THE SIGNS ARE THERE

Maybe you’ve noticed your once engaged and involved teen exhibiting a loss of interest in academics, sports, friends and family. Do you feel disconnected from your teen? Is your teen struggling to make friends? Maybe they aren’t handling pressure well. Maybe your teen is being unduly influenced by what you consider the “wrong” crowd, peers whose behaviors and points of view are having a negative impact on your adolescent. Is your teen developing their sense of identity from social media and what they view on the internet? Maybe your teen is being ruthlessly picked at and bullied. Has your child always done well by most standards and for a reason you cannot quite put your finger on, they are now seemingly “checking out”? Is your relationship with your teen not what you would like for it to be?

OUR DISSERVICE TO OUR YOUTH

Our young adults and youth today have been done a huge disservice. When the pendulum swung so far to one side that before we could blink, every kid was getting a trophy or a first place ribbon and Tug-Of-War turned into Tug-Of-Fun we took away a child’s ability to learn to be resilient, to be a good sport, cheering on others even after losing or failing at something. Today’s youth are entitled, easily offended, unable to navigate their hurt feelings, incapable of coping with problems and challenges that arise in life, facing the real world without the creative skills and resilience that was once part of each growing child’s persona.

Many kids today are suffering in silence. Our teens today are bombarded with the pressures of navigating social media and the internet on top of what we might consider “normal” pressures. At times, all this pressure can feel suffocating and hopeless.