Talking To Teens: Expert Tips for Parenting Teenagers

Dr. Shimi Kang, author of The Tech Solution and Dolphin Parenting, spreads the word on the three types of tech use (toxic, junk, & healthy) and the consequences of each. Plus how to manage any new apps that teens might get into. Full show notesTechnology is not going away, but it can feel like our teens have been looking at a screen for half their lives. With so many new distracting gadgets and apps, it’s often overwhelming to monitor our teen’s usage--not to mention try to keep an eye on our own!It’s important to make sure teens gain an understanding of how tech and apps work. They will likely have to use various softwares and apps when they join the workforce, and they need to know how to adapt to new tech. But striking a balance between the good tech and the bad tech is tricky.This week, Dr. Shimi Kang, author of The Tech Solution: Creating Healthy Habits for Kids Growing Up in a Digital World, clues me in on how different types of tech are hurting and helping teen’s developing brains--and what to do if you’ve already tried and failed to pry a phone from your screen-addicted teen.As addiction psychiatrist, Dr. Kang noticed an increasing number of teens and young adults in her practice with tech-addiction. Some of her patients can feel their anxiety rise from simply parting with their phone during a session. Parents she spoke with reported such extremes as violence when taking away phones or shutting off gaming consoles or wifi.Dr. Kang recognizes that there will always be a new addicting app around the corner. Through her research for the book, she also uncovered the truth that technology incorporates “persuasive design.” Persuasive design means the websites, app, and gadgets we use are designed to be addictive—the more people use a website or an app, the longer the makers have to expose users to advertisements and up-sells.This is not to say technology is bad—we have technology to thank for plenty of advancements and improvements. Dr. Kang argues it is the way in which we engage with tech that determines whether we can consider it good or bad.The three types of tech use Dr. Kang has come up with are: toxic tech, junk tech, and healthy tech. In today’s episode we cover what each one looks like and how to help your teen self-regulate their tech use.Toxic techFrom brain imaging researchers have been able to identify that certain technology use causes spikes in the stress hormone cortisol. Too much of the stress hormone cortisol has been linked to anxiety, depression, irritability, and even physical problems like high blood pressure and stomach ulcers.What might toxic tech look like with a teen? While it’s unlikely your teen will develop stomach ulcers from toxic tech use alone, as the name implies, toxic tech should be avoided. Shimi suggests social media as the big toxic tech to avoid. Teens compare themselves to the perfect looking celebrities they see on social media which can cause feelings of inferiority and therefore trigger stress. Receiving negative comments or being bullied, seeing violent or graphic content, even reading through a fiery comment feud, all have the potential to spike cortisol.It is probably impossible to avoid all the toxic tech there is out there, but it should be limited as much as possible.Junk TechJunk tech is the type of tech that is most addicting. Junk tech makes use of the brain’s dopamine reward system, which is how teens and even adults can get addicted to silly games like Candy Crush and Angry Birds. The “persuasive design” of apps and sites like Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, video streaming (e.g. Netflix) also have teens glued to their screen as they double-tap and “like” posts only to glance up and find hours have passed since they first logged on!Junk tech does not increase cortisol, but the mindless nature of endless scrolling on Instagram or autoplay on Netflix not only becomes a huge time suck, but is a passive activity for the brain.At a time when brains are developing their dopamine pathways, it’s important to help our teens set limits on how much junk tech they consume. Instead of just tuning in to TikTok, an alternative could be creating one which turns junk tech into healthy tech.Healthy TechTo determine if something is healthy tech, Dr. Kang says it should fall into one of the three Cs: care (self-care), connection, or creativity. Making a TikTok instead of just watching a hundred of them, would involve creativity—if your teen makes a TikTok with someone else, you can even count it as “connection” too!FaceTiming with a friend (connection), using a meditation app (care), tracking your steps/sleep on a Fitbit (care), building a website (creativity), or using video editing software (creativity) are all healthy tech use according to Shimi.Instead of having to make up new rules for each app or site, Dr. Kang says to make rules around the three types of tech instead. Determine as a family how much of each would be appropriate. Adults and kids will probably have different rules as more adult responsibilities such as bill paying move online. If your child is doing remote schooling, you can add allowances for screen time as related to classwork.Again, as Dr. Kang asserts, technology is here to stay—we need to help teens learn to navigate tech on their own, including how to self-regulate. Using the three types of tech as a framework, and explaining the science of the hormones behind each can help teens understand that rules around tech are not to control them, but to help eliminate stressful, toxic tech; limit junk tech; and expand healthy tech.In addition to our discussion on the three types of tech use, Shimi and I cover:How to bring up tech limits if you are getting a late startWhy it’s important to be a “dolphin parent”What you can do if your teens call you out on your tech useA visualization script to prepare teens to overcome obstacles and achieve their goalsWhat you know about the increasing incidents of burnout among teensDr. Shimi has so much experience as a practicing addiction psychiatrist and author of two parenting books—I’m so excited to share her expertise on technology use with you, our listeners!

Kari Kampakis, author of Love Her Well, joins Andy for a heartfelt discussion on parenting mistakes and repairing hurt relationships with our teens. Cat’s out of the bag: out teens know we’re not perfect!Full show notesIt’s not always easy to be pleasant as a parent, especially when your teens push your buttons, blow off curfew, or “forget” to unload the dishwasher, no matter how many times you gently remind them. As young people still figuring out the world, teenagers can be unpredictable in their emotions and wants. Having a good relationship with your teen is important, but having to keep your teen in line makes for a hard balance.And when your teenager is acting crazy and just not listening, how can you make sure they start behaving without bringing your relationship to the brink of destruction? How can you set rules and boundaries while also keeping your teens trust? It seems like sometimes there’s just no easy way to maintain a solid relationship with your teenager when they are driving you up the wall.But our guest today has faith that as parents, we were born for these challenges. Kari Kampakis, author of Love Her Well: 10 Ways to Find Love and Connection With Your Teenage Daughter and mother of four teen/tween daughters(!), is chock full of wisdom about how to be a more wise and graceful parent. Kari believes that as parents we can form strong, loving bonds with our kids and still nudge them towards becoming healthy, respectable adults. Whether you’re looking to empower your kids when they’ve made a mistake or just looking for ways to balance setting boundaries with fun, Kari has you covered.How We Can “Speak Life” to Our TeensTeenagers today are dealing with a lot of responsibilities, obstacles, and cultural expectations, so Kari says bringing positivity as a parent can be super valuable. When kids are acting crazy, it might be because they’re frustrated and overwhelmed--meaning they need you to be an ally, not an enemy. They may be dealing with more than you think, and may be more critical of themselves than you’d imagine...which is why it can be really tough for them to face your criticism as well.So what positive things can we say to them that will help ease all this craziness? In her book, Kari presents a list of 35 ways we can “speak life” to our teens. This could be anything from asking them, “What can I do for you this week?”, to just reminding them that they are smart and capable of handling life’s obstacles. In the episode, Kari dives into the philosophy behind this idea, and her experience doing this with her own kids.This positivity doesn’t just apply to kids, it applies to parents too! How can you expect to be positive with your kids if you can’t be positive with yourself? You’re likely just as overwhelmed, with a schedule full of carpooling, cooking, or career obligations. In our conversation, Kari explains to me how you can get better at forgiving yourself when we mess up, and empower yourself when life gets you down. Being a positive parent includes going a little easier on yourself as well, understanding that you and your teen are both doing the best you can.Now, Kari knows from her own experiences with motherhood that constant positivity isn't always realistic. Sometimes teens just make you want to scream, shout and pull your hair out! In the episode, Kari emphasizes the importance of not taking your anger out on your kids, however, and shares how you can find other ways to vent all that frustration.Although an outburst may seem harmless to you, Kari explains how kids remember what you say. When you want to yell and scream, it might be better to just breathe and remind yourself that a more positive approach can help you and your teen get to the root of whatever it is you’re fighting about instead of just digging a deeper divide.Balancing Positive and Negative ReinforcementIt’s hard not to feel that urge to be negative, however, when your teenager comes home late, refusing to tell you who they were with or what they were doing. How are you supposed to smile and stay positive when you’re infuriated and want to angrily remind them they have a curfew? Kari knows this feeling well, and talks a lot in the episode about the challenges of setting rules while also trying to maintain a positive relationship with your teen. Interestingly, she says that the goal is not necessarily for our kids like us when they’re sixteen, but to respect us when they're forty.By this Kari means that even though it can be hard to find the right words, it’s important that we step in and give our kids some rules that they’ll appreciate in thirty years. Although they may not like us now, they’ll thank us later.But if we're being tough on kids, where does positivity come into play? Kari explains in our conversation how, when kids mess up, you can let them know you’re disappointed while also being there for them as they grow from their mistakes. If we can remind kids that we love them unconditionally, even when we don’t approve of their behavior, we can help them learn from risky behavior instead of reverting back to it.For example, say your son fails his calculus exam because he chose to play his xbox instead of crack open the books. You could yell at him, sure, but will that really help? Kari says no. Instead, she suggests letting him know you expect more from him. It could be valuable to remind him that you think he’s smart and hardworking––that way, when he goes to text his next exam, he might see himself that way and study a little harder.Kari is a big proponent of using positive affirmations to remind your teen that you hold them to a high standard. By telling kids that they’re capable, tough, and kind, we can prepare them to handle the unpredictable journey of life without falling too far off the path. It’s like the great sculptor, Michelangelo, envisioning a brilliant work of art in a block of marble before it’s even carved. Your child might not know how great they are, but by recognizing their potential, we can ensure that they grow up to amaze the world.In the Episode...Kari and I have a great conversation about how a positive attitude can be a powerful parenting tool. Along with her tips on staying positive and balancing discipline with praise, we talk about:What inspired write a book for parentsHow we can be better at listening and empathizing with teensWhen it might be better to let teens forge their own way forwardHow cultural stereotypes about gender may be hurting your kids35 ways you and your teen can spend more time togetherI’m really thankful to Kari for coming on the podcast today to share her unique perspective on parenting. If you want to check out some more of Kari’s work, you can go to her website, karikampakis.com where you can check out her blog, her other two books and her podcast! Hope you enjoy this episode and we’ll see you next week.

Bill Deresiewicz, bestselling author and our first ever guest on the show, re-joins us for our 100th episode to talk about his latest book The Death of the Artist. We discuss if art is even a worthy pursuit for young people today and if so, what can young people expect.Full show notesWhen our kid says they want to pursue art as a career, we can sometimes be hesitant to support them. We have no doubt that they’re talented: we’ve seen them receive standing ovations at the end of a musical theater performance, rack up trophies and medals for photography, maybe even have their creative writing featured in the local paper. But that’s now--pursuing work as an adult creative conjures up the image of the starving artists, of young people struggling financially and emotionally as they try desperately to make it big in the fast paced world of art and entertainment.We want our kids to be financially stable, instead of living hand to mouth. Should we be encouraging our kids to pursue careers as bankers and programmers, even though it means they’re talent will go to waste? Can our kids really make enough money from their art to live happy and healthy lives?If only someone could tell us what it’s like to pursue a life as an artist in the modern age, so we could know if a stable future in the arts is truly possible. If only there was a person out there who knows exactly why it’s hard to make money as an artist, and whether or not we should encourage our kids to go after a career in art…Luckily, our guest today, Bill Deresiewicz, knows a thing or two (and much more) about artists in today’s world. He interviewed almost 200 artists—-filmmakers, writers, illustrators, and more—-for his recent book, The Death of the Artist: How Creators are Struggling to Survive in the Age of Billionaires and Big Tech. In his book and our interview, Bill dives deep into the realities of being a modern creative.In today’s episode, he explains why he thinks young people should continue to pursue careers in the arts, even though it's harder than ever to break through. He talks about the serious obstacles facing artists today, but also the important role art plays in our society and in the lives of young artists.The Value of Art and ArtistsMany kids spend their whole life thinking they’re unintelligent because they aren’t great in a traditional classroom setting, can’t solve equations or memorize dates--until they discover art. Suddenly they find that they have a treasure trove of talent and buckets of passion. They may have been called lazy or stupid for not execlling in chemistry, but what they really needed was someone to hand them some sheet music or a camera.Bill speaks on how our education often mistreats these kids, how they aren’t taught to foster their talents. Instead, they are put into certain boxes that they just don’t fit into, and are constantly being told they’re just not as capable as other kids. If we can give these kids a chance to flourish, they can become shining stars, instead of barely keeping up.Ok, you might be saying to yourself, but what about that whole financial stability thing? Sure, some kids are better at art than math, but if we know there’s not a lot of money in art, wouldn’t it be more valuable to just find a better math tutor? What could they possibly gain from painting or dancing that could equate to time spent doing calculus?Actually, there’s a lot of incredible, widely applicable things our kids can learn from practicing in the arts. Bill tells a great anecdote that demonstrates this. He interviewed a professor of theater for his book, who talked all about an enlightening experience she had running into an old student. The student had studied theatrical lighting design, but had gone on to become a manager at a major electronics company. As she told the professor, the student got her start with the company through theater work. Not only that, she credited theater with giving her all the skills that made her qualified to be a manager: the ability to meet a deadline, to finish projects under budget, and to collaborate with others towards a common goal.We often overlook arts education, but it can be more valuable for our teens than we might think. If kids are passionate about art and spend time perfecting their craft, they’ll learn skills that transcend far beyond watercolors or improv. They’ll learn dedication, self efficacy, and grit. Then, even if they decide to branch away from the arts at some point in their life, they’ll be able to carry these skills into other roles and occupations.It’s easy to dismiss young artists, but when it comes down to it, we all need a little art in our lives. Whether it’s the TV shows we watch to unwind after a stressful day or the tunes we listen to on the radio while driving to the grocery store, art makes life a little more enjoyable. This raises the question however: if we all need art, why is it so hard to make a living as an artist?Why Modern Artists are StrugglingWe know that creating works of art is never going to be as stable as crunching numbers or prescribing medication, but Bill says making money as an artist is even more difficult now than it was twenty or thirty years ago. Why?Bill points to the fact that nowadays, a lot of music, film, and visual art is available for free or cheap online. Instead of paying $20 for a DVD copy of a movie, you can find it online at a free website where pirated films are bountiful. Instead of buying a book in hard copy, you can probably find a PDF online somewhere you can download at no cost.It’s not just piracy driving this free-art society; there's been a general cultural shift. People have gotten used to enjoying music and movies without being charged, whether that’s on Instagram, Spotify, or Youtube. These platforms make it easy for artists to upload—-no labels, publishers, or managers necessary—-but they also don’t provide an easy way for creators to make money.Even if there is a wider audience online with more accessible materials and outlets, it doesn’t mean your teenager will be able to stand out against the millions of other people putting art online. Nowadays comercial book publishers publish about 75,000 books a year—-meanwhile, there are about 1 million books self published online in the same amount of time. With all that competition, it’s hard for your teen to stand out. This in turn makes it difficult to make any money.So when it comes down to it, is it a good idea for our kids to pursue a living in art? And how can we make art a more feasible career for young people?In the Episode….Bill answers these questions and many more in our conversation. He’s talked to working professionals from many different fields of artistic expression: film and television, visual art, writing and music--all with varying degrees of career success. His tips provide a lot of context for the parent of any teen hoping to make a career out of creativity. We talk about:Why we expect artists to work for free--and why we think art should be freeHow opting out of a creative career can be just as brave as pursuing itWhat we can say to our teens about what to expect in career as an artistsWhy only 1% of creators are making most of the money in the industryThanks for listening and supportingour “art” here at Talking to Teens! We know that helping your kids find their...

Chris Farrell, co-author of ReThink Money for Children and Teens and co-founder of FUNancial Freedom, shares his passion for teaching teens money management. Say goodbye to the days of allowance and hello to a future with a financially independent teen!Full show notesTalking to our kids about finances can be a chore: terms like “good debt,” “credit score,” and “interests rates” tend to make most people’s eyes glaze over. Besides that hurdle, it feels like as parents we have to know all the ins and outs of money and wealth to get our teens to pay attention. Most parents might just throw up their hands and rely on schools and colleges to fill in the gaps. Let’s just hope our teens get jobs that have a good retirement plan with full benefits...and that they stay in that job for their career.But what if talking to our teens about money now was guaranteed to make them wealthier in the future?It’s not a pipe dream—in fact, the evidence (and this week’s guest) suggests getting teens financially literate is one of the most important things to do now to prepare them for stability as an adult. As we’ve now seen with sex education, the less information a teen is given, the more likely they are to take uneducated risks, which could put their future on hold.We can set our teens up for success by helping them learn good money habits now—whether or not we have good money habits ourselves! while they’re young will lead to a lifetime of responsibility with the dollar. Not to mention, if their finances are in check, their life will run a little smoother in all areas--allowing them to grow up and become their best selves.So how can we talk to teenagers about finances in a way that excites them? That’s what our guest today, Chris Farrell, is all about. He’s the founder of FUNancial Freedom, an organization aimed at getting kids and teenagers interested in business personal money management. His book, Rethink Money for Children and Teens, is a guide to help your teenager transform themselves from totally-clueless-about-money to a business whiz. His goal is to make finance fun, and to lead kids towards more prosperous financial futures.And the best way to do that according to Chris and FUNancial Freedom is to throw kids right into the maw of entrepreneurship.Learning About Money Through EntrepreneurshipChris believes all kids can (and should) experiment with running a business. Project-based or hands-on learning is often the most impactful when it comes to remembering concepts and internalizing information. As Chris says, it’s also by doing that kids and teens become more confident and self-assured in their abilities.If you’re thinking your kid could no way handle running their own business, Chris says you might be surprised. With the numerous online marketplaces as well as remaining “traditional” ways to earn, getting a business started today can be as simple as having a smartphone and an email.Of course, your teen might need your help with a few of the finer points, like attaching business accounts to personal checking accounts or memorizing their social security number. But in Chris’s experience, on the technology side of entrepreneurship, today’s teens seem to pick it up at lightning speed.To get your teen on their way you can use the FUNancial Freedom’s LEAP method, which starts first with the Learning piece--however, most teens might be eager to jump into the Earning part, and then realize they need some of that Learning to be Earning. The next piece to help kids then Accelerate. In layman’s/-woman’s terms, the Accelerate phase is about discovering how to save and invest--in their business and themselves. Lastly, P is for Play, the phase where teens and kids set financial goals and explore all the fun ways to use what they’ve earned to make the world a better, more fun place.Having Fun Starts with an Abundance MindsetAs Chris notes, making money is about more than just dollars and cents: it’s about having more choices, less stress, and the ability to make the world a better place. In America, money or personal finances consistently tops the list of the number one stressor in people’s lives. Money might not be able to give you purpose in life, and just because you have mo’ money doesn’t mean you have less problems; but surveys of American households do show that having at a minimum, financial stability, greatly increases life satisfaction.Just think of how amazing it would feel to pick up the tab at dinner, treat the whole table, and not stress about the dollar amount on the bill. What if your teen could do that? Not worrying about the dollar amount so much is what Chris calls an “abundance mindset.” The opposite is how most people operate: a “scarcity mindset.” When you go to a restaurant the first thing most people do is look to the right side of the menu--where all the prices are. Many people even base their food and beverage choices on how much money they are willing to spend that evening. There’s nothing wrong with that--being frugal and investigating coupon apps is usually a good thing. But many parents may wish for something different for their teens.An abundance mindset starts with proper money management. It’s not just about having enough to spend, but it’s also about switching one’s mindset: just because one person has a lot, doesn’t mean there is less for other people. There is a lot of money in the world and there are people, companies, and organizations ready to spend it. As some of the great motivational speakers of the last century proclaimed: “If you help enough people get what they want, you can have everything you want.”Money is useful as a commodity, but it can also be a great tool through which to teach life lessons and instill values.Instill Values Through BusinessAlong with all of his financial tips, Chris emphasizes the importance of helping teens define their values and priorities. When they spend money, what do they typically spend it on? Books? Gym memberships? Events with friends? Concert tickets? Traveling?What we spend our money on is often the same as what we spend our time on. And we spend time on things that matter to us, things that we value. As Chris mentioned, some people will always make sure to have a gym membership, no matter what the budget is, because fitness and health is important to them, it’s one of their core values.Having money means being able to “spend” on what matters to us, but it also means having the ability to live our values in a more impactful way. Chris and FUNancial Freedom strongly believe in teaching teens not just how to earn, save and invest, but also in the joy of giving and using money to make a difference in our communities.In addition to the LEAP methodology, in our interview we cover:The 50-20-20-10 rule for managing incomeHow to explain the difference between good debt and bad debtThe number one piece of advice Warren Buffet gives about moneyWhy it’s never been easier to start a businessAdditional online resources to help teens earn moneyGrateful to have had this conversation with Chris and looking forward to sharing it with you!

Shanterra McBride, author of Love Your Jiggle and founder of Marvelous University, joins Andy for a talk on how to help our teens through their most awkward years and what to do to prepare them for the big world ahead. Full show notesBeing a tween and becoming an adult is an awkward time not just for tweens, but for their parents! Bodies are changing, friendships are growing more complicated, and your once confident child may appear to be folding in on themselves, pulling away from the world, just at the moment when they need to learn how to be on their own in it!Instead of being able to tune in more accurately to their own voice, our teens are increasingly confronted with a myriad of messages on who to befriend, how to behave, and what to wear. With so many companies and personalities vying for our teens attention, it can feel like there’s no room for the voice of a parent.But teens, arguably more now than ever, need a steady parental presence...This week’s guest Shanterra McBride gets it. She knows from her own experiences mentoring and educating youth that parenting is hard. She also deeply and truly believes that, parents, you can do this.Shanterra McBride is the author of Love Your Jiggle: The Girls’ Guide To Being Marvelous and founder of Marvelous University. Although Shanterra’s book centers on girls, her experience in education has led her to work with teens of all genders and ages. She knows that insecurities and awkwardness during the adolescent years hit us all hard—and that sometimes all it takes for a teen to feel okay at the end of the day is for a parent to just listen.McBride discovered her passion for working with teens as volunteer in AmeriCorps. Placed in what at the time was considered the worst school in Washington, D.C., Shanterra found her calling in helping awkward, insecure, and misled “ducklings” turn into marvelous swans.Shanterra realized three main areas thwarting teen success and came up with unique ways to tackle each.First, every teen she met had body image issues —even before the days of Instagram and TikTok. While we often think of “body image” as a girl-specific issue, for young people going through puberty no one is exempt from having a complicated relationship with their body.At a time of such physical and obvious changes, there is already plenty for a teen to be self conscious about. Throw in an aunt’s comment to your daughter about her “new boobs” or an uncle’s tease directed at your son and his “puny muscles” and your teen might just want to run from the house screaming of embarrassment.Whether your teen is an early or late bloomer, as skinny as a stick or with extra jiggle, Shanterra explains that we need to get teens focusing on what their body can do, not just what it looks like. Different bodies can do different things and we can help our teens appreciate their own physicality by reminding them of this. Shanterra goes so far as to recommend telling your teen to spend some time looking at themself in the mirror—seriously! Before jumping to a judgment on this idea, consider that your teen should know and make their own decisions about their body before others tell them what to think and feel about your teen’s shape, size, or color.To lessen the already fraught feelings around our teens changing bodies, Shanterra prefers to use the word “jiggle.” She acknowledges such a silly sounding the word immediately disarms teens. And she insists that “jiggle” means a person’s whole body...not just the parts that can actually “jiggle”. Loving your jiggle then, is embracing your whole self and everything your body and mind can do as well as all the potential inside! What an incredible gift the power of a healthy self image is for teens.The second big issue teens face that Shanterra identifies revolves around friendships. She realized teens, particularly “new” teens look at friendship all wrong.Teens navigating the new and more intense social hierarchies of middle school and high school may lose sight of what friendship is truly about. Instead of choosing friends based on honesty, mutual respect, and shared interests for example, Shanterra saw adolescents making friends based on what relationships they thought would elevate them in the eyes of the group. Using relationships as a means to an end, like popularity, is not the lesson we want our teens to learn, particularly if we want them to become adults with healthy relationships.Although it’s difficult to watch a child struggle with friendship drama, parents can help nudge kids in the right direction. Shanterra suggests parents can step in by helping their teen pause to contemplate what characteristics would be good to have in a friend...and which characteristics your teen is putting forth. And when drama does happen, not jumping in and getting riled up, but pausing again to encourage contemplation instead of snap judgements.Of course, usually what a teen will want most is just an ear to listen, and maybe someone to talk things through with.Which brings us to the final issue of unmet needs in teens. The three needs are independence, connection, and mastery. We’ve already seen how with friendships teens might be struggling with connection. But what about independence and mastery?In our interview, Shanterra touches on how although our teens might still be “kids” in our eyes, they are ready for increased independence. Shanterra has seen so many teens worn out from being told what grades to get, what activities to do, when to get their chores done, who to be friends with, etc. To make sure your teen’s need for independence is met, give them age-appropriate responsibilities and consider collaborating on any household policies or rules. For example, together deciding on a curfew and what consequences there would be in the event the curfew is broken. Your teen needs to feel that they have some control over their own life.When it comes to mastery, Shanterra is referring to developing skills. As parents we should avoid rewarding our teen for simply “showing up”—after all, we don’t get paid to just “show up” to work, we have to do the work that is required of us. We should absolutely celebrate and congratulate our teens when they hit a goal or milestone, and we should absolutely be emphasizing the work they put in to get to those markers. You don’t have to win the championship trophy to have a met need of mastery—but you do need to perform and work hard in that final game if you plan on walking away with a sense of accomplishment.Throughout all this, it can be all to easy to forget that parents have needs too! Luckily to make things simple, they are the same as teens: independence, mastery (competence), and connection. Parents also need to feel that they have control over their life, are connected to others, and have something they are good or getting better at...which in some cases might be parenting!In this episode we cover:How to help your teen “pause” during friendship troublesBody image issues male teens might faceThe overlap between parent and teen needsWhy it’s important to give teens feedback nowA pep talk for any parents who are having a particularly difficult timeShanterra’s keen insights into teens along with her endearing charm make for a great intervie...

Brooklyn Raney, author of One Trusted Adult, shares with Andy what she’s seen works with teens as a mentor, high school dean, camp director, and parent herself. Having support at home is important for teens, but having just one trusted adult outside the home can be even more impactful.Full show notesHelping your teenager approach independence is hard. You want to make sure they know how to make their own choices so they’re prepared for adulthood--but you want them to always make the right choices. You want them to have autonomy and take care of things on their own--as long as they do it the way you want.Even though it might be tempting to always take control and step in when your kid is making tough decisions, sometimes you just need to let your teenager learn on their own. If you constantly insert yourself in your teenager’s choices, they’re not going to be able to handle life’s crazy obstacles when they no longer have you to guide them through every little thing. Sometimes, you just need to let go and watch your teenager go at the world themselves.Brooklyn Raney has a lot to say about the benefits of letting go. She’s a speaker, teacher, and educator, and the author of One Trusted Adult: How to Build Strong Connections and Healthy Boundaries with Young People. She also runs a leadership camp for girls which helps teach young women about teamwork and resilience, and is a high school dean. Her work has helped parents, kids and educators everywhere learn the value of letting go.She compares raising a child to raising a baby bird. If young birds are given too much assistance when they’re young and fragile, then they never learn to fly. Similarly, if teenagers are controlled and micromanaged, they’ll never develop the critical thinking and decision making skills that are necessary to becoming a functional adult.As an educator, Brooklyn has seen this principle in action. When several of her students were using the social media app Yik Yak to anonymously bully other students, she and her fellow faculty members had a tough time figuring out the best solution. They tried issuing a message over the platform, but they were only met with disdain--and the bullying continued. Finally, a group of students decided to band together and drown out the negative comments by posting a massive influx of positive ones. It ended up working even better than they imagined.It just goes to show that if we can invest in the abilities of young people, we can help them grow to become independent and innovative. Instead of trying to step in and control the situation, let them work it out and learn from thinking critically to reach an effective solution.As a parent, helping a teenager grow more independent means helping a teenager learn to handle their own emotions. Brooklyn breaks down how to practice the principle of letting go when helping a child work through a personal issue. She says one of the most simple, helpful, and unobtrusive gestures you can partake in when comforting a troubled teen is simply asking them whether or not they would like advice. Inquire if they’d prefer your opinion or if they would just like you to listen.In doing this, you’re not telling them how to live or act. You’re allowing them to make a choice and practice autonomy. At the same time, you’re showing them you’re still there for them emotionally and can offer advice if needed. Many times, teenagers don’t really want or need to be given advice. They just want a trusted adult to listen to their problem and offer some comfort, so that they can continue working through the problem in their own way on their own time.This is a very important idea: a trusted adult during the teen years is key to ensuring a person’s mental health remains strong in their lifetime. In the episode, Brooklyn cites research that has proven this concept again and again. This trusted figure can be a parent, but it can also be someone outside the home such as a coach, teacher, aunt, uncle, etc. If the non-parent mentor is connected to the parents in some way, that’s even better.Brooklyn gives a great example in the episode. Her story delves into her son’s incident with his school’s administration regarding a vape pen. He was sent home for having the pen at school, and although his father administered an articulate, powerful talk on why this is unacceptable, Brooklyn’s son didn’t seem to be receptive to any verbal reinforcement. Later on, however, his drum teacher delivered to him a very similar speech about the dangers of vaping, and he was held in rapt attention and seemed to get the message.While it may be frustrating that your teenager trusts another adult that isn’t you, the important thing is making sure there is someone in their lives whom they listen to and connect with. If teens have a trusting, healthy relationship with an adult who can help guide them through life, they’ll enter adulthood with more grit and more problem solving abilities.When it comes to this independent decision making, your teenager may not always know what they want. One day, they adopt a particular identity, and the next day, they’re a totally different person. While this may feel disorienting or frustrating for you, Brooklyn reminds us that it’s important to remember: all humans are flexible, fluid people. Young people are especially elastic, as they are still searching for the permanent aspects of their identity.One great way to help your teenager through this is to model the fluidity of identity in your own life. If you show that you’re open to change, you will help your teenager to see that it’s natural to continue to evolve and grow as an individual far past teenagerhood. It’s especially important for your kids to see you fail, learn from your mistakes and adapt. If they see this resilience in you, then they are likely to understand how they can apply it to their own lives.Teenagers will always struggle with identity; it’s part of being young. Brooklyn talks for a while on the idea of ensuring that teens have a varied identity. This means making sure teenagers don’t put all their eggs in one basket, making certain that they think of themselves as nuanced and complicated individuals with more than just one thing to offer the world. She uses the example of her own teenage self, who identified solely as a good hockey player. Whenever she lost a game or made a mistake while playing, she felt although she no longer had anything to offer the world.If we help teens see themselves as well rounded individuals with multiple interests, skills, and offerings, we can help them gain self efficacy and become more independent and successful in the real world.When it comes down to it, watching your teenager become autonomous can be truly terrifying. You’re afraid that if you don’t step in, they’ll make bad choices that affect them for years to come. At the same time, you don't want to control them to the point where they aren’t able to make their own choices when they reach adulthood.Don’t fear; Brooklyn is here. She’s got lots of advice to help you figure out what’s going on inside your teenager’s head and how you can help them transition into adult life. In the episode, we coverThe difference between preventative and responsive mentorshipWhy we like to put teenagers in boxesHow to set up boundaries while maintaining trustThe importance of feedback.Thanks for listening. See you next week!

Cindy Pierce, author of Sexploitation and Sex, College, and Social Media, brings her immense knowledge and humorous vibes to this week’s episode. Porn is wreaking havoc on our teens’ sexual development, but, fortunately, Cindy has ways parents can help undo the deleterious effects.Full show notesTalking to teens about sex is one of the hardest things to do as a parent. Initiation discussion about the birds and the bees can be very confusing, messy, and just plain awkward! Not only that, but teenagers can be very resistant to opening up and talking about sex even if they have questions and want clarification on the subject.No matter how uncomfortable or difficult talking to your teenager about sex and relationships is, it’s a crucial part of helping your child to grow up happy and healthy. Kids today are exposed to sexual content from a very young age, with the internet providing an infinite amount of pornographic content. While knowing about sex from a young age is ok, kids should be learning the facts from an educational, honest source rather than porn. The porn industry, more concerned with making money than protecting the minds and hearts of young people, often portrays sex as degrading, violent, and often not even consensual.Sound terrifying? I’m scared too! That’s why I’m sitting down with Cindy Pierce in today’s episode. Cindy is the author of several different books that tell you how to talk to teens about sex: Sexploitation: Helping Kids Develop Healthy Sexuality in a Porn-Driven World and Sex, College, and Social Media: A Commonsense Guide to Navigating the Hookup Culture. She also travels around to schools across the country to educate teenagers, parents, and college students about sex.She reveals fascinating and shocking things about how kids today are learning about sex as well as great tips to master talking to teens about sex. Cindy also shines light on a lot of the questions teenage and college aged people have about sex, relationships, and porn.For example, she reveals that in her experience, most kids in the modern day are exposed to sex and even pornography by the age of 9. This is why one of Cindy’s biggest tips for parents is to start talking to your teenager about sex and relationships from as young as ages 5-7. This doesn’t have to be a full briefing, but instead a safe, simple explanation about biology and the reasons why people decide to copulate.It may seem a little early to start talking to teens about sex, but it’s easy for children to be exposed to porn and be confused and manipulated from a young age. We want our kids to understand that sex is meant to be between two consenting adults who care about one another and communicate effectively. Instead, they may begin to believe that the degrading and often violent sex they see in porn is the same as real life sex--and we know it’s not.By talking to teens about sex and relationships early, you’re also establishing an important connection with your kids that lasts, a certain trust. It helps you open up a safe space to talk about complicated subjects. Then, as they grow up and begin to experience the myriad of problems that comes with growing up, they’ll know they can come to you for advice and that golden parental wisdom instead of the internet.Nervous about initiating discussion? Wondering how to talk to your teenager about pornography without saying the wrong thing ? Cindy also shares some tips for how to make sure that when you give the talk, you give it right. One thing she recommends is vulnerability. It’s easy to feel pressure to be a perfect parent, but you’re only human. It’s much healthier and more productive to talk openly about your experiences and be honest when you don’t know all the answers.Although it would be nice if there was a secret to success when it comes to talking to teenager about sex and realtionships, there’s no one way to approach your child about these topics. This is because all children are different, with different personalities, fears, and interests. Every kid is unique, and struggles with their own complicated relationship with intimacy and sexuality.Cindy speaks on the idea that talking to teens about sex is one that continues to evolve over time, not a static event. Instead of one specific instance in which the two of you sit down to discuss it all, the “talk” is really a shifting conversation which changes as your teenager grows. Keep communicating, keep up the dialogue about how to have safe, consenual sex to ensure that your teen develops and maintains a healthy relationship with the subject.Speaking of changes, one of the biggest shifts in a teenager’s life is their transition into college life--and this transition includes new sexual experiences. College hookup culture creates a confusing environment for many young adults as they enter university.This confusion and chaos is often the catalyst for, as Cindy puts it in the episode, below average sex. This means sex that is completed without trust, without communication, and often, without condoms! That’s why we need to be talking to teens about sex on a regular nasis and educating them about how to maintain self respect and sexual health while in college.Cindy breaks down how this hook up culture during the early years of college is largely motivated by the need for high social status. With the addition of social media to the lives of young people, status and image has become more significant than ever for college students. Part of this image is who you decide to sleep with. This means that students are motivated to hook up with other students to garner respect from their peers, rather than to share an intimate, fun experience with someone they care about.According to Cindy’s research, most college students actually report that they dislike hook up culture. Although it may seem like a convenient, no strings attached way to futile one’s physical need for intimacy, it can lead to a lot of traumatizing experiences, emotional damage, and, quite simply, unenjoyable sex. Often times communication between the two individuals is poor, leading to the lines of consent becoming blurred, the status of the relationship to be confusing and the sex to be bad.Instead of promoting this kind of sexual experience, Cindy emphasizes the idea of happier, healthier sex that involves trust and consnent By listening to her ideas about how young people can form positive sexual habits, we can teach our kids about how to communicate better with their partners and keep themselves from getting hurt.In the episode we cover:The most awkward question to expect from your teenJust how financially powerfully the porn industry isWhat the impact of Covid-19 is on teen and college hook up cultureA myriad of internet resources for teens and kids of all ages to learn about sexThe importance of teaching about pleasureWhy teens and young men are suffering from erectile dysfunction despite their youthHaving "the talk" is already a daunting task for many parents--it may come as a shock that "the talk" actually should be an ongoing conversation. However for our teens healthy development into a full adult, having ongoing, in depth conversations about sex and sexuality is of the utmost importance. Teens crave good information, and while it may be uncomfortable explaining intimate things to your teen, a few moments of awkwardness is a small pr...

Annie Grace, author of This Naked Mind and The Alcohol Experiment, dispels myths around alcohol with Andy and reveals her number one method for talking to teens about drinking.Full show notes Drinking alcohol is a significant part of Western culture. Of Americans over 18, 86.3% say that they’ve tried alcohol and 55.3% report that they drink regularly. Nowhere is alcohol more culturally expected than in young adulthood. It’s almost assumed that college students will experiment with alcohol, and teenagers are becoming more and more likely to try alcohol before reaching adulthood.But it’s nothing to worry about, right? Alcohol isn’t that dangerous, is it? Unfortunately, the science says otherwise. In a recent federal report which rated the harmfulness of various drugs, alcohol was rated far and wide the most dangerous drug, with heroin coming in far behind in second and crack in third.How is this possible? The study examined the widespread dangers of different drugs on society as a whole, looking at how many people face serious damage from using. Alcohol is by far the deadliest, killing approximately 88,000 Americans a year. All illegal drugs combined kill about 22,000 a year, while pharmaceuticals kill 24,000. If we combine these two numbers, we can see that the amount of deaths caused by all other drugs is only around half of those caused by alcohol.And yet, most people are more informed about the various risks of taking Advil than they are about the dangers of alcohol! Our guest today, Annie Grace, is determined to change this. She’s the author of the book This Naked Mind: Control Alcohol, Find Freedom, Discover Happiness and Change Your Life.The book is all about how to stop alcoholism with one simple tool--education. Annie dives into her own individual journey in the episode: how she developed a drinking problem in her mid twenties, how she tried all the traditional avenues of fixing the issue to no avail until finally, she decided to find her own unique way to tackle her alcoholism.She asked herself and many, many others every question she could think of concerning alcohol use in order to get to the bottom of why we drink so much in America and how to stop. Does alcohol really help you to relieve stress? Is it truly an effective way to combat social anxiety? When Annie really took the time to become educated on the topic she found that, in the long run, alcohol actually ends up hurting those who consume it much more than it helps. Most of the time, drinking worsened the very problems people were using alcohol to solve.Armed with this knowledge, Annie no longer felt the need to drink. Instead of fighting alcoholism the traditional way, a way in which the journey is viewed as a torturous uphill battle, Annie simply looked at the pros and cons and decided that there were no good reasons to keep drinking. In fact, she found that not drinking was a much more positive experience, so she just stopped doing it one day and never looked back.Positivity plays a big role in Annie’s approach to curbing alcoholic behavior. Annie talks about how rarely we acknowledge the power of positivity when it comes to changing our habits. Instead of focusing on everything you’re giving up when you give up drinking, think instead about what you’re gaining: long term health, peace of mind, and freedom from addiction.Annie took these ideas and compiled them into a pdf, which she then put online, expecting only friends and family to read it. Instead, the pdf was downloaded over 20,000 times in two weeks. After months of requests from fans of the pdf, Annie self published a book which contains all her experiences and methods. The book experienced great popularity, and became subject to a bidding war between five major publishers. Along with publishing another book, she also has a podcast, a website (thealcoholexpirement.com), and has been featured in Forbes, the Chicago Tribune, and more. People everywhere have begun adopting Annie’s strategy as an alternative to traditional treatment.That’s because traditional treatment has a lot of issues, many of which we discuss in the episode. There’s a lot of things we believe about alcohol which—-according to Anna--are serious misconceptions. One of the biggest ones Annie and I discuss is the illusion of a binary system of classification when it comes to diagnosing alcoholism. As a society, we tend to separate people into two categories: alcoholic and non-alcoholic. This labeling causes a lot more problems than it solves.One of the main issues with this is that it dissuades people from getting help. People assume that only those with genetic or personality disorders have alcohol issues. This makes them more hesitant to seek treatment, as they don’t want to be one of “those” people, the people with the problems.On the other hand, those who do end up being diagnosed with alcoholism and going into treatment are faced with an extremely intense amount of scrutiny over their habits They are expected to be entirely sober, to the point where one drink becomes a major source of anxiety and fear. This is because they are seen as chemically addicted individuals with genetic disorders. However, Annie informs us that 90% of those who drink excessively are not found to be chemically dependent on alcohol. Most of the problem is their mentality towards drinking which, with Annie’s methods, can be fixed.So many of these misconceptions are fed by the media, something we may not even be noticing. Annie explains that a lot of the time, information about alcoholism in the media is misconstrued or exaggerated because people don’t actually want to believe that alcohol is dangerous. As we interact with the media, we don’t want to read or share things that make us question our preconceived ideas or opinions. We want things that align with what we already believe and confirm what we already think.What this means is that if we’re a regular drinker, as many Americans are, an article that makes us question our reality too much or has something negative to say about drinking is not one we’re going to circulate among our friends and family. Instead, we’re more likely to click on an article that tells us that red wine is good for our heart, or that it helps us live longer. According to Annie, most of these articles use research that is taken out of context and misconstrued. We don’t want to be susceptible to this--and we don’t want our teens to be susceptible either.As parents, how can we talk to our kids about alcohol to make sure they aren’t led in the wrong direction by these misconceptions? Annie dives into this in the episode. In short, she says the key is to use vulnerability. Talk to your kid honestly about your own experiences and mistakes you’ve made in the past. Basically--keep it real! If you fill your child’s head with antagonizing notions about drinking that are filled with hypocrisy, they’re not going to listen to you, nor are they going to keep you informed on their own drinking.Additionally, you want to model the behavior you want to see your children exhibit. Your habits are very influential on the choices your children make. How much and how often you drink sets a precedent for your child’s drinking habits.With all that being said, alcohol is a very nuanced topic. Have no fear, however, Annie is here to give her expert wisdom on the subject and help us all become more informed. In the episode we discuss:The aspects of modern and corporat...

Dr. Jess Shatkin, author of Born to be Wild and expert in the field of child and adolescent psychiatry, clues us into why teens run wild and how we can help keep them safe. A still-developing brain and high levels of hormones mean parents have their work cut out for them!Full show notesWe have the “talk” with our teens and make sure they at least attend health class. We push our teens to get adequate sleep and nutrition. We put our teens through D.A.R.E. and make clear drugs and alcohol are not acceptable. And vandalism and stealing are against the law--we shouldn't even have to mention that to our teens.So Why--why! we wonder, Why do teenagers still do these things!? And for Chrissake why is it always teens doing the misbehaving? You rarely see groups of 25 year old's, 40 year old's or (spry) 80 year old's participating in reckless and risky behaviors.Adults--from parents to deans to coaches--devote so much time and energy into trying to teach adolescents the risks of misbehaving. From broken bones to trauma, we want to help our teens avoid threats to their physical and mental health—so why don’t teens act accordingly? Why are teenagers more likely to take risks than any other age group? Do they really think they’re invincible?Teenage risk taking is more complicated than just a single platitude. It’s not just the fact that teen brain’s executive regions are under construction: an influx of hormones muddles things up along with intense peer pressure, whether real or perceived.To understand the interaction between the biology and neurology of the teen brain, this week I spoke with Dr. Jess Shatkin, author of Born to Be Wild: Why Teens Take Risks, and How We Can Help Keep Them Safe. As a practicing psychiatrist in Manhattan and Vice Chair for Education and Professor of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry and Pediatrics at the NYU School of Medicine, Dr. Shatkin has been entrenched in the workings of the teenage brain for decades.Dr. Shatkin was curious as to why teenagers make risky decisions even in his early days. The youngest of eight, he watched his older siblings morph and change, from tame tweens to wild teens to mature twentysomethings and adults. When Dr. Shatkin himself was a teen, he realized that he was making decisions he logically wouldn’t otherwise, had he been younger. And with older siblings to look up to, he knew he wouldn’t always feel so, well, wild.While teenage risk taking is more common than we’d like, it turns out teens don’t actually think they are invincible, as many adults have come to believe. We’d be wrong to assume teens feel as invincible as we think they act.When researchers actually began to ask teens if they think they’re invincible, a curious pattern emerged. Teenagers actually tend to overestimate the risk they face from certain activities. When prompted, most teenagers will say they believe they are around 90% likely to get pregnant from one instance of unprotected sex (the real number is somewhere around 20%). Some young people do believe that they are invincible, but from Jess’s studies, this is not due to age, but instead the personality of the individual. It’s the adults, in fact, who are more likely to feel a false sense of invincibility.So then why are teenagers more likely to take risks if they are so certain that negative consequences will arise? As Jess explained to me, this can be largely attributed to evolution. Adolescence is when our body starts to develop the need to seem attractive to potential mates as well as adjust to any new changes in the environment. We suddenly experience an influx of hormones which encourage us to impress our peers by exhibiting our affinity for danger.Whether we’re conscious of it or not, we want our peers to see us as cool, interesting, and sexy--good qualities in a viable mate. In one study Dr. Shatkin and I talked about, researchers used financial choices to assess young people’s changes in decision making. Every students who participated was given two options: get $200 immediately, or wait six months and receive $1,000. $1,000 is 4 times more than the $200--the choice should be easy! And for students that made the decision alone, it was. They all selected the delayed reward of the $1000. However, when the researchers had a student make the exact same decision but in front of one or more peers, the majority of students switched to taking the immediate $200. Even when the researchers just made participants think there was a peer watching from behind a one-way mirror, the students took the immediate reward. It was as if the logical processing power of the brain was turned off in the face of a peer nearby.As parents, this might be alarming. The study has implications far beyond just missing out on $800. What if your teen follows their friends to a college that is exorbitantly expensive just because it is ‘cooler’? Or what if they put their life on the line when driving a peer home? You want your children to become responsible, respectable independent thinkers, not impulsive risk takers who are frighteningly susceptible to peer pressure! You’ve already warned them about the dangers of teenage risk taking and yet, they seem to insist on getting into trouble.When it comes to helping our kids develop ways to muster through tempting risks, Dr. Shatkin reminds us that the language we use is of the utmost importance. Just telling kids that activities are risky does not make them less likely to participate in them. Take for example the high rates of teen pregnancy among teens who have been given the simple message of “don’t,” with no education around it.Simply inundating teens with the same warning messages over and over, doesn’t lead to changed behavior. Instead of repeating how risky having unprotected sex is, you could have a conversation with your teen about what your teen could say or do when they find themselves in a heated and compromising situation. See our interview with Dr. Lisa Damour on helping teens develop more ways to say ‘no.’And what is it that drives teens to seek out these risky situations? The answer is a hormone we more regularly associate with matters of lust: dopamine. But dopamine is not just for lovers. It is a vital hormone that drives us to take action, getting us excited about possibilities. Dopamine is intricately linked to reward circuitry and is at elevated levels during the teen years. Readers may already be familiar with the studies that show teens' brains look similar to the brains of gambling addicts under fMRI scans.Dopamine spikes when we sense a reward is near--like thinking about an upcoming vacation or how impressed your peers will be if you snuck into your neighbor’s pool and did a cannonball. If you haven’t planned that vacation yet, dopamine will keep you busily scheduling and booking things, and you might even get a little spike in dopamine when you tell other people about it. The difference for a teen might be they are wildly excited about the vacation, particularly if it can make them seem ‘cool’ to their peers. They might develop a bug for traveling if they firstly enjoy their time traveling and if they receive the ‘reward’ of peer approval when they come back and regale their peers with tales of their adventures. Dopamine drives everyone to try new things, and if the “reward” is big enough, we keep doing it until it becomes a habit or the reward grows worn and no longer dynamic.Teen...

Lauren Muhlheim, author of When Your Teen Has an Eating Disorder and clinical psychologist, speaks with Andy on spotting and treating eating disorders in teens. Eating disorders are scary, but Lauren tells us that together, families can reduce the dangers and stress eating disorders cause.Full show notesFor the average person, there is absolutely nothing frightening about pizza. It’s delicious, cheap to order, and easy to eat! So why might pizza be such a struggle for a teenager with an eating disorder?Pizza is high in calories and fat, and can be very triggering for someone who constantly obsesses over what they eat. Pizza is also the go-to food for birthday parties, school events, or college activities. It’s one of the most frequently eaten foods in American culture. For a teenager with an eating disorder, adjusting to regular life means eating pizza--and for them, this is isn’t easy.That’s why we need to take teen eating disorder treatment seriously, and help those suffering from anorexia, bulimia, or binge eating as soon as possible. By waiting too long to address these problems, or letting teenagers struggle with them alone, their physical and mental health can only get worse. It can become so serious that even something as simple as pizza at a school event can become a battleground.My guest today is Lauren Muhlheim, clinical psychologist and expert on teen eating disorder treatment. She recently authored When Your Teen Has an Eating Disorder: Practical Strategies to Help Your Teen Recover from Anorexia, Bulimia, and Binge Eating. The book dives into a lot of information about eating disorder recovery, focusing mainly on the idea of family-based treatment.You may be familiar with the term family therapy, in which a family undergoes treatment together to work out issues they may be having with one another. Although they may sound similar, family therapy and family-based treatment are actually very different. When it comes to teen eating disorder treatment, family therapy focuses on the cause of the disorder, viewing family issues as the underlying problem. This kind of treatment usually only looks at the family as the cause, and places the solution in the hands of residential or other professional treatment. Family based treatment focuses on how families can set up structures and systems to help their teen heal physically and mentally. In this type of therapy, families essentially become the residential treatment; they are the ones who monitor eating, take measures to inhibit purging, or whatever the teenager may need.This kind of therapy is derived from research done in the U.K. in the 90s, before being brought over to the U.S., to be studied by researchers at Stanford University. Previously, family therapy was the most widely spread treatment for eating disorders, going back as far as the 1600s. For centuries, teenagers have been leaving their homes to get residential treatment for eating disorders, and then returning home only to relapse. Many times, this can be attributed to losing the structure of in-patient therapy and suddenly being left to their own devices. Family based treatment was invented to stop this issue, and is now the most researched form of teen eating disorder treatment.For parents, the idea of family-based therapy should be encouraging, not disheartening. This means that you are part of the solution, that there are steps you can take to help your child! You have the ability to guide your teenager through this difficult period.So where can we as parents start when it comes to stopping eating disorders in our homes?The first step is to watch your teenager closely and take any sign of an eating disorder seriously. One of the most important things to prevent a disorder from worsening, according to Lauren, is to not wait too long. She mentions that some pediatricians or doctors may tell parents to wait for more symptoms to arise before truly taking the disorder seriously, but if a parent waits too long, the disorder can become so bad that it takes a teenager years to recover. This problem is particularly bad when it comes to teens and anorexia. She mentions that there are no negative repercussions for having a talk with your child about eating habits and the possibility of an eating disorders, and that it’s much better to do so then to sit back and allow the problem to unfold.Lauren says be careful not to be so affected by diet culture that you are more nervous about your teenager gaining weight than losing it. You might regard low weight as positive thing or a sign of health, but it’s important to pay close attention to teenager’s habits to make sure they aren’t treating their bodies poorly. Lauren also emphasizes watching teen’s trajectory along their growth and height charts. If you’re paying attention and checking regularly, you are more likely to notice when your teenager seems to take an unhealthy dip in their growth. Lauren stresses that a teen who is staying the same size can sometimes be just as bad as an adult who is drastically losing weight. Teenagers are supposed to be gaining weight to keep up with their growth and not doing so could be dangerous. Noticing anything that concerns you may be a good sign that you should seek teen eating disorder treatment.If you decide to try family-based therapy, the best way to start is to help your teen get back to their healthy weight. Lauren equates food to medicine for teen eating disorder treatment; The anxiety and depression teenagers feel when they get stuck in an eating disorder is largely caused by malnutrition. Lauren and I discuss a groundbreaking study in which men in their 20s with great physical and mental health had their caloric intake cut by 50% for six months. As a result of their poor nutrition, they became extremely anxious, depressed and obsessed with food.This state is called negative energy balance: someone is eating too little or exercising too much instead of maintaining healthy habits and feels physical and mental effects. For those who are predisposed to developing eating disorders and find themselves with negative energy balance, these physical and mental issues and lack of nutrition become a brutal cycle from which they cannot escape. This is why Lauren says getting teenagers fed is the priority when it comes to teen eating disorder treatment.You may be wondering, how can I get a teenager to eat regular, balanced meals if they were previously diagnosed with a disorder that is defined by their adversity to eating? Taking a strong stance and imposing structure may cause a lot of tension between you and your teen, but it’s much better than allowing the disorder to continue to manifest. The key is to have lots of structure and supervision. Starting with three meals and three snacks a day is a good start. Some teenagers may need to replenish weight they’ve lost or failed to gain because of their disorder. In some cases, they may have become hypermetabolic. In these situations, teenagers may need to eat as much as 3,000 or 6,000 calories a day. It may seem like a lot, but taking these steps is going to help your teen be happy and healthy so they can reach their full potential!Supervising your teen to make sure they eat is one of the best ways to help them fix their negative energy balance and recover. This can mean making sure they eat at home, but in serious cases, this can also include supervising meals they normally eat at school by picking students up before lunch period and having them eat in your car or watching them eat with friends over facetime. Supervision can also e...