s successes based on behavior in sports, academics, and social events (birthday parties, invites, etc.). Successes can also be taking out the trash without asking, helping an elderly neighbor mow their yard, or opening the door for someone on crutches. As a child grows and develops, they are working to answer many questions. Where do they fit? What are they good at? Will I make lots of money? What is important? Lots of questions go through a teen's mind. Questions that were not even close to being on the radar when they were little.
A teenager is stuck between a child and an adult. As teenage years progress, more questions arise. Should I take the initiative or not? Will I make the right choice? Is easier to have mom and dad decide? Do I actually want mom and dad to decide? What’s right? What’s wrong? Who am I? Who do I want to be? Many fights between parents and teens evolve from differences in what is the right choice or behavior. A teen may want to wait to take the ACT, and a parent may think that is not the right choice.
For years, parents have made decisions for their children. Of course, children can also make decisions that are not in their best interest. It’s hard to figure out what decisions parents should allow their children to make in their own lives. It’s a tough and vague line. It’s a very automatic behavior for parents to make decisions for their child. Most children want to become individuals that make their parents proud, but also be autonomous, unique individuals. For teens, the struggle is all too real.
The dreams and visions parents have for their children can clash with the child’s own dreams and visions. Sometimes an artist visions a finished product and it turns out completely different than what they were hoping. An artist starts with a raw canvas. The artist guides, adds color, and shapes the work. The art piece gets a vibe based on all those different colors and strokes. The expected outcome may not have been what the artist imagined, but it is still beautiful.
I talk with many teens who feel they are pulled in many directions. Many individuals tell them what to do and who they are to become. It’s at this point that I explain to parents about ‘the box.’ When their child was born, parents place an imaginary box on the shelf. The box is labeled with their child’s name. Everything a parent sees and hopes for their child fits in that box. All the dreams, cute things they do, the picture of their future, all of it is in the box. The issue comes when your child no longer fits in the box. Parents can try to make their child fit into the box, but that comes with aches, pains, arguments, aggression, and who knows what else. A child may have outgrown the box, is no longer a shape that will fit in the box, or has dreams outside the box.
Parents may define their child as a ‘little me.’ Truthfully, your child did inherit your genetics, but they are uniquely different from you. Many variables effect the development of a child. Sometimes children grow into something you never expected. Others turn out just as you expected. Either way they are your children and always will be.