Ah the teenager, what an exciting phenomena! I was blessed in my parenting career to raise two sets of teenagers. One was my own biological pair and the other was a teen I helped raise with my second husband. Some might challenge my thought of this being a blessing but there has always been something intriguing about the mind of a teenager. So much so, I wrote a self-help book for teens entitled Choices4Teens and teens are now the focus of my practice in natural healing. Mentoring teens provides great challenges and even bigger rewards successfully guiding them into adulthood.
So how do we handle when our little cherubs talk back? Excellent question! We always want to give our teens an out. Stuff just seems to fall out of their mouths without passing through any sort of filtering process. Unfortunately the filter develops a little later in the teens brain development.
When a teen talks back you may want to say something like, "You must have been talking to your brother, because I know you don't talk to your mother that way." or "I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that and you can rephrase and try again." or "You may want to take that back and try again."
You always want to give your teen a chance to recant their statement. Think of it as a "mulligan" or a "do over" while they are learning to develop that filter. Often teens don't mean what they say, it just goes from thought to action without regard for anyone's feelings. Giving them a chance to rethink what they are putting out there will help train them to use their filter.
Try keep calm, use the phrases from above and see how that works for you.
Jane Berthiaume
So how do we handle when our little cherubs talk back? Excellent question! We always want to give our teens an out. Stuff just seems to fall out of their mouths without passing through any sort of filtering process. Unfortunately the filter develops a little later in the teens brain development.
When a teen talks back you may want to say something like, "You must have been talking to your brother, because I know you don't talk to your mother that way." or "I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that and you can rephrase and try again." or "You may want to take that back and try again."
You always want to give your teen a chance to recant their statement. Think of it as a "mulligan" or a "do over" while they are learning to develop that filter. Often teens don't mean what they say, it just goes from thought to action without regard for anyone's feelings. Giving them a chance to rethink what they are putting out there will help train them to use their filter.
Try keep calm, use the phrases from above and see how that works for you.
Jane Berthiaume
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